Evening Class

The scream seemed to excite him more. 'You are a slut,' he said. 'A coarse slut. You can't get enough of it, that's always been your problem even before you were a married woman. You are disgusting.' He raised the belt and brought it down first on her shoulders, then on her head.

At the same time his trousers fell to the floor and he ripped at her nightdress. She moved to get the bedroom chair to protect herself but he got there first and, raising the chair, he broke it on the edge of the bed and came at her with it raised aloft.

'Don't, Shay, in the name of God don't do this.' She didn't care who heard. Behind him at the door she saw the small frightened figure of Gus, his hand in his mouth with terror, and behind that was Laddy. Wakened by the screams, both of them transfixed by the scene in front of them. Before she could stop herself Rose cried, 'Help, Laddy, help me!' And then she saw Shay being pulled back, Laddy's huge arm around his neck restraining him.

Gus was screaming in terror. Rose gathered her torn nightdress and, uncaring about the blood flowing down her forehead, ran to pick her son up in her arms.

'He's not himself,' she said to Laddy. 'He doesn't know what he's doing, we'll have to lock him in somewhere.'

'Daddy,' screamed Gus.

Shay broke free and came at the mother and child. He still had the leg of the chair in his hand.

'Laddy, for God's sake,' she implored.

Shay stopped to look at Laddy, the big boy with his face red and sweating, standing in his pyjamas, uncertain, frightened.

'Well, Lady Rose, don't you have a fine protector here. The town simpleton in his pyjamas, that's great to see, isn't it. The village idiot going to look after his big sister.' He looked from one to the other, taunting Laddy. 'Come on then, big boy, hit me now. Hit me, Laddy, you big fat queer. Come on.' He had the chair leg with the spiky pointy bit where it had snapped making it a dangerous weapon.

'Hit him, Laddy,' Rose cried, and Laddy's big fist came out and hit Shay hard across the jaw. As Shay fell his head hit the marble washstand. There was a crunching sound and his eyes were open as he lay on the floor. Rose put Gus down on the floor gently, the child had stopped crying now. The silence lasted for ever.

'I think he's dead,' Laddy said.

'You did what you had to do, Laddy.' Laddy looked at her in disbelief. He thought that he had done something terrible. He had hit Shay too hard, he had knocked the life out of him. Often Rose had said to him: 'You don't know your own strength, Laddy, go easy with this or that.' But this time there wasn't a word said against him. He could hardly believe what had happened. He turned his face away from the staring eyes on the floor.

Rose spoke slowly. 'Now, Laddy, I want you to get dressed and cycle into town and tell Kenny that poor Shay had a fall and hit his head and he'll tell Father Maher and then they'll drive you back here.'

'And will I say…?'

'You'll say that you heard a lot of shouting and that Shay fell and that I asked you to go for the doctor.'

'But isn't he… I mean, will Kenny be able to…?'

'Kenny will do what he can and then he'll close poor Shay's eyes for him. Will you get dressed and go now, Laddy, there's a good fellow?'

'Will you be all right, Rose?'

'I'll be fine, and Gus is fine.'

'I'm fine,' Gus said, his finger still in his mouth and holding on to Rose's hand.

Laddy cycled furiously through the dark, the light on his bicycle bobbing up and down through the frightening shadows and shapes of the night.

Kenny and Father Maher put his bicycle on the roof of the doctor's car. When they got home Rose was very calm. She had dressed in a neat dark cardigan and skirt with a white blouse, she had combed her hair slightly over her forehead to hide the cut. The fire was burning brightly, she had built it up and burned the broken bedroom chair. It was in ashes now. No one would ever see that it had been used as a weapon.

Her face was pale. She had a kettle ready for tea, and candles for the Last Sacraments. The prayers were said, Laddy and Gus joining Rose in the responses. The death certificate was written, and it was obviously by misadventure and due to intoxication.

The women who would lay him out would be there in the morning. The sympathies that were offered and accepted were formal and perfunctory. Both the doctor and the priest knew that this was a loveless marriage of convenience, where the hired hand had made the woman of the house pregnant. Shay Neil couldn't hold his drink, that was known.

Kenny was not going to speculate about how Shay had fallen, nor was he going to discuss the fresh blood on her face. When the priest was busy elsewhere the doctor took out his black bag and without waiting to be asked to do so, gave the wound a quick examination and dabbed antiseptic on it. 'You'll be fine, Rose,' he said. And she knew he wasn't just talking about the cut on her forehead. He meant about everything.

After the funeral Rose asked all her family back to the farm, and they sat around the table in the kitchen to a meal that she had prepared carefully. There had been only a few of Shay's relations at the funeral and they had not been invited back to the farm.

Rose had a proposition to make. The place had no happy associations for her now, she and Gus and Laddy would like to sell it and live in Dublin. She had discussed it with an estate agent and had been given a realistic idea of what it would sell for. Did any of them have any objection to the place being sold? Would any of them like to live in it? No, none of them wanted to live there, and yes they were all enthusiastic and happy for Rose to sell the farm.

'Good.' She was brisk.

Were there any keepsakes or mementoes they might like to take?

'Now?' They were surprised at the speed.

'Yes, today.'

She was going to put the house on the market next day.

Gus settled in a Dublin school, and Laddy, armed with a glowing reference from Mrs. Nolan, got a job as a porter in a small hotel. He was soon regarded as part of the family and invited to live in. This suited everyone. And the years passed peacefully enough.

Rose took up nursing again. Gus did well at school and went into a Hotel Management course. Rose was still a presentable woman in her forties, she could have her chances of marrying again in Dublin. The widower of a woman she had nursed seemed very interested in her, but Rose was firm. One loveless marriage behind her was enough. She wouldn't join again unless it was someone she really loved. She didn't mind missing out on love, because she didn't really think she had. Most people didn't have anything nearly as good as Gus and Laddy in their lives.

Gus loved his work, he was prepared to do the longest hours and the hardest jobs to learn the hotel business. Laddy had always taken the boy to football matches and boxing matches. He remembered the fortune teller. 'Maybe she meant I was going to be interested in sports,' he told Gus. 'Maybe she didn't mean good at it, more involved in it.'

'Could be.' Gus was very fond of the big kind man who looked after him so well.

None of them ever talked about the night of the accident. Sometimes Rose wondered how much Gus remembered. He had been six, old enough to have taken it all in. But he didn't appear to have nightmares as a child and later on he could listen to talk about his father without looking awkward. He did not, however, ask many questions about what his father had been like, which was significant. Most boys would surely have wanted to know. Possibly Gus knew enough.

The hotel where Laddy worked was owned by an elderly couple. They told Laddy that they would soon retire, and he became very agitated. This had been his home now for years. It coincided with Gus meeting the girl of his dreams, a bright sparky girl called

Maggie, a trained chef with Northern Ireland wit and confidence. She was ideal for him in Rose's mind; she would give him all the support he needed.

'I always thought I'd be jealous when Gus found himself a proper girl but it's not so, I'm delighted for him.'

'And I always thought I'd have some wee bat out of hell as a mother-in-law and I got you,' Maggie said.

All they needed now was a hotel job together. Even to buy a small run-down place and build it up.

'Couldn't you buy my hotel?' Laddy suggested. It would be exactly what they wanted, but of course they couldn't afford it.

'If you give me a room in it to live in, I'll give you the money,' Rose said.

What better could she do with what she had saved and the proceeds of her Dublin flat when she sold it? It would be a home for Laddy and Gus, a start in business for the young couple. A place to rest her limbs when this ill health that had been foretold finally came. She knew it was sinful and even stupid to believe in fortune tellers, but that whole day, the day of Gypsy Ella, was still very clear in her mind.

It had been, after all, the day that Shay had raped her.

It was not easy to get business at the start. They spent a lot of time studying the accounts. They were paying out more than was coming in.

Laddy understood that business was not good. 'I can carry more coal upstairs,' he said, anxious to help.

'Not much use, Laddy, when we've no one to light fires for.' Maggie was very kind to her husband's Uncle Laddy. She always made him feel important.

'Could we go out in the street, Rose, and I would wear a sandwich board with the name of the hotel and you could give people leaflets?' He was so eager to help.

'No, Laddy. This is Gus and Maggie's hotel. They'll come up with ideas, they'll get it going. Soon it will be very busy, as many guests as they can handle.'

And eventually it was.

The young couple worked at it night and day. They built up a clientele of faithful visitors. They attracted people from the North, the word of mouth spread. And whenever they had a foreign visitor from the continent Maggie would give them a card saying: 'We have friends who speak French, German, Italian'.

It was true. They knew a German bookbinder, a French teacher in a boys' school and an Italian who ran a chip shop. When they needed translation these people were immediately found on the telephone to interpret for them.

Gus and Maggie had two children, angelic little girls, and Rose thought herself one of the happiest women in Ireland. She would take her little granddaughters to feed the ducks in St Stephen's Green on a sunny morning.

One of the hotel guests asked Laddy was there a snooker hall nearby, and Laddy, eager to please, found one.

'Have a game with me,' said the man, a lonely businessman from Birmingham.

'I'm afraid I don't play, sir.' Laddy was apologetic.

'I'll show you,' the man said.

And then it happened. The fortune teller's forecast came true. Laddy had a natural eye for the game. The man from Birmingham didn't believe he had never played before. He learned the order, yellow, green, brown, blue, pink, black. He potted them all easily and stylishly. People gathered to watch.

Laddy was the sportsman that had been foretold for him.

He never wagered money on a game. Other people bet on him, but he worked too hard for his wages and they all needed them, Rose, Gus, Maggie and the little girls. But he won competitions and he had his picture in the paper. And he was invited to join a club. He was a minor snooker celebrity.

Rose watched all this with delight. Her brother a person of importance at last. She didn't even need to ask her son to look after Laddy when she was gone. She knew it wasn't necessary. Laddy would live with Gus and Maggie until the end. She made a scrapbook of his snooker triumphs, and together they would read it.

'Would Shay have been proud of all this, do you think?' Laddy asked one evening. He was a middle aged man now and he had hardly ever spoken of the dead Shay Neil. The man he had killed that night with a violent blow.

Rose was startled. She spoke slowly. 'I think he might have been pleased. But you know, with him it was very hard to know what he thought. He said very little, who knows what he was thinking in his head.'

'Why did you marry him, Rose?'

'To make a home for us all,' she said simply.

