Minogue nodded. Kilmartin beamed.

“Ah, you’re a star! A real trooper. We’ll say no more about it. Now, tell us a bit more about this Saint place.”

“Santorini. It’s in Greece, I told you. Cradle of civilisation, don’t you know.”

“Oho! Greece is right. You’d want to watch you don’t end up on the flat of your back there with the runs, boyo.” Kilmartin nodded solemnly. “They cook up bits of meat and what-have-you there. Right in the street, bejases. A pal of Maura’s went there and spent half her holiday in the jacks-”

Minogue stared back at his superior.

“I’m sorry to hear that, Jim. Very sorry.”

Kilmartin guffawed.

“I’m sure you are,” said the Chief Inspector, hearty again. “Now shag off with yourself, ya bowsie. But phone me when you get your leg in the door with Tynan.”

Minogue reviewed the statements taken from one Tommy-John Casey several weeks ago. Casey had been in a dispute with a relation over the rent of pasture in the townland of Inisgeall, County Mayo. Casey and his victim, Patrick Tuohy, had repaired to a pub in Ballina in the hopes, Casey maintained, of coming to an amicable arrangement. The two men had continued drinking until midnight, whereupon Tommy-John Casey left the pub, got into his car and ran over Tuohy on a narrow road a mile outside town. Didn’t know what had come over him, Casey had repeated over and over again. Kilmartin had read the statement with Minogue. What came over him, Kilmartin had scoffed, was the car. Casey had been contrite and candid with the Gardai. Minogue, unimpressed, had pointed to the fact that Casey had driven a further two hundred yards along the road beyond the point where he had catapulted Tuohy over the hedge, smashing his windscreen and leaving Tuohy dying, his skull shattered.

He glanced over at Hoey. His colleague’s face looked a little puffy. Lack of sleep, bachelor diet. Drink, of course.