Before Kieran and Justice O’Rafferty appeared, she heard a murmur at the back of the court, and when she turned around again she saw Barry Riordan walking in, accompanied by two hard-looking men in those tight buttoned-up coats known in Cork as farting jackets.

Barry Riordan saw her looking round at him, and made a pistol gesture with his finger and thumb, and grinned. Threatening a garda was an arrestable offence, but she doubted if anybody else had seen it, and this was hardly the moment for her to go to the back of the court and lift him.

At last it was ‘All rise!’ and the two judges came in to sit down behind the bench. The bailiff signalled to the two uniformed gardaí standing beside the witness box, and they left the courtroom, returning two or three minutes later with Donal Hagerty.

Donal Hagerty was taller than his brother Billy had been, and not so stocky, and unlike Billy he had thick black hair, brushed to the left at a forty-five-degree angle, as if he were standing in a stiff sideways wind. He sat in the witness box staring at nothing at all, and it was noticeable to Katie that he didn’t turn around and make eye contact with any of the gang members sitting at the back of the court. He had probably been warned by the O’Flynns what would happen if he gave the slightest suggestion that he knew them.

Donal Hagerty was ordered to stand, and then, in the clearest and most theatrical of voices, Kieran calmly reminded him that he had been found guilty on three charges of murder. Together with Justice O’Rafferty, he had taken into consideration a probation report on Donal’s deprived background, a psychiatric report, and pleas of mitigation from his defence barrister because of his alcohol and drug use.

‘Notwithstanding these, I hereby sentence you to life imprisonment on all three convictions, to be served concurrently, with the statutory minimum of twelve years before you may be considered for parole. The court is adjourned.’

‘All rise!’ shouted the bailiff, and with that, Kieran and Justice O’Rafferty stood up and walked towards the door behind the bench.

Before they had reached it, though, Katie heard a scuffling sound from the back of the courtroom. When she looked round, she saw that Barry Riordan was standing on one of the benches and shaking his fist.

‘Wrong man!’ he screamed out. ‘Right sentence but wrong fecking man! It’s Tommy O’Flynn should be going to prison for this! He paid to have my brother and his family shot – Tommy O’Flynn! This gom you have in the dock here, he’s nothing but a puppet! Go and haul in Tommy O’Flynn!’