As an explanation it seemed to satisfy Laddy. He had never given any more thought to marriage himself, or women, as far as Rose knew. He must have had sexual desires and needs like any man but they were never acknowledged in any way. And nowadays the snooker seemed a perfectly adequate substitute. So by the time Rose realised that the women's trouble she complained of meant hysterectomy and then that hysterectomy hadn't solved the problem, she was a woman with no worries about the future.

The doctor was not accustomed to people taking a diagnosis and sentence like this so calmly.

'We'll make sure that there's as little pain as possible,' he said.

'Oh, I know you will. Now, what I'd really like is to go to a hospice, if that's possible.'

'You have a very loving family who would want to nurse you,' the doctor said.

'True, but they have a hotel to run. I'd much prefer not to be there, just because they would give me too much time. Please, Doctor, I'll be no trouble up in the hospice, I'll help all I can.'

'I don't doubt that,' he said blowing his nose hard.

Rose had her moments of rage and anger like anyone else. But they were not shared with her family or her fellow patients in the hospice. The hours that she spend brooding on the unfair hand that had been dealt to her were short compared to the time spent planning for the months that were left.

When the family came to visit they got hardly any information about pain and nausea, but a lot of detail about the place she was in and the work it was doing. The hospice was a happy place, open to ideas and receptive to anything new. This is what she wanted them to channel their energy into, not to bringing her sweets or bed jackets. Something practical, something that would help. That's what Rose wanted from her family.

So they set about organising it.

Laddy got them a second-hand snooker table and gave lessons, and Gus came with Maggie to do cookery demonstrations. And the months passed easily and happily. Even though Rose was very thin now and her step was slower she said she was in no pain, and she wanted no sympathy, only company and enthusiasm. At least her mind was fine, she said.

It was too fine for Gus and Maggie, they couldn't hide from her the catastrophe that happened to them. They had insured and invested with a company that had gone bankrupt. They would lose the hotel, their hopes and dreams and future. Perhaps there was a hope that they could keep it from Rose. Maybe she could die without knowing what had happened to them. After all, she was so frail now that they could not take her back home to the hotel, as they had been able to do in the early months, for a Sunday lunch with her grandchildren. The only thing they could save from the disaster was the fact that Rose might not know how her investment in them had been lost.

But they could not hide it.

'You have to tell me what it is,' she said to Gus and Maggie. 'You cannot leave this room without telling me what's happening. I only have weeks left of my life, you won't let me spend them in torment, trying to work out what is. Letting me imagine it even worse than it is.'

'What would be the worst thing that you might think it is?' Maggie asked.

That there's something wrong with one of the children?' They shook their heads 'Or with either of you? Or Laddy? Some illness?' Again they said no. 'Well, we can face anything else,' she said, her thin face smiling and her eyes burning brightly out at them.

They told her the story. How it was in the papers that the assets were gone. There was nothing left in the funds to meet the calls that were being made. Then the plausible man Harry Kane had said on television that nobody would lose their investment, the banks would rescue them, but people still feared they would. Nothing was clear.

Tears poured down Rose's face. Gypsy Ella had never told her this. She cursed herself for believing the fortune teller in the beginning. She cursed Harry Kane and all belonging to him for his greed and theft. They had never seen her so angry.

'I knew we shouldn't have told you,' Gus said dismally.

'No, of course you had to tell me. And swear you'll tell me every single thing that happens from now on. If you tell me that it's fine and it isn't, I'll know, and I'll never forgive you.'

'I'll show you every page of the paperwork, Mam,' he said.

'And if he doesn't, I will,' Maggie promised.

'And Mam, suppose it does go down you know, and we have to get another job, you know we'll take Laddy with us.'

'Of course she knows that,' said Maggie scornfully.

And as the days passed they brought her letters from the bank. And there did seem to be a rescue package. Their investment had been shaken but not lost. She read the small print carefully to make sure there was nothing she had missed.

'Does Laddy understand how near we came to losing everything?' she asked.

'He understands at a level of his own,' said Maggie, and with a great rush of relief Rose realised that whatever happened when she was gone, Laddy would be in safe, understanding hands.

She died peacefully.

She never knew that a woman called Siobhan Casey would call to the hotel and explain that a substantial reinvestment would now be called for, to make up for the hotel having been rescued. Miss Casey pointed out that in similar circumstances when a limited company had failed investors had not been recompensed, and that the money payable to the Neils for their hotel had come from the personal finances of Kane, who was now being supported in his new venture by all those whose businesses he had saved.

There was an element of secrecy about it which was called confidentiality. The paperwork looked impressive but it was requested that it should not be put through the books in the normal way. It was a gentleman's agreement, nothing for the accountants to be involved in.

At first the amount suggested was not large, but then it increased. Gus and Maggie worried about it. But they had been pulled out of the fire when they assumed everything was gone. Perhaps in the swings and roundabouts of business this was accepted practice. Miss Casey spoke of her associates in a slightly respectful tone as if these were people of immense power, people it might be foolish to cross.

Gus knew that if his mother were alive she would be against it. This made him worry about why he was being so naive as to go ahead with it. They told Laddy nothing. They just made economies. They couldn't get a new boiler when they needed one, and they didn't replace the hall carpet, they bought a cheap rug instead to cover the worn bit. But Laddy realised that something was wrong and it worried him. It couldn't be that they didn't have enough business, the customers were coming in thick and fast. But the Hearty Irish Breakfasts weren't as hearty as they used to be, and Maggie said there was no need for Laddy to go to the market for fresh flowers any more, they were too dear. And when one of the waitresses left she wasn't replaced.

They were getting a fair few Italians now, and Paolo who worked in the chip shop was worn out coming to translate. 'One of you should learn to speak the language,' he said to Gus. I mean, we're all Europeans, but none of you are even trying.'

'I had hoped the girls might be interested in languages,' Gus had apologised. But it hadn't happened.

An Italian businessman, his wife and two sons came to stay in the hotel. The man was holed up in offices with the Irish Trade Board all day, his wife was in the shops fingering soft Irish tweed and examining jewellery. Their two teenage sons were bored and discontented. Laddy offered to take them to play snooker. Not in a hall where there would be smoking and drinking and gambling but in a Catholic Boys' Club where they would come to no harm. And he completely transformed their holiday.

From Paolo he got a written list… tavola da biliardo, sala da biliardo, stecca da biliardo. The boys responded by learning the words in English: billiard table, cue.

They were a wealthy family. They lived in Roma, that was all Laddy could get from them. When they were leaving they had their photograph taken with him outside the hotel. Then they got into their taxi and went to the airport. On the footpath when the taxi pulled away Laddy saw the roll of notes. Irish bank notes tightly wrapped together with a rubber band. He looked up to see the taxi disappearing. They would never know where they had dropped it. They might not notice it until they got home. They were wealthy people, they wouldn't miss it. The woman had spent a fortune in Grafton Street every time she had got near the place.

They wouldn't need this money.

Not like Maggie and Gus, who badly needed some things. Nice new menu holders, for example. Theirs had become very stained and tattered. They needed a new sign over the door. He thought along these lines for about four minutes, then he sighed, and got the bus out to the airport to give them back the money they had lost.

He found them checking in all their lovely expensive soft leather luggage. For a moment he wavered again but then he thrust out his big hand before he could change his mind.

The Italian family all hugged him. They shouted out to everyone around about the generosity and the marvellousness of the Irish. Never had they met such good people in their lives. Some notes were peeled off and put into Laddy's pocket. That wasn't important.

'Può venire alla. casa. La casa a Roma,' they begged him.

'They're asking you to go to Rome to stay with them,' translated people in the queue, pleased to hear such enthusiasm for one of their own.

'I know,' said Laddy, his eyes shining. 'And what's more I'll go. I had my fortune told years ago, and she said I'd go abroad across the water.' He beamed at everyone. The Italians all kissed him again and he went back on the bus. He could hardly wait to tell them his good news.

Gus and Maggie talked about it that night.

'Maybe he'll forget it in a few days,' Gus said.

'Why couldn't they just have given him the tip and left it?' Maggie wondered. Because they knew in their hearts that Laddy would think he was invited to stay with these people in Rome and that he would prepare for it and then his heart would break.

'I'll need to get a passport, you know,' Laddy said next day.

'Won't you need to learn to speak Italian first?' Maggie said with a stroke of genius.

If they could delay the whole expedition for some time, Laddy might be persuaded that the trip to Rome was only a dream.

In his snooker club Laddy asked around about Italian lessons.

A van driver he knew called Jimmy Sullivan said there was a great woman altogether called Signora who had come to live with them, and she was starting Italian lessons up in Mountainview school.

Laddy went up to the school one evening and booked. 'I'm not very well educated, do you think I'd be able to keep up with the lessons?' he asked the woman called Signora when he was paying his money.

'Oh, there'll be no problem about that. If you love the whole idea of it we'll have you speaking it in no time,' she said.

'It'll only be two hours off on Tuesday and Thursday evening,' Laddy said in a pleading tone to Gus and Maggie.

'Take all the time you like, for God's sake, Laddy. Don't you work a hundred hours a week as it is?'

'You were quite right that I shouldn't go out there like a fool. Signora says she'll have me speaking it in no time.'

Maggie closed her eyes. What had made her open her mouth and get him to go to Italian lessons? The notion of poor Laddy keeping up with an evening class was ludicrous.

He was very nervous on the first evening so Maggie went with him.

They looked a decent crowd going in to the rather bleak-looking school yard. The classroom was all decorated with pictures and posters and there even seemed to be plates of cheese and meat that they would eat later. The woman in charge was giving them big cardboard labels with their names on, translating them into an Italian form as she went along.

'Laddy,' she said. 'Now that's a hard one. Do you have any other name?'

'I don't think so.' Laddy sounded fearful and apologetic.

'No, that's fine. Let's think of a nice Italian name that sounds a bit like it. Lorenzo! How about that?' Laddy looked doubtful, but Signora liked it. 'Lorenzo,' she said again and again, rolling the word. 'I think that's the right name. We don't have any other Lorenzos in the class.'

'Is that what all the people called Laddy in Italy call themselves?' he asked eagerly.

Maggie waited, biting her lip.

'That's it, Lorenzo,' said the woman with the strange hair and the huge smile.

Maggie went back to the hotel. 'She was a nice person,' she told Gus. 'There'd be no way she'd make poor Laddy feel a fool or anything. But I'd give it three lessons before he has to give it up.'

Gus sighed. It was just one more thing to sigh about these days.

They couldn't have been more wrong about the class. Laddy loved it. He learned the phrases that they got as homework each week as if his very life depended on it. When any Italians came to the hotel he greeted them warmly in Italian, adding mi chiamo Lorenzo with a sense of pride, as if they should have expected the porter at a small

Irish hotel to be called something like that. The weeks went on and often on nights when it rained they saw Laddy being driven home to the door in a sleek BMW.

