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Katie’s father nodded in appreciation. ‘You’re a very tolerant woman, Kathleen. Very understanding. I never met a detective superintendent like you, not in all my years of service. Thank you.’

After lunch, John went into the kitchen to help Ailish wash the dishes and clear up, while Katie and her father sat together in the living room, finishing the Merlot they had drunk with their meal.

Katie told her father about Dermot O’Driscoll retiring, and about Bryan Molloy cancelling Operation Rocker. She also told him about the Angel of Revenge and her strong feeling that Mister Dessie was likely to be her next victim.

‘You don’t have any real proof of that, though?’ he asked her.

‘No, I don’t. I may be barking up the wrong tree completely and she could have a different agenda altogether. It might be about drugs, or money. But she’s Nigerian, and she’s already murdered three of the scumbags who work in the sex trade for Michael Gerrety. It seems logical to me that she’ll go for another one, and Mister Dessie is the biggest scumbag of the lot of them. Of course, I don’t know for sure what her motive is, but since she calls herself the Angel of Revenge she’s clearly paying them back for something they’ve done.’

Katie’s father said, ‘What you’ve told me about those two gardaí … what did you say their names were?’

‘Ronan Kelly and Billy Daly. I think they’re weak and greedy rather than corrupt. They’re not exactly the sharpest tools in the box.’

‘Well … I came across a few of those in my time. It’s understandable. They’re young men, not too well paid, and they’re mixing all day every day with criminals who have flashy cars and willing women and money to burn. But … can you really trust them to help you?’

‘Kelly texted me about eleven last night to tell me that Mister Dessie was at Havana Brown’s and then he texted me again at half past one to say that he had gone home to Togher with some girl. Admittedly, I haven’t heard anything today, but that could be because Mister Dessie’s still at home.’

Katie’s father swirled his wine around his glass. ‘If I were you, Katie, I’d be very wary of those two guards. I know you’ve told them that you’ll speak up on their behalf if they cooperate with you to catch this Angel woman. But they’re going to lose their jobs whatever they do, and they’re going to be pretty sick about that, aren’t they?’

‘Don’t worry yourself, Dad,’ said Katie. ‘I always keep my eyes wide open. What really concerns me at the moment is if I’m right not to alert Mister Dessie that he’s likely to be next on the Angel’s hit list.’

‘Don’t you think he might have worked that out for himself? He looks thick but there’s no flies on Mister Dessie. I knew him when he was knee-high to a high knee and he was very, very cute, believe me.’

‘Yes,’ said Katie. ‘But supposing Kelly and Daly don’t keep me up to date with his movements, and the Angel manages to kill him, and I’ve done nothing at all to warn him?’

‘If Mister Dessie does get himself murdered, why should you feel guilty? He chose the kind of life he’s leading of his own free will and he’s fully aware how dangerous it can be. I don’t think there’s anything morally wrong in using him as bait, especially when you’re trying to apprehend a multiple murderer. Besides, the world wouldn’t exactly be a worse place without Mister Dessie, would it?’

‘I have to agree with you on that,’ said Katie. ‘But we’re supposed to treat all people with equal respect, aren’t we, no matter if they’re saints or scobes?’

‘That’s what it says in the oath we took. But how can we be expected to respect people who don’t respect themselves or anybody else? We can’t, it’s humanly impossible, and if we did it would make policing impossible, too. No, Katie, I think you should trust your intuition on this one.’

‘So what do you recommend I do about Michael Gerrety?’

‘Nothing, for the time being. If Bryan Molloy won’t authorize Operation Rocker, the DPP will just have to go ahead with whatever evidence you already have.’

‘I honestly don’t think we have enough to guarantee that we’ll get a conviction – especially if Gerrety gets to the witnesses, which he will. We’ll just end up looking priggish and out of date and, worst of all, incompetent.’

‘In that case, sweetheart, I would simply let it drop for now and bide my time. If Michael Gerrety comes to believe that he’s above the law, he’s going to overstep the mark one day, and then you’ll have him.’

‘I’m not so sure about that,’ said Katie. ‘He’s a very careful man, Michael Gerrety. He has a keen understanding of public opinion, too. He knows which way the wind’s blowing, especially when it comes to the sex trade.’

