He switched on the hydro jet pump and instantly the water over the manhole looked as if it were boiling. A few tangled tree roots came dancing to the surface, followed by lumps of sodden paper. The roaring of the pump was deafening and Declan had to mime to Peter that the blockage hadn’t budged. He jabbed the pipe down again and again and he still couldn’t shift it.

He was just about to give up when the water suddenly swirled and gurgled like a whirlpool. Out of the flooded manhole a human figure shot up, almost waist-high. It was a man in a wet white shirt and sagging red braces. His bloated face was pale green, mottled with black, and his eyes were as blind as two poached eggs. His lips were swollen into a monstrous pout, as if he were furious at having been dislodged.

He bobbed up and down in the froth from the jet pump, but Declan immediately switched off the motor, and he sank down to float just below the surface. Both Declan and Peter stumbled away from the manhole, almost falling over each other, their waders splashing in the floodwater.

‘Christ almighty, Peter, that put my heart crossways!’ Declan panted, bending over and grasping his knees, as if he had just run a marathon.

‘You and me both, boy. Jesus. How do you think your man got himself stuck down there?’

‘What difference does it make? The poor soul’s dead and perished, however he did it.’

‘But the cover was closed, like, and you wouldn’t think that anybody would go down there and shut the lid down after themselves. I mean, that would be suicide. Or sewercide. Christ, this is no time for me to be making jokes.’

‘I don’t know, Peter. I have no idea at all. But we have to ring the guards.’

‘God, Declan. I think that turkey sandwich is getting itself ready for a second coming.’

*

Detective Inspector Mulliken stood in the rain with his collar turned up and the peak of his tweed cap pulled down, watching as the man’s body was lifted out of the manhole. As soon as the tide had turned, the manhole had started to empty, and the body had sunk back down into the sewer. Peter Bale had called in a flusher from Irish Water and the flusher had climbed down to attach a harness under the man’s arms so that he could be hauled out.

An ambulance was parked by the side of the road, as well as two squad cars, two unmarked Garda cars, and two cars and a van from the Technical Bureau. Even as the body appeared, a van from RTÉ news came down the road, followed by a battered blue Mondeo that Detective Inspector Mulliken recognized as belonging to Dan Keane from the Irish Examiner.