'You should ask your lady friend in, Laddy.' Maggie had peered out a few times and just seen the profile of a handsome woman driving the car.

'Ah no, Constanza has to get back. She has a long drive home,' he said.

Constanza! How had this ridiculous teacher hypnotised the whole class into her game-playing. She was like some pied piper. Laddy missed a snooker competition which he would definitely have won because he couldn't let down the Italian class. It was parts of the body that week and he and Francesca would have to point out to the class things like their throats and elbows and ankles. He had them all learned: la gola he had his hand on his neck, i gomiti one hand on each elbow and he bent down to touch la caviglia on each foot. Francesca would never forgive him if he didn't turn up. He'd miss the snooker competition, there'd be another. There wouldn't be another day with parts of the body. He would be furious if Francesca didn't turn up because she was in some sort of competition or other.

Gus and Maggie looked at each other, amazed. They decided that it was good for him. They had to believe that, other things were so grim at the moment. There were improvements that were now pressing and they just couldn't afford to make them. They had told Laddy that things were difficult but he didn't appear to have taken it on board. They were trying to live one day at a time. At least Laddy was happy for the moment. At least Rose had died thinking all was well.

Sometimes Laddy found it hard to remember all the vocabulary. He hadn't been used to it at school where the Brothers hadn't seemed to need too much studying from him. But in this class he was expected to keep up.

Sometimes he sat, fingers in ears on the wall of the school yard, learning the words. Trying to remember the emphasis. Dov'è il dolore, you must say that in a questioning way. It was the thing the doctor would say to you when you ended up in hospital. You wouldn't want to be an eejit and not know where you were hurting, so remember what he would ask. Dov'è il dolore, he said over and over.

Mr. O'Brien who was the Principal of the whole school came and sat beside him. 'How are you?' he asked.

'Bene, benissimo.' Signora had told them to answer every question in Italian.

'Great stuff… And do you like the classes? What's your name again?'

'Mi chiamo Lorenzo.'

'Of course you do. Well, Lorenzo, is it worth the money?'

'I'm not sure how much it costs, Signor. My nephew's wife pays it for me.'

Tony O'Brien looked at the big simple man with the beginnings of a lump in his throat. Aidan Dunne had been right to fight for these classes. And they seemed to be going like a dream. All kinds of people coming there. Harry Kane's wife of all people, and gangsters like the fellow with the low brow.

He had said as much to Grania but she still thought that he was patronising her, patting her father on the head for his efforts. Maybe he should learn something specific so that he could prove to Grania that he was interested.

'What are you doing today, Lorenzo?'

'Well, all this week it's parts of the body for when we get heart attacks or have accidents in Italy. The first thing the doctor will say when you're wheeled in is Dov'è il dolore? Do you know what that means?'

'No, I don't. I'm not in the class. The doctor would say to you Dov'è il dolore?'

'Yes, it means: where is the pain? And you tell him.'

'Dov'è is where, is that it?'

'Yes, it must be, because you have Dov'è il banco; Dov'è l'albergo. So you're right, Dov'è must be where is?' Laddy seemed pleased, as if he hadn't made the connection before.

'Are you married, Lorenzo?'

'No, Signor, I wouldn't be much good at it. My sister said I should concentrate on snooker.'

'Well, it doesn't have to be one or the other, man. You could have had both.'

'That's all right if you're very clever, and run a school like you do. But I wouldn't be able to do too many things at the one time.'

'I'm not either, Lorenzo,' Mr. O'Brien looked sad.

'And are you not married, then? I'd have thought you'd have big grown-up children by now,' Laddy said.

'No, I'm not married.'

'Maybe teaching's a job where people don't get married,' Laddy speculated. 'Mr. Dunne in the class, he's not married either.'

'Oh, is that so?' Tony O'Brien was alert to this piece of news.

'No, but I think he's having a romance with Signora!' Laddy looked around him as he spoke in case he was overheard. It was so daring to say such a thing aloud.

'I'm not sure that's the situation.' Tony O'Brien was astounded.

'We all think it is. Francesca and Guglielmo and Bartolomeo and I were talking about it. They laugh a lot together and go home along the road after class.'

'Well, now,' said Tony O'Brien.

Tt would be nice for them, wouldn't it?' Laddy liked everyone pleased about things.

'It would be very interesting, yes,' Tony O'Brien agreed. Whatever he had wanted to find out to tell Grania, he had never expected this. He wondered about the piece of information. It might be this poor fellow's over-simple interpretation, or it might in fact be true. If it were true then things were looking up. Aidan Dunne could not be too critical if he himself were involved in something a little unusual to put it mildly. There was no high moral ground he could claim and preach from. After all, Tony O'Brien was a straightforward single man wooing a single woman. Compared to the Aidan-Signora relationship, this was totally straight and uncomplicated.

But it wasn't something he would mention to Grania yet. They had met and the conversation had been stilted, both of them trying to be polite and forget the cruel timing that had upset them before.

'Are you going to stay the night?' he had asked.

'Yes, but I don't want to make love.' She spoke without coyness or any element of game-playing.

'And shall we sleep in the same bed or will I sleep on the sofa?'

She had looked very young and confused. He had wanted to take her in his arms, stroke her and tell her that it would all work out in the end, it would be all right eventually. But he didn't dare.

'I should sleep on the sofa, it's your house.'

'I don't know what to say to you, Grania. If I beg you to sleep in my bed with me it looks as if I am just being a beast and after your body. If I don't it looks as if I don't care. Do you see what a problem it is for me?'

'Please let me sleep on the sofa this time?' she had asked.

And he tucked her in and kissed her on the forehead. In the morning he had made her Costa Rican coffee and she looked tired with dark circles under her eyes.

'I couldn't sleep,' she said. 'I read some of your books. You have amazing things I've never heard of.'

He saw Catch 22 and On The Road beside her bed. Grania would not have read Heller or Kerouac. Possibly the gulf between them was too great. She had looked mystified at his collection of traditional jazz. She was a child.

'I would love to come back for supper again,' she had said as she left.

'You tell me when and I'll cook it for you,' he had said.

'Tonight? Would that be too soon?'

'No, tonight would be great,' he had said. 'But a little later because I like to look in on the Italian class. And before we fight again I go because I want to, nothing to do with you or your father.'

'Peace,' she said. But her eyes had been troubled.

Now Tony O'Brien had gone home and got everything ready. The chicken breasts were marinating in ginger and honey, the table was set. There were clean sheets on the bed and a rug left on the sofa to cover every eventuality.

Tony had hoped to have something more appropriate to report from his visit to the class than the news that Crania's father was rumoured to be having an affair with the very strange-looking Italian teacher. He had better go into the bloody classroom quick and find some damn thing to tell her about.

'Dov'è il dolore?' he said as a farewell to Lorenzo.

','/ gomito,' shouted Laddy, clutching his elbow.

'Right on,' said Tony O'Brien.

The whole thing was getting madder by the minute.

The parts of the body class was great fun. Tony O'Brien had to keep his hand over his face to stop laughing as they poked at each other and shouted eccola. But to his surprise they seemed to have learned a hell of a lotof vocabulary and to be quite unselfconscious about using it.

The woman was a good teacher; she would suddenly hark back to the days of the week or the ordering of a drink in the bar. 'We won't spend all our time in hospital when we go on the viaggio to Roma.'

These people really thought they were going on an excursion to Rome.

Tony O'Brien, who could cope with the Department of Education, the various teachers' unions, the wrath of priests and nuns, the demands of parents, the drug dealers and the vandals, and the most difficult and deprived of school children, was speechless. He felt slightly dizzy at the thought of the excursion.

He was about to tell Aidan Dunne that he was leaving when he saw Aidan and Signora laughing over some boxes that were changing from being hospital beds into seats in a train. The way they stood was the way people who cared about each other might stand. Intimate without touching each other. Jesus God, suppose it was true!

He grabbed his coat and continued with his plans to wine, dine and hopefully bed Aidan Dunne's daughter.

Things were so bad in the hotel that Gus and Maggie found it very hard to cope with Laddy's learning problems. His mind was full of words, he told them, and some of them were getting jumbled.

'Never mind, Laddy. Learn what you can,' Gus was soothing. Just like the Brothers years ago were soothing to Laddy, telling him not to push himself.

But Laddy would have none of it. 'You don't understand. Signora says this is the stage we must be confident and no humming and hahing. We're having another lesson on parts of the body and I keep forgetting them. Please hear me, please.'

Two guests had left today because they said that the rooms were not up to standard, one said she would write to the Tourist Board. They had barely enough to pay the wages this week and there was Laddy, his big face working with anxiety, wanting to be heard his Italian homework.

T'd be all right if I knew I were going to be with Constanza. She sort of helps me along, but we can't have the same partners. I could be with Francesca or Gloria. But very probably with Elizabetta, so can we go over them, please?'

Maggie picked up the piece of paper. 'Where do we begin?' she asked. There was an interruption. The butcher wanted to discuss when if ever his bill was going to be paid. 'Let me deal with it, Gus,' Maggie said.

Gus took the paper. 'Right, Laddy. Will I be the doctor or the patient?'

'Could you be both, Gus, until I get the sound of it back. Could you say the words to me like you used to?'

'Sure. Now I have come in to the surgery and there's something wrong with me and you're the doctor, so what do you say?'

'I have to say: "Where is the pain?" Elizabetta will be the patient, I'll be the doctor.'

Gus never knew how he kept his patience. Dov'è il dolore, he said through clenched teeth. Dov'è le fa male? And Laddy repeated it all desperately over and over. 'You see Elizabetta used to be a bit silly when she came first and not learning properly but Guglielmo has forced her to take it seriously and now she does all her homework too.' These people sounded like the cast of a pantomime to Gus and Maggie. Grown people calling each other ridiculous names and pointing to their elbows and having pretend stethoscopes.

And that, of all nights, was the night he invited Constanza in. The most elegant woman that they had ever seen, with a troubled face. Of all the bloody nights of the year, Laddy would have to choose this one. When they had spent three hours in the back room going over and over the columns of figures trying not to face what was obvious, which was that they must sell the hotel. Now they would have to make small talk to some half cracked woman

But there was no small talk. This was the angriest person they had ever met. She told them that she was married to Harry Kane, the name on the papers, the contracts, the documents. She told them that Siobhan Casey was his mistress.

'I don't see how that could be, you're much better looking,' Maggie said suddenly.

