‘What happened to Cooney’s girlfriend?’ Karen asked, leaning forward and, in so doing, releasing Tony’s hand. He felt a pang of regret, could still feel the pressure of her skin on his. He’d not held Ann’s hand in such a manner for years before her death and felt a strange disloyalty and simultaneous thrill at having done so now with Karen.

‘Fuck knows,’ Duggan said. ‘The last I saw of her, she was lying on the pavement outside the Rialto.’ He coughed noisily, then spat up something into a tissue he pulled from his pocket. He balled it up and pocketed it again. ‘There’s services in two miles,’ he said, nodding out at the sign ahead for Monkton.

‘We’ll stop for a few minutes,’ Barr said.

‘Get us a Coke and a Double Decker, would you, son?’ Duggan said, twisting in his seat to face his fellow travellers. ‘What about youse?’

Tony reached into his pocket, pulling out a ten-pound note. ‘A bottle of water for me. Do you want one?’ he asked Karen, who nodded, ran her little finger along the lower eyelid, fixing a faint run of her mascara.

‘Put your money away,’ Duggan said. ‘The party’ll cover it, won’t they, Richard?’

Barr avoided the question and took the note from Tony with muttered thanks.

‘It’s the new dispensation for the old guard. Haven’t you heard?’

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Seven

‘You hadn’t heard,’ Liverpool Betty said. ‘God, I’m so sorry. I thought you’d have known.’

They’d arrived in the bar after 8pm, having arranged to meet Duggan there. They’d taken turns doing surveillance on the cop’s house, for a week, sometimes together, sometimes alone. They’d alternated cars, too, so that none of them would be seen in the same car twice, nor was the same car used on two consecutive stake-outs.

Duggan wasn’t there when they arrived so Karen had taken a seat in one of the booths to keep it for them as a private place to talk, while Tony had gone up to get drinks.

‘You’re the teacher,’ Betty had said as she pulled a pint of stout and set it aside to settle.

‘That’s right.’

‘That was sad news, wasn’t it?’ she said, taking his proffered note and turning to the till. ‘About Shauna.’

It took Tony a moment to work out whom she meant. ‘Shauna? Shauna Laird?’

Betty nodded.

He shook his head lightly. ‘What news? Did something happen to her?’

‘You hadn’t heard,’ Betty said. ‘God, I’m so sorry. I thought you’d have known.’

‘Known what?’

‘She died last night.’

‘Shauna Laird?’ Tony repeated incredulously. ‘The wee girl doing drama.’

Betty nodded.

‘She died?’

Betty handed him his change. ‘I’m sorry.’

Jesus!’ Tony slumped on to the stool next to which he had been standing. ‘What happened to her?’