‘They’re much more than alike, they’re twins,’ Aoife told her, speaking softly but very clearly in a Galway accent. ‘They both have headstamps that show they were manufactured by Prvi Partizan in Serbia. Not only that, they have identical indentations caused by the firing-pin of the pistol they were shot from. They also have identical face-marks caused by the ejector after they were fired. And to top it all, they have matching fingerprints on them. I’ve sent off copies of course to see if AFIS has a record of them.’

‘Take a sconce at the labels on them,’ Bill put in. ‘You’ll see that one was found in the burned-out Honda Accord that was found at Bottlehill after Billy Hagerty was shot. And you’ll never guess where the other one was picked up.’

‘Go on. Surprise me.’

‘We raked it up out of the grass verge next to the body of Timbo Coffey. Billy Hagerty and Timbo Coffey were shot by one and the same gun.’

‘Why in the name of Jesus would anybody have wanted to shoot both a tragic gombeen like Billy Hagerty and an old alky Pavee like Timbo Coffey? Always assuming that the same perpetrator shot them both, and that one shooter didn’t lend another shooter a borrow of his gun.’

‘That’s the sixty-five-thousand-euro question,’ said Bill. ‘Even if the shooter who killed Billy Hagerty had been intending to kill Thomas O’Flynn, but missed, why would he have shot Timbo Coffey?’

Katie sat back and shook her head. ‘I give up, Bill. I think the whole world’s gone off its head.’

Bill and Aoife left, and Detective Scanlan came forward.

‘Padragain,’ said Katie. ‘Tell me you have some good news.’

‘I just heard about DS Ní Nuallán. That took some nerve, jumping into the river like that, especially this time of year. Is she really okay?’

‘She’s grand altogether, thanks. But she had me worried for a minute or two, I have to admit.’

Detective Scanlan looked as if she were about to say something sympathetic, like, ‘I know what you two feel for each other’. But all she did was give Katie an understanding smile, and say, ‘I went round to that house in Tivoli Park earlier this afternoon.’

‘Oh yes? And did you find anybody in?’

‘There was still nobody home but one of the neighbours told me that the family would be back from their holliers later, so I went round again at four. The Dalys, that’s who they are. Stephen Daly from Mulligan and Daly, the solicitors from South Mall.’

‘I know him of course. He’s on the board of the ISPCC. He and my husband, Paul, used to play golf together.’