Who are the people in your neighbourhood? The man across the road who is trusted to mind the spare keys of almost everyone on the avenue. The woman who comes off like a busybody but is really just keeping an eye on things when most of the residents are out at work. The teenager who knocks on the door at 9 a.m. because you have left your wallet, containing €80, in the basket of your bike all night. They're the people you meet when you're walking down the street each day.
These are the people in your neighbourhood. Three boys and a girl, they can't be more than 19, who have nothing better to do at night than mess with people's cars. It's 10 p.m. A man in his 30s is relaxing at home. He hears some noise outside and lifts a slat on the blind to peek out. He sees the teenagers at his car - one on the driver's side and one on the passenger side - then puts on his jacket and goes out to confront them.
One of them, he notices, has written their name in the dust on the bonnet. He is not afraid of these kinds of neighbours. Never has been. He tells the gang to get away from his car. He demands that one of them wipe the name off before leaving. He turns to walk away. He feels a blow to the back of the neck and falls to the ground. All he can remember are the lights from the port tunnel shining between the trees, first from this angle and then another, as his head moves from side to side in rhythm with the kicks.
These are the people in your neighbourhood. As two teenagers stand kicking a man who lies in the fetal position, trying to shield his head, two cars approach the scene. Both drivers make an instant decision. A decision to slow down. A decision to steer the cars around the huddle of bodies on the road. A decision to drive away without alerting anyone.
A third car, containing a woman and a man, drives up. They stop, and the man presses down hard on the car horn. When that doesn't stop them the man emerges from the car. Only then do the youths run away. Blood is everywhere. An ambulance arrives. As he is taken into the ambulance the man's shoulder pops out of its socket. The man has a dislocated and fractured shoulder and broken ribs.
A policeman sits at the end of the bed and says, yes, we know who they are, because we passed them earlier in the night. They will call to his house to take a statement, they say.
These are the policemen in your neighbourhood. They do not take a statement from the woman who caught the people in the act. The woman who described what she saw as a frenzy of kicking. Despite his constant requests they do not arrange a line-up so the man can identify his assailants. They tell the victim that a prosecution is unlikely. They have 80 or 90 cases like this on their books and don't have the resources. They call to read the statement that he typed with one hand, but they do not take it away with them. They know who they are.
The neighbours send cards and nod when he tells them the police don't think anything will come of it. He won't let it lie. He asks the policemen whether they would have investigated more thoroughly had he died. He thinks it's a sad indictment of society that you have to die before a decent attempt is made to catch people like those who attacked him.
He has had enough of civil libertarians who cite poverty and lack of education as factors when the majority in the same situation don't resort to violence. He knows the truth. That we have all developed a creeping complacency towards violent crime.
Two months later the man can't sleep at night with the physical discomfort. He is facing into 10 months of physiotherapy. It may seem strange, but he wants to meet these people in his neighbourhood.
He used to sleep with one arm crooked above his shoulder. It was the way he was born, a perfectly formed caul covering the arm like a blanket. After half a lifetime sleeping this way he can't get used to the new position. He thinks about his neighbours, about the name he saw on the bonnet of his car. He phones the police to ask who they are.
He will get their names and addresses whether the police give them to him or not. He knows what he will do when he finds them. He will watch them. See how they live. He might call to their door and ask: "Do you remember me?" He might ask them why they did it. They know where he lives. He thinks it's only right and proper that they should know that he knows where they live too.