Constanza thanked her briefly, and took out her chequebook. She gave them the name of friends whom she would like them to use in doing the work. Never for a moment did they doubt that she was sincere. She said without them she might never have had the information and courage to do what she was about to do. Lives would change and they must believe that the money was theirs by right and would be recovered by her when the wheels started to turn.

'Did I do right telling Constanza?' Laddy looked around fearfully at the three of them. He had never spoken of their business outside before. He had been afraid that they did not look welcoming when he had arrived in with her beside him. But now, in as much as he could follow it all, everything seemed to have sorted itself out marvellously. Far better than he could have hoped.

'Yes, Laddy, you did right,' Gus said. It was very quiet but Laddy knew that there was high praise hidden in there somehow.

Everyone seemed to be breathing more easily. Gus and Maggie had been so tense when they were helping him with his Italian words a few hours ago. Now it seemed to have gone away, whatever the problem was.

He must tell them how well he had done in class. 'It all went great tonight. You know I was afraid I wouldn't remember the words but I did, all of them,' he beamed around.

Maggie nodded, not trusting herself to speak. Her eyes were very bright.

Constanza decided to rescue the conversation. 'Did you know Laddy and I were partners tonight? We were very good,' she said.

'The elbow and the ankle and the throat?' Gus said.

'Oh, and much more, the knee and the beard,' said Constanza.

','/ ginocchio e la barba,' Laddy cried.

'Did you know Laddy has hopes of seeing this family in Rome?' Maggie began.

'Oh, we all know about it, yes. And next summer when we all go to Rome we'll certainly see them. Signora has it all under control.'

Constanza left.

They sat together, the three of them who would always live together, as Rose had known they would.

FIONA

Fiona worked in the coffee shop of a big city hospital. She often said it was as bad as being a nurse without any of the good bits, like making people better. She saw the pale, anxious faces of people waiting for their appointment, the visitors who had come to see someone who was not getting better, the children troublesome and noisy, knowing that something was wrong but not sure what it was.

From time to time nice things happened, like the man who came out crying: 'I don't have cancer, I don't have cancer.' And he kissed Fiona and went round the room shaking people's hands. Which was of course fine for him and everyone smiled for him. But some of those who smiled did have cancer, and that was something he hadn't thought of. And some of those who did have cancer would get better, but when they saw him rejoicing over his sentence being lifted they forgot that they could get better and envied his reprieve.

You had to pay for tea, coffee and biscuits but Fiona knew that you never pressed for payment if someone was upset. In fact you pressed hot sweet tea into the hands of anyone suffering from shock. She wished they didn't have paper cups, but it would have been impossible to have washed cups and saucers for the numbers that passed through every day. A lot of them knew her by name and made conversation just to take their minds off whatever else they were thinking.

Fiona was always bright and cheerful, it was what they needed. She was a small pixie-like girl with enormous glasses that made her eyes look even bigger than ever, and she wore her hair tied back with a big bow. It was warm in the big waiting room so Fiona wore tee-shirts and a short black skirt. She had bought shirts which had the day of the week on them and she found people liked that. 'I don't know what day it is unless I look at Fiona's chest,' they would say. 'Lucky you don't just have January, February, March on them,' others would say. It was always a talking point, Fiona and her days of the week.

Sometimes Fiona had happy fantasies that one of the handsome doctors would stop and look into her huge eyes and say that she was the girl he had been looking for all his life.

But this didn't happen. And Fiona realised that it was never likely to happen. These doctors had friends of their own, other doctors, doctors' daughters, smart people. They wouldn't look into

° the eyes of a girl wearing a tee-shirt and handing out paper cups of coffee. Stop dreaming, she told herself.

Fiona was twenty and rather disillusioned about the whole business of meeting men. She just wasn't good at it. Look at her friends Grania and Brigid Dunne now. They only had to go out the door and they met fellows, fellows they sometimes stayed the night with. Fiona knew this because she was often asked to be the alibi. 'I'm staying with Fiona,' was the great excuse.

Fiona's mother knew nothing of this. She would not have approved. Fiona's mother was very firmly in the Nice Girls Wait Until They Are Married school of thought. Fiona realised that she herself had no very firm views on the matter at all. In theory she felt that if you loved a fellow and he loved you then you should have a proper relationship with him. But since the matter had never come up she had never been able to put the theory to the test.

Sometimes she looked at herself in the mirror. She wasn't bad looking. She was possibly a little too small, and maybe it didn't help to have to wear glasses, but people said they liked her glasses, they said she looked sweet in them. Were they patting her on the head? Did she look idiotic? It was so hard to know.

Grania Dunne told her not to be such a fool, she looked fine. But then Grania only had half a mind on anything these days. She was so infatuated with this man who was as old as her father! Fiona couldn't understand it. Grania had her pick of fellows, why did she go for this old, old man?

And Brigid said that Fiona looked terrific and she had a gorgeous figure, unlike Brigid who put on weight as soon as she ate a sandwich. Why was it, then, that Brigid with the chubby hips was never without a date or a partner at everything? And it wasn't just people she met in the travel agency. Brigid said she never met a chap that you'd fancy in the line of work. There were just crowds of girls coming in booking sunshine holidays, and old women booking pilgrimages, and honeymoon couples that would make you throw up talking about somewhere Very Private. And it wasn't a question of Grania and Brigid sleeping with everyone they met. That wasn't the explanation of their popularity with men. It was a great puzzle to Fiona.

The morning was very busy and she was rushed off her feet. There were so many teabags and biscuit-wrapping papers in her litter bin she needed to move it. She struggled with the large plastic bag to the door. Once she got it out to the bin area she would be fine. A young man stood up and took it from her.

'Let me carry that,' he said. He was dark and quite handsome apart from rather spiky hair. He had a motorcycle helmet under one arm, almost as if afraid to leave it out of his sight.

She held the door open to where the bins were lined up. 'Any of those would be great,' she said, and waited courteously for him to return.

'That was very nice of you,' she said.

'It keeps my mind off other things,' he said.

She hoped there wasn't something bad wrong with him, he looked so fit and young. But then Fiona had seen the fit and the well go through her waiting room to be told bad news.

'Well, it's a great hospital,' she said. She didn't even know if it was. She supposed it was all right as hospitals go, but she always said that to people to cheer them and give them hope.

'Is it?' he sounded eager. 'I just brought her here because it was nearest.'

'Oh, it's got a great reputation.' Fiona didn't want to end the conversation.

He was pointing to her chest. 'Giovedì,' he said eventually.

'I beg your pardon?'

'It's the Italian for Thursday,' he explained.

'Oh, is it? Do you speak Italian?'

'No, but I go to an evening class in Italian twice a week.' He seemed very proud of this and eager and enthusiastic. She liked him and wanted to go on talking.

'Who did you say you brought in here?' she asked. Better clear the whole thing up at the start. If it were a wife or a girlfriend, no point in getting interested.

'My mother,' he said, his face clouding. 'She's in Emergency. I'm to wait here.'

'Did she have an accident?'

'Sort of.' He didn't want to talk about it.

Fiona went back to Italian classes. Was it hard work? Where were they held?

'In Mountainview, the big school there.'

Fiona was amazed. 'Isn't that a coincidence! My best friend's father is a teacher there.' It seemed like a bond.

i

'It's a small world all right,' the boy said.

She felt she was boring him, and there were people waiting at the counter for tea and coffee. 'Thanks for helping me with the rubbish, that was very nice of you,' she said.

'You're very welcome.'

'I'm sure your mother will be fine, they're just terrific in Emergency.'

'I'm sure she will,' he said.

Fiona served the people and smiled at them all. Was she perhaps a very boring person? It wasn't something you would automatically know about yourself.

'Am I boring?' she asked Brigid that night.

'No, you're a scream. You should have your own television show.' Brigid was looking with no pleasure at a zip that had parted company with the skirt. 'They just don't make them properly, you know, I couldn't be so fat that this actually burst. That's impossible.'

'Of course it's impossible,' Fiona lied. Then she realised that Brigid was probably lying to her too. 'I am boring,' poor Fiona said, in a sudden moment of self-realisation.

'Fiona, you're thin, isn't that all anybody in the whole bloody world wants to be? Will you shut up about being boring, you were never boring until you started yammering on that you were.' Brigid had little patience with this complaint when faced with the incontrovertible evidence that she'd put on more weight.

'I met this fellow, and he started to yawn and go away from me two minutes after he met me.' Fiona looked very upset.

Brigid relented. 'Where did you meet him?'

'At work, his mother was in Emergency.'

'Well, for God's sake, his mother had been knocked down or whatever. What did you expect him to do, make party conversation with you? Cop yourself on, Fiona, really and truly.'

Fiona was only partly convinced. 'He's learning Italian up in your father's school.'

'Good. Thank God someone is, they were afraid they wouldn't get enough pupils for the class; he was like a weasel all the summer,' Brigid said.

'I blame my parents, of course. I couldn't be anything else but boring, they don't talk about anything. There are no subjects of discussion at home. What would I have to say after years of that?'

'Oh, will you shut up, Fiona, you're not boring, and nobody's parents have anything to say. Mine haven't had a conversation for years. Dad goes into his room after supper and stays there all night. I'm surprised he doesn't sleep there. Sits at his little desk, touches the books and the Italian plates and the pictures on the wall. In the sunny evenings he sits on the sofa in the window just looking ahead of him. How's that for dull?'

'What would I say if I ever saw him again?' Fiona asked.

'My father?'

'No, the fellow with the spiky hair.'

'God, I suppose you could ask him how his mother was. Do I have to go in and sit beside you as if you were a puppet saying speak now, nod now?'

'It mightn't be a bad idea… Does your father have an Italian dictionary?'

'He must have about twenty, why?'

'I want to look up the days of the week,' Fiona explained, as if it should have been obvious.

'I was up seeing the Dunne family tonight,' Fiona said at home.

'That's nice,' her mother said.

'Wouldn't want to see too much of them, not to appear to live in the house,' her father warned.

Fiona wondered what he could mean. She hadn't been there in weeks. If only her parents knew how often the Dunne girls claimed to be staying overnight in this house! Now that would really cause them problems.

'Would you say Brigid Dunne is pretty?' she asked.

'I don't know, it's hard to say,' her mother said.

Her father was reading his paper.

'But is it hard to say, suppose you saw her would you say that's a good looking girl?'

'I'd have to think about it,' said Fiona's mother.

That night in bed Fiona thought about it over and over.

