‘Of course I defended you. But the public perception is that you’ve lost your grip. You’re going to have to up your game, Kathleen, and fast. Right now we have too many high-profile cases that you haven’t been able to solve, and the media are going to go on giving you a hard time until you track down the offenders and fetch them up in front of the courts.’

‘And what if it takes longer to track them down than the media would like? Why doesn’t Owen Dineen try his luck at finding out who set fire to Justice Quinn or who stabbed that student in the Zombie Lounge? Why doesn’t he try to trap the Lee Pusher?’

‘I hear you, but I have to put you on notice. We can’t tolerate very much more of this bad media coverage. It’s not only the Sun now. I’ve had the Times and the Examiner on to me, too. I know your arrest figures are marginally improved on last year, but what we’re talking about here is a crisis of confidence.’

Katie said nothing. Inside, her stomach had knotted up and she felt that she could burst out with rage, in the same way that Conor had exploded when he had blown up the Foggy Fields puppy farm. But she also remembered what Conor had said to her when they had first lived together, and she had raged on to him about some misogynistic comment at work. Fanacht socair. Stay calm. Hold your peace. Don’t throw all your cards on to the table. The time will come when you’ll be vindicated.

‘Fair play to you, sir,’ she told Frank, at last. ‘Let’s see what the papers have to say tomorrow, shall we?’

*

Before she left the city centre, Katie drove up to Oliver Plunkett Street, where Detective Inspector Fitzpatrick had requisitioned two upstairs offices at the Zombie Lounge as interview rooms. He had chosen to bring potential witnesses to the club rather than the Garda station because he believed that it would make it easier for them to picture in their mind’s eye anything they might have seen when Tadhg Kimmons was stabbed. It would be less intimidating, too.

Six young clubbers were waiting in the booth where Thomas O’Flynn and his cronies had been sitting, four boys and two girls. They looked bored and restless, even though they had each been given a free bottle of Pepsi-Cola and a package of Taytos.

‘I’m Detective Superintendent Maguire,’ Katie told them. ‘I just want to tell you how much we appreciate your co-operation with this investigation.’

‘I don’t know what I’m doing here to be straight with you,’ said one of the lads. ‘I didn’t see feck-all, and neither did none of the rest of us here. I didn’t even notice the feen when he was panned out on the floor.’