‘I didn’t really understand why you wanted me to hack Owen Dineen… but now that I’ve heard what he’s been doing – like, deliberately writing bad things about you – and the chief superintendent actually paying him to do it – I can hardly believe it.’

Katie smiled and patted his arm. ‘Conall – I owe you more than I can tell you. In fact, you’ve made my day. So far, at least.’

‘Thank you, ma’am. And – well – I don’t quite know how to say this – but the other thing – the pictures. My sister’s LGBT – so, you know, that won’t go any further, either.’

He blushed, and then stood up, and left Katie’s office with his odd loping walk, almost colliding with the door frame.

39

The rain continued, heavy and relentless, and when Katie hurried across the station car park to climb into the car with Inspector O’Rourke and Kyna and Detectives O’Donovan and Buckley, she heard a rumble of thunder directly overhead. It sounded like a hundred empty beer barrels rolling down the steps into a cellar.

‘Grand weather for fishing,’ said Inspector O’Rourke. ‘The salmon can’t tell the difference between the river and the sky.’

‘Let’s hope it’s grand weather for hauling in Riordans,’ said Detective O’Donovan.

They were squashed tightly together in the Toyota, because they were all wearing ballistic vests underneath their raincoats. They drove along Merchants Quay to St Patrick’s Bridge, with the floodwater swilling across the road with herringbone ripples. Then they crossed over the river and headed north-westwards, up the steep incline of Roman Street, with its small multicoloured houses stacked up on either side. It took them no more than ten minutes to reach the grey Gothic tower of St Mary’s Cathedral and Gerald Griffin Street – only a hundred metres north of The Weavers.

They parked in Cathedral Walk, next to a deserted school playground. Katie thanked God that the O’Flynns had decided to hold their party on a Saturday, when there would be no children around. Inspector O’Rourke was in radio contact with all of the other Garda vehicles, and he was following their arrival in the area, in ones and twos, on a map on his laptop.

Their fake gas fitters had erected a red PVC work tent on the corner of Cathedral Walk – not only because it was raining but to conceal the fact that they had only lifted up a few flagstones and weren’t actually carrying out any repairs. They had also fenced off the pavement from Cathedral Walk up towards Cathedral Road with Bord Gáis barriers, although they had left a two-metre gap to give access to the front door of The Weavers.