“That it is,” Cal says. He’s, he gets. Caroline, just like Fergal and Eugene, thinks Brendan is alive. Cal doesn’t set too much store by that. To them, the idea of someone their age dying is impossible. He hopes it can stay that way a while longer. “That unrealistic attitude make him any enemies?”

Caroline’s eyes widen, just a flicker, but her voice stays even. “Not like you’re talking about. People got annoyed with him, sometimes. But . . . sure, we’ve all known each other all our lives. Everyone knows what he’s like. It was never a big deal.”

“I know how that goes,” Cal says. “Is he reliable? Say he tells you he’s gonna do something for you, or get you something. Would you expect that he’d get it done, or that he’d forget the whole thing?”

“He’d follow through,” Caroline says immediately. “It’s a matter of pride for him, like. His dad was an awful man for making promises and forgetting them. Brendan hated it. He didn’t want to be like that.”

“Well, there you go. People can forgive a man for being a little bit unrealistic, as long as he’s reliable.” Cal puts the baseball cap back on the counter and pats it into shape. “I’m guessing that means he wouldn’t have up and left if he thought you were pregnant.”

He’s betting on Caroline having more sense than to get huffy about that. Sure enough, she says matter-of-factly, “No way. He’d’ve done everything he could to be the perfect daddy. Anyway, there’s no reason he’d think that. I’d no scare or anything.”

“You said money was tight for Brendan, and he worried that you thought he was going nowhere. He have any plans to try and fix that?”

Caroline blows out air through a small wry smile. “I bet he did, yeah. He said—when we were breaking up, like—he said he’d show me he was going places.”

“He mention how?”

She shakes her head.

Cal says, “Maybe by getting involved in something he shouldn’t’ve?”

“Like what?”

Caroline’s voice has sharpened. “Well, like something against the law,” Cal says mildly. “Stealing, maybe, or running drugs.”

“He never did anything like that. Not when we were going out.”

“How’d he get the money for the band tickets?”

“One of our friends’ uncle does furniture removals, so Brendan got a few days with him. And he gave grinds.” At Cal’s uncomprehending look, she says, “Tutored people from our school in chemistry, and engineering—they’re his best subjects. Stuff like that.”

Back on the job, Cal could have verified all this. Now all he’s got is his gut, which is telling him that Caroline wants to think well of Brendan, but also that she’s no fool. “Smart thinking,” he says. “Not gonna make a guy rich, though.”

“No, but you see what I mean. He didn’t do anything dodgy.”

“You’re not telling me he never would, though,” Cal points out.

Caroline goes back to her tissue paper, folding it around the sheep with deft quick fingers. Cal waits.

“There were rumors going round,” Caroline says in the end, “after Brendan went.” Her hands are moving faster, and her voice has tightened. She doesn’t enjoy talking about this. “People were saying he’d raped me, and he went on the run because I was going to the Guards.”

“And that wasn’t true?”

“No, it wasn’t. Brendan never laid a finger on me that I didn’t want. I squashed that one quick, once I heard about it. But there were plenty of others I couldn’t do anything about. That he ran because he beat up his mam. Or because he got caught peeping in women’s windows. Probably worse ones that no one told me.”

She pulls a piece of tape off the dispenser with a snap. “That’s what Ardnakelty was like to Brendan, all his life. Because he came from that family, people always believed the worst about him, whether there was any reason to or not. Even my parents—and they’re not like that—they were horrified when I started going out with him, only they said I had sense, so if I saw something in him then it was probably there. But they didn’t like it. Even when they saw he was good to me, they didn’t like it.” She glances up at Cal. The fast jerk of her head has anger in it. “So I’m just saying, don’t be believing everything people tell you about Brendan. Most of it’s a load of shite.”

“Then you tell me,” Cal says. “Would he do anything criminal, or not?”

“I’ll tell you what Brendan’s like,” Caroline says. Her hands have stopped moving; she’s forgotten all about the toy sheep. “He has a rake of little brothers and sisters, right? Most people, when they start going out with someone, they ignore everyone else. But Brendan: even when we first started going out, when we were pure mad about each other, he’d be saying, ‘I can’t meet up tonight, I’ve to go watch Trey’s football match,’ or ‘Maeve’s after having a row with her best friend, I’ll hang around home and cheer her up.’ Their parents weren’t doing any of that, so Brendan did it. Not like it was a pain in the arse. Like he wanted to.”

“He sounds like a good man,” Cal says. “But good men break the law, sometimes. You haven’t told me whether he would or not.”

Caroline goes back to folding the edges of the paper. In the end she says, “I hope not.”

Her face has tightened up. Cal waits.

She starts to say something, and then stops. Instead she says, “I’d just like to know he’s OK.”

Cal says gently, “I haven’t heard anything to say he’s not.”

“Right.” Caroline takes a quick breath. She’s not looking at Cal any more. “Yeah. I’d say he’s grand.”

“Tell you what,” Cal says. “I’ll say to Miz Reddy, if she does hear from Brendan, she should let you know.”

“Thanks,” Caroline says politely, unrolling green ribbon from a spool. The conversation is over. “That’d be great.”

She wraps up the sheep nice and pretty, and twirls the green ribbon in ringlets. When Cal thanks her for all her help, he leaves a second in case she might say something else, but she just gives him a bright impersonal smile and wishes his niece a happy birthday.

The outdoors, away from the clutter and the syrupy ballads, feels spacious and loose, peaceful. In the main square, families in their good clothes and old women in head scarves are coming out of the church; behind its spire, the wind chivvies scraps of cloud across the blue sky.