‘A bit dramatic? That was unbelievable. I’ve heard of woman-to-man gender reassignment, but it’s pure incredible to see what those surgeons can do. Anyhow, I’ve already put DI Fitzpatrick on to it. He’ll be contacting the HSE to see if they have any record of who Billy was before he was Billy.’

Bill Phinner prodded at his computer keyboard, and then angled the monitor so that Katie could see the screen.

‘We retrieved very small samples of blood, bile and semen, as well as cerebrospinal fluid. No pleural fluid because his lungs were fried. Unfortunately, all the samples were severely compromised by the intense heat that Justice Quinn’s body was subjected to. His blood had literally boiled. We could find nothing to indicate that he was poisoned or drugged – not for sure.’

‘But it’s still conceivable that he might have been?’

‘Yes, it’s possible all right. But as you know, most of those knock-you-out drugs like Rohypnol or GHB don’t linger in your body for very long. You can sometimes find traces of GHB after twelve hours but that’s only if it’s been a fierce hefty dose. Then again, if he was drugged, I suppose we have to be after asking ourselves how he managed to drive himself up to White’s Cross. Not so easy to do if he was unconscious.’

‘Dr Kelley said that apart from being burned, there were no physical injuries that might have been fatal. No cuts, for instance. No stab wounds.’

‘No. But again, he was so badly burned that it isn’t possible to say that one hundred per cent. Look at that Princess Diana. She wasn’t burned but she died of a leaky vein that nobody found.’

Katie said, ‘Okay, then. Thanks, Bill.’ She turned to leave but by the odd way he was looking at her she sensed that he had something more to say to her.

‘What?’ she asked him.

He opened his desk drawer and took out the phone that had been dropped by the intruder who she had chased away from her house. It was sealed inside a clear plastic evidence bag.

‘I’m not sure how to say this, ma’am, so I’ll come out with it direct. Conall, our IT expert, was able to unlock this phone with very little trouble at all. It still had the factory password, and he couldn’t find hardly nothing on it in the way of texts or emails or stuff like that. I’d say that it was bought specially for that fellow to follow you back to your house. There’s a number of photos on it, like.’

‘Photos of what, exactly?’