“Get the lights up,” he said to Malone. “Video. Pronto.”

“Damn,” Kilmartin went on. “Wouldn’t you know it? I have to water the horse.”

Minogue yawned as he made a quick survey of the scene, and then made his way through the crowd. Air thick with the smell of the canal seemed to settle in his lungs. There were about two dozen gawkers now. He searched the faces close to him. An intense light flared suddenly beside him before it shifted down over the water. He turned to find Paddy Dillon, a Cavan man known for wearing his tweed jacket every working day of the year. The cut of Dillon’s jacket had become misshapen by his constant storage of batteries, clips, bolts, tapes and tools. Dillon hefted the camera onto his shoulder.

“How’s Paddy.”

“Ah, Matt, me oul standby. Steady, boy. Struggling, but steady.”

“Close again tonight, Paddy.”

“Aye, surely!” Dillon’s accent gave his voice a plaintive tone. “Close isn’t it, now. It must be the weather we get for throwing in our lot with a united Europe. Oh, yes. I must say now that I can do without this degree of heat. Yes, I can.”

Minogue gave Dillon’s tweed jacket a lingering glance but Dillon was already absorbed in something else.

“Run up and down the banks first, Paddy. Anybody moves off from the crowd, get a good look, will you? We’ll be on the prowl.”

Malone led Dillon down the bank.

The quartz light turned the black water khaki. The hair was too blonde to be natural, Minogue thought. Just below the surface, the face and neck looked phosphorescent in the glare. The shoulders were covered. He began to move through the gawkers.

“What’s the story here, Chief?” The query came from one of a trio of men in their twenties. All three bore the tired, blurry expressions of men who had been drinking.