How did Grania and Brigid Dunne get to be so confident and sure of things? They had the same kind of home, they went to the same school. Yet Grania was as brave as a lion. She had been having an affair with a man, an old, old man, for ages now. On off, on off, but it was the real thing. She was going to tell her father and mother about it, say that she was going to move in with him and even get married.

The really terrible thing was that he was Mr. Dunne's boss. And Mr. Dunne didn't like him. Grania didn't know whether she should pretend to begin the affair now so as to give her father time to get accustomed to it, or tell him the truth. The old man said people should be told the truth straight out, that they were often more courageous than you thought.

But Grania and Brigid had their doubts.

Brigid had her doubts, anyway. He was so terribly old. 'You'll be a widow in no time,' she had said.

'I'll be a rich widow, that's why we're getting married. I'll have his pension,' Grania had laughed.

'You'll want other fellows, you'll go off and be unfaithful to him and he'll come after you and find you in someone's bed and do a double slaying.' Brigid looked almost enthusiastic at the prospect.

'No, I never really wanted anyone before. When it happens you'll all know.' Grania looked unbearably smug about it.

Fiona and Brigid raised their eyes to heaven over it all. True love was a very exhausting and excluding thing to have to watch from the sideline. But Brigid wasn't always on the sidelines. She had plenty of offers.

Fiona lay in the dark and thought of the nice boy with the spiky hair who had smiled so warmly at her. Wouldn't it be wonderful to be the kind of girl who could get a boy like that to fancy her.

It was over a week before she saw him again.

'How's your mother? Fiona asked him.

'How did you know about her?' He seemed annoyed, and worried that she had made the enquiry. So much for Brigid's great suggestion.

'When you were here last week you helped me carry out the rubbish bag and you told me your mother was in Emergency.'

His face cleared. 'Yes, of course, I'm sorry. Well she's not great actually, she did it again.'

'Got knocked down?'

'No, took an overdose.'

'Oh, I'm very, very sorry.' She sounded very sincere.

'I know you are.'

There was a silence. Then she pointed to her tee shirt. 'Venerdì,' she said proudly. 'Is that how you pronounce it?'

'Yes, it is.' He said it in a more Italian way and she repeated it.

'Are you learning Italian too then?' he asked with interest.

Fiona spoke without thinking, 'No, I just learned the days of the week in case I met you again,' she said. Her face got red and she wanted to die that moment, beside the coffee and tea machines.

'My name's Barry,' he said. 'Would you like to come to the pictures tonight?'

Barry and Fiona met in O'Connell Street and looked at the cinema queues.

'What would you like?' he asked.

'No, what would you like?'

'I don't mind, honestly.'

'Neither do I.' Did Fiona see a look of impatience crossing his face? 'Perhaps the one with the shortest queue,' she suggested.

'But that's Martial Arts,' he protested.

'That's fine,' she said foolishly.

'You like Martial Arts?' He was unbelieving.

'Do you like them?' she countered.

As a date it wasn't a great success so far. They went to a film which neither of them enjoyed. Then came the problem of what to do next.

'Would you like pizza?' he offered.

Fiona nodded eagerly. 'That would be great.'

'Or would you prefer to go to a pub?'

'Well, I'd like that, too.'

'Let's have a pizza,' he said, in the tone of a man who knew that if any decision was ever going to be made it would have to be made by him.

They sat and looked at each other. The choosing of the pizza had been a nightmare. Fiona had said yes to both the pizza margherita and the pizza napoletana, so Barry had eventually ordered them a quattro stagioni each. This one had four different fillings he said, one in each corner. You could eat them all, no further decisions would be called for.

He told her that at the Italian class Signora the teacher had brought in pizzas one evening. He said that she must spend all the money she earned on bringing them gifts. They all sat there eating and chanting the names of the various pizzas aloud, it had been wonderful. He looked boyish and so enthusiastic about it all. Fiona wished she could have that kind of life in her face and her heart. About anything.

It was of course all her mother and father's fault. They were nice kind people but they had nothing to say to anyone. Her father said that 'Least said soonest mended' should be tattooed on to everyone's arm at birth and then people wouldn't go round saying the wrong thing. It did mean that her father hardly said anything at all. Her mother had a different rule to live by. It had to do with not getting carried away over things. She had always told Fiona not to get carried away by the Irish dancing class, or the holiday in Spain, or anything at all that she got enthusiastic about. That's why she had no opinions, no views.

She had ended up as the kind of person who couldn't decide what film to see, what pizza to eat, and what to say next. Should she talk to him about his mother's suicide attempts, or was he just trying to have some time off to forget about it? Fiona frowned with the concentration of it all.

'I'm sorry, I suppose I'm a bit boring about the Italian classes.'

'Oh no, heavens no you're not,' she cried. 'I just love hearing you talk about them. You see, I wish I cared about things like you do. I was envying you and all the people who bothered to go to that class, I feel a bit dull.' Very often, when she least expected it, she appeared to have said something that pleased people.

Barry smiled from ear to ear and patted her hand. 'No, you're not a bit dull, you're very nice and there's nothing to stop you going to any evening class yourself, is there?'

'No, I suppose not. Is your one full?' Again she wished she had not spoken. It looked too eager, chasing him, not being able to find an evening class of her own. She bit her lip as he shook his head.

'It wouldn't be any good joining ours now. It's too late, we're all too far ahead,' he said proudly. 'And anyway, everyone joined for some kind of reason, you know. They all had a need to learn Italian. Or that's the way it looks.'

'What was your need to learn it?' she asked.

Barry looked a bit awkward. 'Oh well, it has to do with being there for the World Cup,' he said. 'I went with a crowd but I met a lot of nice Italian people and I felt as thick as a plank not being able to speak their language.'

'But the World Cup won't be there again, will it?'

'No, but the Italians will still be there. I'd like to go back to the place I was in and talk to them,' he said. There was a faraway look on his face.

Fiona wondered whether to ask him about his mother but she decided against it. If he had wanted to tell her he would have. It could be too personal and private. She thought he was very, very nice and would love to see him again. How did these girls who were great with fellows manage it? Was it by saying something witty? Or by not saying anything at all? She wished she knew. Fiona would love to have said something that would make this nice kind boy realise that she liked him and would love to be his friend. And even more in time. Why was there no way of sending out a signal?

'I suppose we should be thinking of going home,' Barry said.

'Oh yes. Of course.' He was tired of her, she could see.

'Will I walk you to the bus?'

'That would be nice, thank you.'

'Or would you rather a lift home on my motorbike?'

'Oh, that would be terrific.' She realised she had agreed to both things. What a fool he would think she was. Fiona decided to explain. 'I mean when you offered to walk me to the bus I didn't know that there was a chance of a lift on the bike. But I would prefer the bike actually.' She was shocked at her own courage.

He seemed to be pleased. 'Great,' he said 'You'll hang on to me tight then. Is that a promise?'

'It's a promise,' said Fiona, and smiled at him from behind her big glasses. She asked him to leave her at the end of the road, because it was a quiet place where motorbikes didn't often travel. She wondered would he ask to see her again.

'I'll see you,' Barry said.

'Yes, that would be nice.' She prayed that her face didn't look too hopeful, too beseeching.

'Well, you might run across me in the supermarket,' he said.

'What? Oh sure. Yes. Easily.'

'Or I might see you in the hospital? he added as another possibility.

'Well, yes. Yes, of course, if you were passing by,' she said sadly.

'I'll be passing by every day,' Barry said. They've kept my mother in. Thank you for not asking about her… I didn't want to talk about it.'

'No, no of course not.' Fiona held her breath with relief. She had

'

been within a whisper of leaning on the table in the pizza place and asking him every detail.

'Goodnight, Fiona.'

'Goodnight, Barry, and thank you,' she said.

She lay awake in her bed for a long time. He did like her. And he admired her for not prying into his life. All right, she had made a few silly mistakes, but he had said he would see her again.

Brigid called by the hospital to see Fiona. 'Could you do us a favour, come up to the house tonight?'

'Sure, why?'

'Tonight's the night. Crania's going to tell them about the Old Age Pensioner. There should be fur and feathers flying.'

'What good will I be?' Fiona asked anxiously.

'They might tone it down a bit if there's an outsider in the house. Might.' Brigid seemed doubtful.

'And will he be there, the old man?'

'He'll be parked in a car outside in case he's needed.'

'Needed?' Fiona sounded fearful.

'Well, you know, needed to be welcomed in as a son-in-law, or to come in and rescue Crania if Dad beats her senseless.'

'He wouldn't do that?' Fiona's mouth was an O of horror.

'No, Fiona, he wouldn't. You take everything so literally. Have you no imagination?'

'No, I don't think I have,' Fiona said sadly.

During the day Fiona made enquiries about Mrs. Healy, Barry's mother. She knew Kitty, one of the nurses on the ward, who told her. Heavy stomach-pumping job, second time. She seemed determined to do it. Kitty had no time for her, let them finish themselves off if they were intent on it. Why spend all that time and money telling them they were loved and needed? They probably weren't. If they only knew all the really sick people, decent people who didn't bring it on themselves, then they'd think again.

Kitty had no sympathy for would-be suicides. But she said Fiona wasn't to tell anyone that. She didn't want to get the reputation for being as hard as nails. And she did give this bloody woman her medication and was as nice to her as she was to all the patients.

'What's her first name?'

'Nessa, I think.'

'What's she like?' Fiona asked.

cOh, I don't know. Weak mainly, in shock a bit. Watches the door of the ward all the time waiting for the husband to come in.'

'And does he?'

'Not so far, her son does but that's not what she's looking for, she wants to see the husband's face. That's why she did it.'

'How do you know?'

'That's why they all do it,' Kitty said sagely.

In the Dunnes' kitchen they sat around the kitchen table. There was a macaroni cheese on it but hardly anyone was eating. Mrs. Dunne had her paperback folded back on itself as she so often had. She gave the impression of someone waiting in an airport rather than being in the centre of her own home.

Brigid as usual was eating nothing officially but pulling little bits off the edge of the dish and taking bread and butter to mop up a bit of juice that spilled, and in the end eating more than if she had been able to take a sensible portion. Grania looked pale, and Mr. Dunne was about to head off to his room that he loved so much.

'Dad, wait a minute,' Grania said. Her voice sounded strangulated. 'I want to tell you something, all of you in fact.'

Crania's mother looked up from her book. Brigid looked down at the table. Fiona felt herself go red and look guilty. Only Crania's father seemed unaware that anything of moment was to be said.

'Yes, of course.' He sat down, almost pleased that there was to be general conversation.

