Cal was hoping Brendan might have talked to Caroline about his big moneymaking plan. Boys run their mouths, when they’re trying to impress girls. Caroline isn’t the type to be impressed by criminal activity, but Brendan could have been too young, too hasty and too desperate to notice that. Cal believes Caroline, though. Whatever was in the works, Brendan kept it to himself.

Cal hasn’t come away empty-handed, though. Suicide is off the table, or as good as. Not because Caroline thinks Brendan wasn’t the type, but because Caroline—and Cal considers her to be the best witness he’s talked to so far—Caroline says Brendan set a lot of store by keeping his promises. Brendan said he’d get Trey a bike for his birthday, and Brendan said he’d pay back Fergal’s hundred bucks—money he wouldn’t have needed if all he was aiming to do was go up the mountain and hang himself. If Brendan was planning on going anywhere, he was also planning on coming back.

And Caroline thinks there was nothing going wrong in Brendan’s mind. Cal is glad of this. If Brendan got spooked, if he ran, if he’s hiding out in the mountains, then he had a reason that existed outside his mind. That means it must have left solid tracks, somewhere along the way.

It might be that Caroline does have a guess at what Brendan was doing and it’s not something she wants to discuss, at least not with a stranger and an ex-cop. On the other hand, it might be that Cal isn’t the only person who’s had a warning.

Cal doesn’t hold out much hope of finding the police station open on a Sunday, but Garda O’Malley is sitting at his desk, reading his paper and eating a big piece of chocolate cake with his fingers. “Ah, God, it’s Officer Hooper,” he says, beaming and trying to work out whether to stand up. “I won’t shake your hand, look—” He holds up his sticky fingers. “My little fella’s after turning eight, and the size of the cake my missus made, we’ll be ating it for his ninth as well.”

“No problem,” Cal says, grinning. “Looks like good cake.”

“Ah, it’s gorgeous. She does watch all them bake-off shows. If I’da known you were coming, I’da brought you a slice.”

“Catch you next year,” Cal says. “I just dropped in to let you know I got that rifle in the end. Thank you kindly for your help.”

“No problem at all,” O’Malley says, relaxing back into his seat and sucking frosting off his thumb. “Have you taken it out yet?”

“Just shooting at tin cans, getting my eye back in. It’s a good gun. I got rabbits on my land, so I’m gonna try and bag me a few of those.”

“Cunning little bastards,” O’Malley says, with the melancholy of experience. “Good luck.”

“Well,” Cal says, “the only other thing I got to hand is a tree full of rooks messing up my lawn. Maybe you can tell me: they good eating?”

O’Malley looks startled, but he considers the question out of politeness. “I’ve never et rook myself,” he says. “But my daddy told us his mammy used to make rook stew when he was a little fella, if they’d nothing else. With potatoes, like, and the bit of onion. I’d say you’d get a recipe on the internet; sure, they’ve everything on there.”

“Worth a try,” Cal says. He has no intention of shooting any of his rooks. He has a feeling the survivors would make bad enemies.

“I wouldn’t say it’d be nice,” O’Malley says, thinking it over further. “Awful strong-tasting, I’d say.”

“I’ll save you a helping,” Cal says, grinning.

“Ah, no, you’re grand,” O’Malley says, slightly apprehensive. “Sure, I’ll still be working my way through this cake.”

Cal laughs, gives the counter a slap and is turning for the door when a thought strikes him. “Almost forgot,” he says. “Some guy was telling me a couple of officers got called out to Ardnakelty, back in March. Would that have been you?”

O’Malley thinks that over. “ ’Twasn’t, no. The only times I’ve been out that way this year, I was up the mountain, trying to get those Reddy childer to get an education. Ardnakelty doesn’t have much call for our services.”

“Well, that’s what I thought,” Cal says, frowning a little. “You got any idea what that thing in March was about?”

“Can’t have been anything serious,” O’Malley assures him. “Sure, if it was, I’d have heard about it.”

“I’d love to know, all the same,” Cal says, his frown deepening. “I can’t rest easy unless I know what I’m living with. Side effect of the job—I mean, hey, who am I telling, right?”

O’Malley doesn’t look like this angle has ever occurred to him before, but he nods along vigorously all the same. “Tell you what I’ll do,” he says, an idea striking him. “You hang on here a minute, and I’ll look it up in the system.”

“Well, that’s kind of you,” Cal says, surprised and pleased. “I’d appreciate that. I’ll bring you some rook stew for sure.”

O’Malley laughs, extracts himself from his chair with a few loud creaking noises, and heads back to the office. Cal waits and looks out the window at the sky, where the clouds are thickening, getting darker and more ominous. He can’t imagine ever getting accustomed to the effortless hairpin turns of the weather around here. He’s used to a hot sunny day being a hot sunny day, a cold rainy day being a cold rainy day, and so on. Here, some days the weather seems like it’s just fucking with people on principle.

“Now,” O’Malley says, coming back out, happy with his results. “Like I told you: nothing serious at all, at all. March the sixteenth, a farmer reported signs of intruders on his land and a possible theft of farm equipment, but when the boys got out there, he told them ’twas all a mistake.” He resettles himself in his chair and pops a chunk of cake into his mouth. “I’d say he found out ’twas the local young scallywags messing, like. They do get bored; sometimes the bold ones’ll hide something just for the crack, to see the farmer go mental looking for it. Or maybe it was robbed, but the farmer found out who done it and got the stuff back, so he left it at that. They’re like that, around here. They’d rather keep us out of it, unless they’ve no choice at all.”

“Well, either way,” Cal says, “that sets my mind at ease. I don’t have any farm equipment to get stolen. I got an old wheelbarrow that came with the place, but if anyone wants it that bad, they’re welcome to it.”

“They’re more likely to put it on top of your roof,” O’Malley says tolerantly.

“It’d probably improve the look of the place,” Cal says. “There’s designer guys who charge yuppies thousands of bucks for ideas like that. Who was the farmer?”