Katie’s father took hold of her hand. ‘I may not have reached your exalted rank in the Garda, Katie, but in all my years of service I learned one thing. Justice does have a tendency to get served, one way or another – sometimes in ways that you’re not expecting at all.’

John came into the living room. ‘You two ready for another glass of wine?’

‘No more for me,’ said Katie. ‘I’m driving.’

‘Oh yes,
and
you have my business proposal to read tonight, don’t you? Come on, I’m starting work tomorrow. I really want to know what you think.’

‘I promise you I’ll read it this evening. Cross my heart and hope to die.’

‘Crossing you heart will be enough, darling,’ said John. ‘Don’t you dare to die.’ He turned to Katie’s father and said, ‘The working title of my proposal is
Attracting Professional Endorsements for Online Medication
. I have to admit that I wouldn’t want to read it, either, if I were her.’

The following morning Katie and Detective Sergeant ó Nuallán drove the thirty-five kilometres up to Mallow. It was lashing with rain all the way up the N20, although it began to clear when they turned into Cleary’s garden centre.

They parked and walked up the steps that led to the office. The garden centre had a row of eight large greenhouses, as well as a long brick building that housed a cafe and shop. Outside the shop rows of new wheelbarrows sparkled with raindrops and there was a cluster of green-painted leprechauns. Although it was wet it was warm and there was a strong fragrance of stocks in the air.

Colin Cleary was sitting in the reception area drinking tea and smoking a cigarette. He was a bulky man, with prickly grey hair and a face that looked as if an amateur sculptor had tried to carve an Easter Island monument out of beetroot and then stuck two bushy grey eyebrows on it. He was wearing a chequered shirt with four buttons undone so that the tangled grey hair from his chest was climbing out of it.

‘Can I help you ladies at all?’ asked a spotty young receptionist. She was wearing a green overall with
Clearly Cleary’s!
embroidered on the pocket.

‘It’s Mr Cleary himself we’ve come to see,’ said Katie. She turned to Colin Cleary and said, ‘It’s been a while, Colin. What’s the story?’

Colin Cleary frowned at her, blowing out a steady stream of smoke from the side of his mouth. Then he slapped his thigh and said, ‘Feck me! There’s one face I never thought I’d ever clap eyes on again! DI fecking Maguire!’

‘Detective superintendent these days, Colin. That shows you how long it’s been. This is Detective Sergeant ó Nuallán.’

‘So what’s the craic?’ said Colin Cleary. ‘I thought you was in Cork. Don’t tell me they’ve demoted you to Mallow.’

‘No, I’m still in Cork city,’ Katie told him. ‘Listen, I need to ask you a couple of questions in private, if that’s okay with you.’

‘Hey – I’m not growing nothing illegal here, DI Maguire. I mean, DS Maguire. You don’t get much of a high from smoking hydrangeas.’

‘It’s not about the garden centre. Colin,’ said Katie, and raised an eyebrow so that he could see that she was serious.

Without another word, Colin Cleary levered himself to his feet and beckoned Katie and Detective Sergeant ó Nuallán to follow him into his private office behind the reception area. When he closed the door, it was so cramped that there was barely room for the three of them. Most of the space was taken up by a large desk heaped with invoices and copies of the
Racing Post
and ripped-open envelopes, as well as a large black leather couch and a Star Galaxy pinball machine. The walls were cluttered with framed photographs of Colin Cleary with jockeys and racehorse owners from the Mallow racecourse.

‘Now then, what can I do for you fair ladies?’ he asked, taking another cigarette from a packet on the desk and lighting it. ‘I might not be narrow these days, but I’m straight. I don’t get involved with none of that political stuff no more.’

Detective Sergeant ó Nuallán took out her notebook and said, flatly, ‘A Heizer Pocket Shotgun.’

Colin Cleary stared at her with one eye closed against the smoke from his cigarette. After a moment, he said, ‘You got me, girl. Is that some kind of a riddle?’

‘Let me tell you this, Colin,’ said Katie, ‘I’m not here looking to cause you any grief. Maybe they’re not forgotten, but they’re all in the past now – those shipments you arranged from Libya and all of that Semtex smuggling. What I urgently need today is some information to help me close three cases of murder, and I’ve been led to believe that you might have supplied the weapon that was used.’

‘A Heizer Pocket Shotgun,’ repeated Detective Sergeant ó Nuallán.

‘Never heard of such a thing,’ said Colin Cleary.