'You'll all find this very hard to take, I know, so I'll try to explain it as simply as I can. I love somebody and I want to get married.'

'Well, isn't that great,' her father said.

'Married?' her mother said, as if it was the most unexpected thing that anyone who loved anyone might consider.

Brigid and Fiona said nothing, but gave little grunts and sounds of surprise and pleasure that anyone would have known were not a serious reaction to the news.

Before her father could ask who she loved Grania told him. 'Now, you're not going to like this in the beginning, you're going to say he's too old for me, and a lot of other things, but it's Tony O'Brien.'

The silence was worse than even Grania could have believed.

*

cls this a joke?' her father said eventually.

'No, Dad,'

'Tony O'Brien! The wife of the Principal, no less.' Her mother gave a snort of laughter.

Fiona couldn't bear the tension. 'I hear he's very nice,' she said pleadingly.

'And who do you hear that from, Fiona?' Mr. Dunne spoke like a typical schoolteacher.

'Well, just around,' Fiona said feebly.

'He's not that bad, Dad. And she's got to marry someone,' Brigid said, thinking this was helping somehow.

'Well, if you think Tony O'Brien will marry you, you have another think coming.' Aidan Dunne's face was in a hard, bitter line.

'We wanted you to know about it first, and then we thought we might get married next month.' Grania tried to keep the shake out of her voice.

'Grania, that man tells at least three girls a year that he's going to marry them. Then he takes them back to his bordello and he does what he likes with them. Well, you probably know that, you've been there often enough when you're telling us that you stay with Fiona.'

Fiona cowered at the lie being unmasked.

'It's not like that. It's been going on for ages, well, it's been in the air for ages. I didn't see him any more after he became Principal because I thought he had sort of cheated us both, you and me, but he says he didn't and that things are fine now.'

'Does he, by God?'

'Yes, he does. He cares about you and he has great admiration for you and the way the evening class is going.'

'I know a boy who goes to it, he says it's just great,' squeaked Fiona. She gathered from the looks she got that the interruption had not been hugely helpful.

Tt took him a long time to persuade me, Dad. I was on your side and I didn't want to have anything to do with him. And he explained that there were no sides… you were all in it for the same reason…'

'I'm sure it took him a long time to persuade you. Usually about three days, he boasts. He boasts, you know, about how he gets

H

young girls to bed with him. That's the kind of man we have running Mountainview.'

'Not nowadays, Dad. Not now. I bet he hasn't. Think about it.'

'Only because he's not in the staffroom, because he's in his little God Almighty tinpot throne room, the Principal's Office as he calls it.'

'But Dad, wasn't it always the Principal's Office, even when Mr. Walsh was there?'

'That was different. He was a man worthy of the post.'

'And hasn't Tony been worthy of it? Hasn't he painted the school, got it all smartened up? Started new things everywhere, given you money for your wild garden, set up the Italian class, got the parents to campaign for a better bus service…?'

'Oh, he has you well indoctrinated.'

'What do you think, Mam?' Grania turned to her mother.

'What do I think? What does it matter what I think? You're going to do whatever you want to anyway.'

'I wish you would understand it's not easy for him either. He wanted to tell you a long time ago, he didn't like it being all secret, but I wasn't ready.'

'Oh, yes.' Her father was very scornful.

'Truly, Dad. He said he didn't feel good seeing you and knowing that sooner or later he would have to face you, knowing he had been keeping something from you.'

'Oh dear me, the poor man, the poor worried soul.' They had never seen their father as sarcastic and bitter as this. His face was literally twisted in a sneer.

Grania straightened her shoulders. 'As Mam said, I am of course over twenty-one and I can and will do what I like, but I had hoped to do it with your… well, your encouragement.'

'And where is he, the great Sir Galahad, who didn't dare to come and tell us himself?'

'He's outside, Dad, in his car. I told him that I'd ask him to come in if it were appropriate.' Grania was biting her lip. She knew he would not be asked in.

'It's not appropriate. And no, Grania, I will not give you the blessing or encouragement you ask for. As your mother says, you'll go your own way and what can we do about it?' Angry and upset, he got up and left the table. They heard the door of his room bang behind him.

Grania looked at her mother. Nell Dunne shrugged. 'What did you expect?' she said.

'Tony does love me,' Grania protested.

'Oh, he may or he may not. But do you think that matters to your father? It's just that you picked on the one person out of all the billions in the world that he will never get reconciled to. Never.'

'But you, you understand?' Grania was dying for someone to support her.

'I understand that he's what you want at the moment. Sure. What else is there to understand?'

Crania's face was stony. 'Thanks, that's a lot of help,' she said. Then she looked at her sister and her friend. 'And thank you too, what a great support you were.'

'God, what could we do, go down on our knees and say we always knew you were made for him?' Brigid was stung with the unfairness of the accusation.

'I did try to say he was well thought of,' poor Fiona bleated.

'You did.' Grania was grim. She stood up from the table with her face still hard.

'Where are you going? Don't go after Dad, he won't change,' Brigid said.

'No, I'm going to pack some things and go to Tony's house.'

'If he's so mad for you he'll still be there tomorrow,' her mother said.

'I don't want to stay here any more,' Grania said. 'I didn't realise it until five minutes ago, but I haven't ever been really happy here.'

'What's happy?' Nell Dunne said.

And they were silent as they heard Crania's footsteps going upstairs and into her room to pack a case.

Outside in a car a man strained to see if he could get any indication of what was going on in the house, and wondered whether movement back and forth in the side bedroom was a good sign or a bad sign.

Then he saw Grania leaving the house with a case.

'I'll take you home, sweetheart,' he said to her. And she cried on his shoulder and into his jacket as she had cried on her father not very long ago when she was a child.

Fiona thought about it all for hours afterwards. Grania was only a year older than her. How had she been able to face up to her parents like that? Compared to the dramas in Crania's life, Fiona's were very small. What she must do now was something to get her locked into Barry and his life again.

She would think when she got into work next morning.

If you worked in the hospital you could often get flowers cheap at the end of the day from the florist, blooms that had passed their best. She got a small bunch of freesias and wrote 'Get well soon, Nessa Healy' on it. When nobody was looking she left them at the Nurse's Station in the ward. Then she hurried back to her coffee shop.

She didn't see Barry for two days, but he looked cheerful when he came in. 'She's much better, she'll be coming home at the end of the week,' he said.

'Oh, I am glad… has she got over it, whatever it was?'

'Well, it's my father, you see. She thinks… well, she thought… anyway, he wouldn't come and see her. He said he wasn't going to be blackmailed by these suicide attempts. And she was very depressed at first.'

'But now?'

'Now it seems that he gave in. He sent her flowers. A bunch of freesias. So she knows he cares and she's going home.'

Fiona felt herself go cold. 'And he didn't come in himself… with the flowers?'

'No just left them in the ward and went away. Still, it did the trick.'

'And what does he say about it all, your Dad?' Fiona's voice was faint.

'Oh, he keeps saying he never sent her flowers, but that's part of the way they go on.' He looked a bit worried about it.

'Everyone's parents are very odd, my friend was just saying that to me the other day. You couldn't understand what goes on in their minds at all.' She looked eager and concerned.

'When she's settled in back at home will we go out again?' he asked.

'I'd love that,' said Fiona. Please, please God, may no one ever find out about the flowers, may they decide to take the easy way out and go along with the notion that he had sent them.

Barry took her to a football match. Before they went he told her which was the good team and which was the bad one. He explained the offside rule and said that the referee had been blind on some previous matches and it was hoped that his sight might have returned to him by now.

At the match Barry met a dark, thickset man. 'Howaya, Luigi, I didn't know you followed this team.'

Luigi couldn't have been more pleased to meet him. 'Bartolomeo, me old skin, I've been with these lads since time began.'

Then they both broke into Italian, mi piace giocare a calcio. They laughed immoderately at this, and Fiona laughed too.

'That means I like to play football,' Luigi explained.

Fiona thought it must, but she sounded as if it was news to her. 'You're all getting on great at the Italian, then?'

cOh sorry, Luigi, this is my friend Fiona,' Barry said.

'Aren't you lucky your girlfriend will go to a match. Suzi says she'd prefer to stand and watch paint dry.'

Fiona wondered should she explain to this odd man with the Dublin accent and the Italian name that she wasn't really Barry's girlfriend. But she decided to let it pass. And why was he calling Barry this strange name?

'If you're meeting Suzi later, maybe we'd all have a drink?' Barry suggested, and Luigi thought that was the greatest idea he'd ever heard and they named a pub.

All through the match Fiona struggled hard to understand it, and to cheer and be excited at the right time. In her heart she thought that this was great, it was what other girls did, went to matches with fellows and met other fellows and joined up with them and their girlfriends later.

She felt terrific.

She must just remember now the different circumstances which led to a goal kick or a corner, and which to a throw-in. And even more important she must remember not to ask Barry about his mother and his father and the mysterious bunch of freesias.

Suzi was gorgeous, she had red hair and she was a waitress in one of those posh places in Temple Bar.

Fiona told her about serving coffee in the hospital. 'It's not in the same league,' she said apologetically.

'It's more important,' said Suzi firmly. 'You're serving people who need il, I'm just putting it in front of people who are there to be seen.'

The men were happy to see the girls talking so they left them to it and analysed the match down to the bone. Then they started talking about the great trip to Italy.

'Does Bartolomeo talk night and day about this viaggio?' Suzi wanted to know.

'Why do you call him that?' Fiona whispered.

'It's his name, isn't it?' Suzi seemed genuinely surprised.

'Well, it's Barry actually.'

'Oh. Well, it's this Signora, she's marvellous altogether. She lives as a lodger in my mother's house. She runs it all and she calls Lou Luigi. It's an improvement as it happens, I sometimes call him that myself. But are you going?'

'Going where?'

'To Roma?' Suzi said, rolling her eyes and the letter R.

'I'm not sure. I don't really know Barry all that well yet. But if things go on well between us, I might be able to go. You never know.'

'Start saving, it'll be great fun. Lou wants us to get married out there or at least have it as a honeymoon.' Suzi waved her finger with a beautiful engagement ring on it.

'That's gorgeous,' Fiona said.

'Yeah, it's not real but a friend of Lou's got some great deal on it.'

'Imagine a honeymoon in Rome.' Fiona was wistful.

'The only snag is that I'll be sharing a honeymoon with fifty or sixty people,' said Suzi.

'Then you'll only have to entertain him at night, not in the day as well,' said Fiona.

'Entertain him'} What about me? I was expecting him to entertain me.'

