Eventually he says, “You went to my house.”

“Yeah,” Cal says. “You might’ve actually been in school, for once.”

“What’d my mam say?”

“What you thought she would.”

“Doesn’t mean she’s right. My mam, she misses things. Sometimes.”

“Well,” Cal says, “don’t we all. What’d she say to you?”

“She didn’t tell me you were there. Alanna did. Said a beardy fella with a wet shoe gave them Kit Kats.”

“Yep. I was out for a walk, had the misfortune to step in the bog right by your mama’s place. What’s the odds?”

Trey doesn’t smile. After a second he says, “My mam’s not mental.”

“Never said she was.”

“People say it.”

“People say a heap besides their prayers.”

Trey obviously has no idea what this means. “Do you think she’s mental?”

Cal thinks this over, noticing along the way that he would strongly prefer not to lie to Trey if he can help it. “No,” he says in the end, “I wouldn’t have said mental. She seems to me more like a lady who could really use a few pieces of good luck.”

He can tell by the twitch of Trey’s eyebrows that he hasn’t looked at things in this light before. After a minute he says, “So find Brendan.”

Cal says, “Brendan’s buddies, that you told me about. Which of ’em’s the most reliable?”

Clearly Trey hasn’t considered this. “Dunno. Paddy’s an awful blow, he’d say anything. And Alan, he’s a spacer, wouldn’t know his arse from his elbow. Fergal, maybe.”

“Where’s Fergal live?”

“Out the other side of the village, ’bout half a mile down the road. Sheep farm, white house. You gonna question him?”

“Which one’s the smartest?”

Trey’s lip curls. “Eugene Moynihan thinks he is. He’s doing a course in Sligo Tech, business or something. Thinks he’s only brilliant.”

“Good for him,” Cal says. “He move to Sligo for that, or is he still around?”

“He wouldn’t want to be stuck in digs. Bet he goes in every day. He has a motorbike.”

“Where’s Eugene live?”

“In the village. That big yella house with the conservatory on the side.”

“What’re they like?”

Trey blows a scornful puff of air out of the side of his mouth. “Eugene’s a wanker. Fergal’s thick.”

“Huh,” Cal says. He figures this is as much detail as he can hope to get. “Sounds like Brendan doesn’t have much of a gift for picking good buddies.”

That gets him a glare. “Not a lot to choose from, round here. What’s he supposed to do?”

“I’m not criticizing, kid,” Cal says, lifting his hands. “He can run with whoever he wants.”

“You gonna question them?”

“I’m gonna talk to them. Like I told you before. We talk to the missing person’s associates.”

Trey nods, satisfied with this. “What do I do?”

“You do nothing,” Cal says. “You stay away from Eugene, stay away from Fergal, keep your head down.” When Trey’s mouth gets a mutinous set: “Kid.”

Trey rolls his eyes and goes back to work. Cal decides against pushing it; the kid knows the deal, and he’s no dummy. For now, anyway, the likelihood is that he’ll do what he’s told.

When the sky in the window starts to burn orange behind the tree line, Cal says, “What time do you reckon it is?”

Trey gives him a suspicious look. “Says on your phone.”

“I know that. I’m asking for your best guess.”

The suspicious look stays, but in the end Trey shrugs. “Seven, maybe.”

Cal checks. It’s eight minutes of. “Close enough,” he says. If Trey figures Brendan left at five, he probably isn’t too far off. “And late enough that you need to get home. I want you to keep away from here after dark, the next while.”

“Why?”

“My neighbor Mart, something killed one of his sheep. He’s not a happy guy.”

Trey thinks this over. “One of Bobby Feeney’s sheep got killed,” he says.

“Yep. You know of anything around here that might go killing sheep?”

“Dog, maybe. That happened before. Senan Maguire shot it.”

“Maybe,” Cal says, thinking of the neat flayed patch on the ewe’s ribs. “You ever see a dog running free, when you were hanging around here at night? Or any other animal big enough to do that?”

“It’s dark,” Trey points out. “You don’t always know what you’re seeing.”

“So you’ve seen something.”

The kid shrugs, one-shouldered, eyes on the neat back-and-forth of the toothbrush. “Seen people going into houses where they shouldn’ta been, coupla times.”

“And?”

“And nothing. I went away.”

“Good call,” Cal says. “Now get. You can come back tomorrow. Afternoon.”

Trey stands up, dusting his hands on his jeans, and nods at the desk. Cal goes over and examines it. “Looking good,” he says. “Another hour or two’s work and it’ll be back on track.”

“When I’m done,” Trey says, shoving an arm into his parka, “you can teach me that.” He jerks his chin at the gun and heads out the door before Cal can answer.

Cal goes to the door and watches the kid stride off, keeping to the hedge line. There are small flickers of movement among the long grass in his field, rabbits out for their evening meal, but the Henry and stew aren’t on his mind any more. Once Trey turns up the road towards the mountains, Cal gives him a minute and then goes to the gate. He watches the kid’s skinny back as he lopes up the road, hands in his pockets, between the blackberry brambles into the thickening dusk. Even after Trey is invisible Cal stays there, leaning his arms on the gate and listening.

NINE

Cal has always liked mornings. He draws a distinction between this and being a morning person, which he isn’t: it takes time, daylight and coffee to connect up his brain cells. He appreciates mornings not for their effect on him, but for themselves. Even smack in the middle of a temperamental Chicago neighborhood, dawn sounds rose up with a startling delicacy, and the air had a lemony, clean-scoured tinge that made you breathe deeper and wider. Here, the first light spreads across the fields like something holy is happening, striking sparks off a million dewdrops and turning the spiderwebs on the hedge to rainbows; mist curls off the grass, and the first calls of birds and sheep seem to arc effortless miles. Whenever he can make himself, Cal gets up early and eats his breakfast sitting on his back step, enjoying the chill and the earthy tang of the air. The doughnut Trey brought him yesterday is still in pretty good shape.