Matron held out her hand, her mouth open. Keeva joined them and pushed Philomena to one side. ‘Don’t be putting the lady off visiting us now, Philomena. Hello, I’m Keeva. Take no notice of Philomena, she was a friend of Angela’s and she never recovered from the murder.’ Her voiced dropped to a whisper as she looked about her to see had she been heard. ‘Ghastly, it was. Not one of us slept for weeks in case he came for us in our beds. Anyway, hello, and a hundred thousand welcomes to you.’ She grinned from ear to ear. ‘We have become a tourist hotspot, or so Peggy says. Ah, here she is now. Peggy, we have more visitors.’

Peggy, at the sight of Pete Shevlin arriving in the back of Joe’s car, had abandoned the shop and joined the rest of them. She’d already been told about the letter by Teresa, before she’d gone on up to the school.

‘’Tis a terrible thing, Keeva,’ said Peggy, and to Matron, ‘Hello, missus, how are you.’ Matron’s mouth opened and closed, but before she could reply, Peggy continued. ‘Are ye staying up at the farm or passing through?’

Having recovered from being addressed as ‘missus’, Matron seized her moment. ‘What exactly has happened?’ she asked.

Peggy spoke to Matron as though she’d known her all of her life. ‘Mary Kate has been stolen by her own grandfather, and he wants money before he will give her back, and it’s a bit of a worry because the man’s an evil murderer who sups with the Devil and fights with the IRA. He will be no stranger to murder so he won’t.’

Matron’s face turned pale as her blood pressure fell into her boots. ‘Mr Keene, this is not the sort of place I imagined you were bringing me to. A grandfather has stolen his granddaughter for money? I think this may have been a terrible mistake.’

‘Hang on a moment,’ said Dr Gaskell, prising himself with some difficulty out of the back of the car. ‘Do you mean Mary Kate Malone who has just returned from Liverpool?’

At the sight of Dr Gaskell, Cat and Mrs O’Keefe pushed open their car doors, and in doing so immediately answered his question. ‘What on earth is going on?’ said Mrs O’Keefe. ‘That’s Dr Gaskell and the matron from St Angelus.’

Dr Gaskell raised his hat to her but had no time to answer, as Joe took charge. ‘Right, everyone, stop talking, please, now. QUIET! We all know what has happened, and we know why. This man that some of you know, Kevin McGuffey, has taken Mary Kate Malone and he wants money before he will give her back. I will get the money, and if by midnight tonight we haven’t found her, I will do as he asks, but as God is my judge, I will be waiting for him. Right now, we need to organise ourselves into search parties – not to find Mary Kate, no one must approach this dangerous man, but to look for clues as to where he may have taken her. Mrs Doyle, I am taking over your post office as a headquarters until this is over. This is where we will operate from. If any of you see something untoward, you must return straight back here to let us know immediately. Seamus, I want you to remain in the post office and write down any and every bit of information brought to you.’