Fiona wished she hadn't spoken, as she so often wished. Of course someone like Suzi would think that way. She'd expect this Luigi to dance attendance on her. She wouldn't try to please him and fear she was annoying him all the time like Fiona would. Wouldn't it be wonderful to be as confident as that. But then, if you looked like Suzi with all that gorgeous red hair, and if you worked in such a smart place, and probably had a history of fellows like Luigi giving you great rocks of rings… Fiona sighed deeply.

Suzi looked at her sympathetically. 'Was the match very boring?' she enquired.

'No, it wasn't bad. I'd never been to one before. I'm not sure if I understand offside though, do you?'

'Jesus no. And I haven't a notion of understanding it. You'd find yourself stuck out in the freezing cold with people bursting your eardrums if you could understand that. Meet them afterwards, that's my motto.' Suzi knew everything.

Fiona looked at her with undisguised admiration and envy. 'How did you get to be… you know, the way you are, sure of things? Was it just because you were good looking?'

Suzi looked at her. This girl with the eager face and the huge glasses wasn't having her on. She was quite sincere. 'I have no idea what I look like,' Suzi said truthfully. 'My father told me I looked like a slut and a whore, my mother said I looked a bit fast, places I tried to get jobs in said I wore too much make-up, fellows who wanted to go to bed with me said I looked great. How would you know what you looked like?'

'Oh I know, I know,' Fiona agreed. Her mother said she looked silly in the tee-shirts, people in the hospital loved them. Some people said her glasses were an asset - they magnified her eyes; other people asked could she not afford contact lenses. And sometimes she thought her long hair was nice and sometimes she thought it was like an overgrown schoolgirl.

'So I suppose in the end I realised that I was a grown up and that I was never going to please everyone,' Suzi explained. 'And I decided to please myself, and I have good legs so I wear short skirts, but not stupid ones, and I did tone down the make-up a bit. And now that I've stopped worrying about it nobody seems to be giving out to me at all.'

'Do you think I should get my hair cut?' Fiona whispered to her trustingly.

'No I don't, and I don't think you should leave it long. It's your hair and your face and you should do what you think about it, don't take my advice or Bartolomeo's advice or your mother's advice, otherwise you'll always be a child. That's my view anyway.'

Oh it was so easy for the beautiful Suzi to talk like that. Fiona felt like a mouse in spectacles. A long-haired mouse. But if she got rid of the glasses and the long hair, she would just be a blinking short-haired mouse. What would make her grown up, and able to make decisions like ordinary people? Maybe something would happen, something that would make her strong.

Barry had enjoyed the evening. He drove Fiona home on his motorbike and as she clung to his jacket she wondered what she would say if he asked her to another match. Should she be courageous and, like Suzi, say she'd prefer to meet him afterwards? Or should she work out the offside rule with someone at work and go with him? Which was the better thing to do? If only she could choose which she wanted to do herself. But she hadn't grown up yet like Suzi, she was someone who had no opinions.

'It was nice to meet your friends,' she said, when she got off the bike at the end of her street.

'Next time we'll do something that you choose,' he said. 'I'll drop in and see you tomorrow. That's the day I'm taking my mother home.'

'Oh, I thought she'd be home by now.' Barry had said he would ask her out when his mother had settled in at home, obviously she had thought Mrs. Healy had been discharged. Fiona had not dared to go near the ward in case of being identified as the woman who had left the freesias.

'No. We thought she'd be well enough but she had a set-back.'

'Oh I'm sorry to hear that,' Fiona said.

'She got it into her head that my dad had sent her flowers. And of course he hadn't, and when she realised that she had a relapse.'

Fiona felt hot and cold at the same time. 'How awful,' she said. And then in a small voice: 'Why did she think he had?'

Barry's face was sad. He shrugged his shoulders. 'Who knows. There was a bunch of flowers with her name printed on it. But the doctors think she got them for herself.'

'Why do they think that?'

'Because nobody else knew she was in there,' Barry said simply.

Another night without sleeping for Fiona. Too much had happened. The match, the rules, the meeting with Luigi and Suzi, the possibility of a trip to Italy, people thinking she was Barry's girlfriend. The whole idea that once you grow up you know what to do and think and decide for yourself. And then the horrible, awful realisation that she had set Barry's mother back by her gift of the flowers. She had thought it would be something nice for the woman to wake up to. Instead it had made everything a thousand times worse.

Fiona was very pale and tired-looking when she went into work. She had taken the wrong day from her pile of tee-shirts. She created great confusion. People kept saying that they thought it was Friday and other people told her that she must have got dressed in the dark. One woman who saw Monday on Fiona's chest left before her appointment because she thought she had got the wrong day. Fiona went to the cloakroom and turned her shirt back to front. She just made sure that nobody saw her from the back.

Barry came in around lunchtime. 'Miss Clarke the supervisor let me have a couple of hours off, she's really nice. She's in the Italian class too, I call her Francesca there and Miss Clarke at work, it's a scream,' he said.

Fiona was beginning to think that half of Dublin was in this class masquerading under false names. But she had more on her mind than to feel envious of all these people who were playing childish games up in that tough school in Mountainview. She must find out about his mother without appearing to ask.

'Everything all right?'

'No, it's not, as it happens. My mother doesn't want to come home and she's not bad enough for them to keep here, so they'll have to get her referred to a mental home.' He looked very bleak and sad.

'That's bad, Barry,' she said, her face tired with lack of sleep and anxiety.

'Yes well, I'll have to cope somehow. I just wanted to say, that you know I said we'd have another outing and you could choose what we did…?'

Fiona began to panic, she hadn't dared to choose yet. God, he wasn't going to ask her now on top of everything else.

'I haven't exactly made up my mind what…'

'No I mean, we may have to put it off a bit, but it's not that I'm going out with anyone else, or don't want to or anything…' he was stammering his eagerness.

Fiona realised that he did like her. About three-quarters of the weight on her heart lifted. 'Oh no, for heaven's sake, I understand, whenever things have sorted themselves out, well I'll hear from you then.' Her smile was enormous, the people waiting for their tea and coffee were ignored.

Barry smiled just as broadly and left.

Fiona learned the rules for offside in soccer but she couldn't understand how you could make sure there were always two people between you and the goal. No one gave her a satisfactory answer.

She rang her friend Brigid Dunne.

Brigid's father answered the phone. 'Oh yes. I'm glad to have an opportunity of talking to you, Fiona. I'm afraid I was rather discourteous to you when you were in our house last. Please forgive me.'

'That's fine, Mr. Dunne. You were upset.'

'Yes, I was very upset and still am. But it's no excuse for behaving badly to a guest. Please accept my apologies.'

'No, maybe I shouldn't have been there.'

'I'll get Brigid for you,' he said.

Brigid was in great form. She had lost a kilo in weight, she had found a fantastic jacket that made you look positively angular, and she was going on a free trip to Prague. No awful nude beaches there showing people up for what they were.

'And how's Grania getting on?'

'I haven't an idea.'

'You mean you haven't been to see her?' Fiona was shocked.

'Hey, that's a good idea. Let's go up to Adultery Mews and see her tonight. We might meet the geriatric as well.'

'Shush, don't call it that. Your father might hear.'

'That's what he calls it, it's his expression.' Brigid was unrepentant.

They fixed a place to meet. It would be a laugh anyway, Brigid thought. Fiona wanted to know if Grania had survived.

Grania opened the door. She wore jeans and a long black sweater. She looked amazed to see them. 'I don't believe it,' she said, delighted. 'Come in. Tony, the first sign of an olive branch has come to the door.'

He came out smiling, good looking, but very old. Fiona wondered how could Grania see her future with this man.

'My sister Brigid, and our friend Fiona.'

'Come in, you couldn't have come at a better time. I wanted to open a bottle of wine. Grania said we were drinking too much, which meant that I was drinking too much… so now we have to.'

He led them into a room filled with books, tapes and CDs. There was some Greek music on the player.

'Is that the Zorba dance?' Fiona asked.

'No, but it's the same composer. Do you like Theodorakis?' His eyes lit up at the thought that he might have found someone who liked his era of music.

'Who?' said Fiona, and the smile fell sadly.

'It's very plush.' Brigid looked around in grudging admiration.

'Isn't it? Tony got all these shelves made, same man who did the shelves for Dad. How is he?' Grania really wanted to know.

'Oh, you know, the same.' Brigid was no help.

'Is he still ranting and raving?'

'No, more sighing and groaning.'

'And Mam?'

'You know Mam, hardly notices you're gone.'

'Thanks, you know how to make someone feel wanted.'

'I'm only telling you the truth.'

Fiona was trying to talk to the old man so that he wouldn't hear all this intimate detail about the Dunne family. But he probably knew it all already.

Tony poured them a glass of wine each. 'I'm delighted to see you girls, but I have a bit of business up in the school to attend to, and you'll want a chat, so I'll leave you at it.'

'You don't have to go, love.' Grania called him love quite unselfconsciously.

'I know I don't have to, but I will.' He turned to Brigid. 'And if you're talking to your father, tell him… well… tell him…' Brigid looked at him expectantly. But the words didn't come easily to Tony O'Brien. 'Tell him… she's fine,' he said gruffly, and left.

'Well,' said Brigid. 'What do you make of that?'

'He's desperately upset,' said Grania. 'You see, Dad doesn't speak to him at school, just walks out if he comes in, and it's hard for him there. And it's hard for me here not being able to go home.'

'Can you not go home?' Fiona asked.

'Not really, there'd be a scene, and the no daughter of mine speech all over again.'

'I don't know, he's quietened down a bit,' Brigid said. 'Maybe he'd only moan and groan for the first few visits, after that he might be normal again.'

'I hate him saying things about Tony.' Grania looked doubtful.

'Bringing up his lurid past, do you mean?' Brigid asked.

'Yeah, but then I had a bit of a past too. If I was as old as he is I'd hope to have a very substantial past. It's just that I haven't been around long enough.'

'Aren't you lucky to have a past?' Fiona was wistful.

'Oh shut up, Fiona. You're as thin as a rake, you must have a past to beat the band,' said Brigid.

'I've never slept with anyone, made love, done it,' Fiona blurted out.

The Dunne sisters looked at her with interest.

'You must have,' Brigid said.

'Why must I have? I'd have remembered it if I did. I didn't, that's it.'

'Why not?' Grania asked.

'I don't know. Either people were drunk or awful or it was the wrong place, or by the time I had decided I would it was too late. You know me.' She sounded full of self-pity and regret. Grania and Brigid seemed at a loss for words. 'But I'd like to now,' Fiona said eagerly.

