‘Look at the men there,’ said Kyna. ‘They could almost be cousins. Same gingery hair, similar pointy noses, similar round faces, similar build – all of them a couple of kilos overweight, like. If he’d had half the chance I reckon our Pusher would have shoved that Ed Sheeran into the river.’

‘The two women don’t resemble each other, though, do they?’

‘No, they don’t. But the men are so alike that I’d guess that it isn’t the human race in general that the Pusher wants to punish, it’s one particular person who’s done him wrong.’

‘You could be right. Of course we can’t tell if he’s managed to get his revenge on that one particular person already, and now he’s simply getting his revenge on every man who happens to look like him. And even if this particular person is still alive, how in the world are we going to find him? Over ten per cent of the male population of County Cork have red hair, and God only knows how many are overweight.’

‘I know that, ma’am. But if we can find a fellow who regularly wears a light grey tracksuit for one reason or another, these pictures could help us when we question him – especially if he has that much bottled-up rage against men who look like this. You remember that time we interviewed that Sean Madden after he’d strangled his wife, and he denied it and denied it until we showed him that picture of her and then he totally lost his cool and admitted it.’

‘Thanks, Kyna. This could be useful. I’m only hoping that Caffrey and O’Crean manage to find somebody who dresses like that.’

Katie shrugged on her jacket and together she and Kyna went downstairs for an update meeting with Superintendent Pearse. When they came out of the lift, Katie saw Bill Phinner talking to Detective Inspector Mulliken on the far side of the reception area. He waved to catch her attention, and then he came over and handed her a manila envelope, with a smaller plastic evidence bag inside it.

‘I was coming up in a minute to see you, ma’am, to give you these. Dr Kelley gave them to me this morning. It’s the rings that were taken from Justice Quinn, his wedding ring and the claddagh band, so that you can return them to his widow.’

‘Thanks a million, Bill. How about his post-mortem? Have you made any more progress on that at all?’

Bill Phinner shook his head. ‘We found some infinitesimal traces of naproxen. It’s an anti-inflammatory drug for treating rheumatoid arthritis or gout. Justice Quinn was probably taking it regularly, but it wouldn’t have knocked him out or affected his awareness in any way. That’s all, though. He was so badly burned we might as well have carried out a post-mortem on a lump of coal.’