The second file was a drunk-driving case, and this one offered fewer options. Everything about the charge seemed to be in order. The best she could hope for was that the officer wouldn’t show up in court and she could get it adjourned, or maybe, if the judge was grumpy enough, thrown out.

Aifric turned to the last file, the thinnest of them all. She opened it and started to read the single sheet of paper that lay inside. It took her a moment to recognize what she was reading: a summary, recounting in the driest of police terminology, the brutal murder of a young woman by her boyfriend.

According to the report, twenty-two-year-old Laura O’Donnell had gone out for drinks with her boyfriend, Robert Collins, to the Lonely Horse pub on the eighth of October. They’d had an argument which had escalated, and Robert had gotten rough—pushing his girlfriend to the floor then walking out. Laura had stayed on for more drinks, finally leaving two hours later to walk the short distance home to her flat on the Portabello Road. She never made it. Three days later, her body was pulled from the nearby canal. She’d been beaten over the head with a rock and thrown into the nearby water. She would have been found earlier, but her body had become wedged under the lock gate at La Touche Bridge. According to the summary, it wasn’t her boyfriend who had reported her missing but her employer, a Mrs. Sheila Carmody, who owned a salon on Talbot Street. Robert Collins had been arrested and charged with the murder of Laura O’Donnell within forty-eight hours of her body being found.

There was nothing else in the file. Nothing other than the date of Robert’s arrest, which had been three weeks prior. Aifric lifted the page, unable to stop herself from looking under it for papers she already knew weren’t there. This was a murder charge. The file should have been packed with statement transcripts, crime-scene reports, and pages and pages of disclosure. She turned to her computer, looked up the court lists for the day, and found the case: DPP v. Collins was before Judge Hartigan at eleven a.m.

Aifric stood up and hurried back to Delores’s desk, file in hand. Delores was typing dictation. She had her earphones in and didn’t look up until she had finished the section she was working on. Then, with an exaggerated show of patience, she took one earphone from her ear and raised her eyes in Aifric’s direction.

“This case file. There’s nothing on it, but it’s due to be sent forward for trial. I can see from the court list that there’s an application before Judge Hartigan in two hours . . . but I’ve got nothing to go on. No instructions to lawyers, no attendances, no disclosure, no nothing.”

Delores glanced briefly at the file. For a fraction of a second, Aifric saw a hint of concern in her eyes, and then the shutters came down again.