‘Oh, come on, Colin, don’t act innocent. I wouldn’t have driven all the way up here to Mallow if my informant wasn’t sound. He only told me on condition that I wouldn’t press any charges against you.’

‘They’re very new, these pocket shotguns,’ said Detective Sergeant ó Nuallán. ‘I’m surprised you managed to get hold of one.’

‘Nothing’s difficult if you know the right people.’

‘So you did get hold of one?’

‘I might have done.’

‘Maybe you got hold of more than one?’

‘Aren’t you straying off the point here, blondie? You came here to talk about the
one
gun, not several, so let’s keep it that way.’

‘So you did supply at least one?’

‘Yes. It’s conceivable.’

‘When was this?’

‘I’d say about three weeks since. But I’m only saying it’s conceivable, not that I actually did it.’

‘Well, purely for the sake of argument, let’s suppose that you actually did,’ said Katie. ‘Who did you supply it to?’

‘There was a young woman who turned up in a taxi just before we was closing up for the day. She was dark.’

‘When you say “dark” …?’

‘I mean she was black. And she was
black
black. Black as the inside of an undertaker’s undercrackers. But she was a looker, I’ll give her that. Not like my fecking wife. If you think I’ve let meself go you should see Bridget. Holy Mary, Mother of God. These days I wouldn’t climb on Bridget to hang wallpaper.’

‘And this black girl, she asked you if you could supply her a handgun that was capable of firing shotgun shells?’

‘She might have done, yes. She said she’d been given my name by a feller in Lagos I used to do a bit of business with. In fact, she showed me a note that he’d given her, to prove she was sound.’

‘Did you ask her
why
she wanted this particular type of gun?’

‘Are you codding? In all of my professional career I never once asked nobody what they wanted a weapon for. I supplied them, that’s all. What they did with them, that was entirely their business. I’m not saying I was never political myself, but what you don’t know can’t break into your house and shake you awake at night.’

‘All right,’ said Detective Sergeant ó Nuallán. ‘So what did you arrange to do?’

‘She said she’d heard of the Taurus Judge, which is a large revolver which takes shotgun shells. I handled a few of them in my time and they’re great guns but they’re fecking enormous. Even with only the three-inch barrel they weigh about eight hundred grams, and there was nothing of her. They do a lightweight alloy version, but the recoil from that would have knocked her into the middle of next week. That’s when I might have suggested the Heizer. I didn’t actually have one in stock, like, but I could get my hands on one in just a couple of days, with ammunition.’

‘How much did you ask for it?’

‘Seven hundred yoyos, cash.’

‘Can you describe her?’ asked Katie.

Colin Carey let smoke dribble out of his mouth and up his nostrils. ‘I don’t have to, do I? There’s been pictures of her on the fecking telebox three times a day.’

‘And it never occurred to you to get in touch with us and tell us that you’d sold her a gun?’

‘Like I told you, DS Maguire, whatever I supply a customer with, I never ask them what they intend to do with it. I don’t do it here, at the garden centre. I don’t say, excuse me, cove, but you’re not thinking of putting them two leprechauns in some kind of compromising sexual position, are you? I never did it when it came to armaments, neither, even if I happened to find out later what they’d been used for. I have me principles.’

‘Colin, you missed your calling,’ said Katie. ‘You should have been a priest.’

‘Maybe you’re right. These days, even some of them young boys look more appetizing than my Bridget.’

‘Did she give you her name?’ asked Detective Sergeant ó Nuallán.

‘She gave me a number to call when the gun was ready for her to collect. She said if somebody else answered but her, I should ask to speak to the girl in number three.’

‘Do you still have the number?’

Colin Cleary leaned forward and made a desultory effort to look for it, lifting up two or three letters and a copy of the
Racing Post
from his paper-strewn desk, but then he sat back and shook his head. ‘No, I doubt it. It was a Cork number, I remember that much. But that’s all.’

‘And who did answer, when you called?’

‘Some old boy. He didn’t give a name.’

‘Can we go through your recent phone records?’ asked Katie.

‘I don’t think so, DS Maguire. Not without a court order, like. And if you asked for a court order, the judge would want to know for what purpose, wouldn’t he?’

‘We would ignore all of the other numbers except for that one, even if they belonged to al-Qaeda. I give you my word on that.’