'Pity we let the stud of all time out, he could have obliged,' Brigid said, jerking her head towards the door that Tony O'Brien had closed behind him.

'I want you to know that I don't find that even remotely funny,' Grania said.

'Nor do I,' said Fiona disapprovingly. 'I wasn't thinking of doing it with just anybody, it's someone I'm in love with.'

'Oh well, excuse me,' Brigid said huffily.

Grania poured another glass of wine for them. 'Let's not fight,' she said.

'Who's fighting?' Brigid asked, stretching out her glass.

'Remember when we were at school we used to have truth or dare?'

'You always took dare,' Fiona remembered.

'But tonight let's do truth.'

'What should I do, the two of you tell me.'

'You should go home and see Dad. He does miss you,' Brigid said.

'You should talk about other things like the bank and politics and the evening class he runs, not things that would remind him of… er • •• Tony, until he gets more used to it,' Fiona said.

'And Mam? Does she really not care?'

'No, I only said that to annoy you. But you know she's got something on her mind, maybe it's work or the menopause, you're not the Big Issue there like you are for Dad.'

'That's fair enough,' Grania said. 'Now, let's do Brigid.'

'I think Brigid should zip up her mouth about being fat,' Fiona said.

'Because she's not fat, she's sexy. A huge bum and big boobs, isn't that what men just love?' said Grania.

'And a very small waist in between,' Fiona added.

'But very, very boring about bloody calories and zip fasteners,' Grania said with a laugh.

'Easy to say when you're like a brush handle.'

'Boring and sexy, an unexpected combination,' Grania said.

And Brigid was smiling a bit, she could see they meant it. 'Right. Now Fiona,' Brigid said, visibly cheered.

The sisters paused. It was easier to attack a member of your own family.

'Let me have another drink to prepare for it,' Fiona said unexpectedly.

'Too humble.'

'Too apologetic.'

'No views on things.'

'Not able to make up her mind on anything.'

'Never really grew up and realised we all have to make up our own minds.'

'Probably going to remain a child all her life.'

'Say that again,' Fiona interrupted.

Grania and Brigid wondered had they got too carried away.

'It's just that you're too nice to people and nobody really knows what you think,' Grania said.

'Or if you think,' Brigid added darkly.

'About being a child?' Fiona begged.

'Well, I suppose I meant that we have to make decisions, don't we. Otherwise other people make them for us and it's like being a child. That's all I meant,' Grania said, afraid that she had offended funny little Fiona.

'That's extraordinary. You're the second person who's said that to me. This girl, Suzi, she said it too when I asked her should I cut my hair. How amazing.'

'So do you think you'll do it?' Brigid asked.

'Do what?'

'Make up your own mind in time about things, sleep with your man, get your hair cut, have views?'

'Will you stop bellyaching about calories?' Fiona said with spirit.

'Yeah, I will if it's that boring.'

'OK then,' said Fiona.

Grania said she'd go out for a Chinese takeaway if Fiona promised she wouldn't dither about what she wanted and if Brigid didn't say one word about things being deep fried. They said that if Grania agreed to go and see her father next day they would obey her rules.

They opened another bottle of wine and laughed until the old man came home and said that at his age he had to have regular sleep so he would chase them away.

But they knew by the way he was looking at Grania that he wasn't thinking about regular sleep.

'Well, that was a great idea to go and see them.' Brigid thought it was her idea by the time they were on the bus home.

'She seems very happy,' Fiona said.

'He's so old though, isn't he?'

'Well, he's what she wants,' Fiona said firmly.

To her surprise Brigid agreed with her vehemently. 'That's the point. It doesn't matter if he's from Mars with pointed ears if it's what she wants. If more people had the guts to go after what they want the world would be a better place.' She spoke very loudly, due perhaps to the wine.

A lot of people on the bus heard her and laughed, some of them even clapped. Brigid glared at them ferociously.

'Aw come on, sexy. Give us a smile,' one of the fellows shouted.

'They called me sexy,' Brigid whispered, delighted, to Fiona.

'What did we tell you?' Fiona said.

She resolved that she would be a different person when Barry Healy asked her out again. As he undoubtedly would.

The time seemed very long, even though it was only a week. Then Barry turned up again.

'Are things all right at home?' she asked.

'No, not really. My mother has no interest in anything, she won't even cook. And in the old days she'd have you demented baking this and that and wanting to force-feed you. Now I have to buy her instant meals in the supermarket or she'd eat nothing.'

Fiona was sympathetic. 'What do you think you'll do?' she asked.

'I've no idea, honestly I'm getting madder than she is herself. Listen, have you decided what you'd like to do when we go out?'

And suddenly there and then Fiona decided. I'd like to come and have tea in your house.'

'No, that wouldn't be a good idea,' he said startled.

'You did ask me what I'd like, that's what it is. Your mother would have to stir herself to get something for me if you said you were bringing a girl to supper, and I could be nice and cheerful and talk about things normally.'

'No, Fiona, not yet.'

'But isn't this the very time it would be a help? How's she going to think that things will ever be normal if you don't make it look as if they are?'

'Well, I suppose you have a point,' he began doubtfully.

'So what evening then?' With grave misgivings Barry fixed the date.

Then he expected Fiona to dither and say that she'd like anything at all, and really it didn't matter. But to his surprise she said that she'd be tired after a long day at work and she'd love something substantial like say spaghetti or maybe shepherd's pie, something nice and comforting. Barry was amazed. But he delivered the message.

'I wouldn't be able to do anything like that,' Barry's mother said.

'Of course you would, Mam, aren't you a great cook?'

'Your father doesn't think so,' she said. And Barry's heart turned to lead again. It was going to take much more than Fiona coming to supper to make his mother turn the corner. He wished that he weren't an only child, that he had six brothers and sisters to share this with. He wished that his father would just say the bloody things that his mother wanted to hear, that he loved her and that his heart was broken when she tried to take her own life. And that he would swear never to leave her for anyone else. After all his father was terribly old, nearly fifty for heaven's sake, of course he wasn't going to leave Mam for anyone else. Who would have him for a start? And why did he have to take this attitude that suicide attempts were blackmail and he wouldn't give in to blackmail. His father had no firm opinions on anything else. When there was an election or a referendum his father would sigh and go back to his evening paper rather than express a view. Why did he have to feel so strongly about this of all things? Couldn't he say the words that would please her?

This bright idea of Fiona's wasn't going to work. He could see that.

'Well, all right, Mam, I suppose I could try to cook something myself. I'm not much good, but I'll try. And I'll pretend you made it. After all, I wouldn't want her to think you weren't welcoming her.'

'I'll cook it,' said his mother. 'You couldn't make a meal for Cascarino.' Cascarino was their big cat with only one eye. He had been called after Tony Cascarino who played football for the Republic of Ireland, but the cat was not as fleet of foot.

Fiona brought a small box of chocolates for Barry's mother.

'Oh, you shouldn't have, they'll only make me put on weight,' the woman said to her. She was pale-looking and had tired eyes. She wore a dull brown dress and her hair was flat and listless.

But Fiona looked at her with admiration. 'Oh Mrs. Healy, you're not fat. You've got lovely cheekbones, that's how you know if a person's going to put on weight or not, the cheekbones,' she said.

Barry saw his mother touch her face with some disbelief. 'Is that right?' she said.

'Oh, it's a fact, look at all the film stars who had good cheekbones…' Together they listed them happily. The Audrey Hepburns who never put on a pound, the Ava Gardners, the Meryl Streeps, then they examined the so-called pretty women whose cheekbones were not apparent.

Barry hadn't seen his mother so animated in weeks. Then he heard Fiona talk about Marilyn Monroe, who might not have stood the test of time if she had allowed herself to grow older. He wished she hadn't let the conversation get round to people who had committed suicide.

His. mother naturally took up the theme. 'But that's not why she killed herself of course, not over her cheekbones.'

Barry could see the colour rising on Fiona's face but she fought back. 'No, I suppose she did it because she thought she wasn't loved enough. Lord, it's just as well the rest of us don't do that, the world would be empty in no time.' She spoke so casually and lightly about it that Barry held his breath.

But unexpectedly his mother answered in quite a normal voice. 'Maybe she hoped she'd be found and whoever it was she loved would be sorry.'

'I'd say he'd have been more pissed off with her than ever,' Fiona said cheerfully.

Barry looked at Fiona with admiration. She had more spark about her today. It was hard to say what it was, but she didn't seem to be waiting to take her cue from him all the time. It had been a very good idea to insist on coming to supper. And imagine Fiona of all people telling his mother she had good cheekbones.

He felt it was a lot less disastrous than it might have been. He let himself relax a little and wondered what they would talk about next, now that they had been through the minefield of Marilyn Monroe's suicide.

Barry ran a list of conversational topics past himself without success. He couldn't say Fiona worked in the hospital, that would remind everyone of the stomach pumping and the stay there, he couldn't suddenly start talking about the Italian Class, the supermarket, or his motorbike because they would know he was trying to get on to other less controversial subjects. He was going to tell his mother about Fiona's tee-shirts but he didn't think she'd like that, and Fiona had dressed up in her good jacket and nice pink blouse for the meeting so perhaps it would be letting her down.

At that moment the cat came in and fixed his one good eye on Fiona.

I'd like to introduce you to Cascarino,' Barry said, never having loved the big angry cat so much in his life. Please may Cascarino not claw at Fiona's new skirt, or pause to lick his nether regions in full view of everyone. But the cat laid his head on Fiona's lap and began a purr that sounded like a light aircraft revving up.

'Do you have a cat at home yourselves?' Barry's mother asked.

'No, I'd love one but my father says you never know what trouble they lead to.'

'That's a pity, I find them a great consolation. Cascarino may not look much but for a male he's very understanding.'

'I know,' Fiona agreed with her. 'Isn't it funny the way men are so difficult. I honestly don't think they mean to be, it's just the way they're made.'

°

'They're made without heart,' Mrs. Healy said, her eyes dangerously bright. 'Oh, they have something in there all right beating away and sending the blood out, but it's not a heart. Look at Barry's father, he's not even here this evening even though he knew Barry was having a friend to supper. He knew and he's still not here.'

This was worse than Barry could have believed possible. He had no idea that his mother would go in at the deep end in the first half an hour.

But to his amazement Fiona seemed to be able to cope with it quite easily.

'That's men for you. When I bring Barry home to my house to meet my family, my father will let me down too. Oh, he'll be there all right, he's always there. But I bet you within five minutes he'll tell Barry it's dangerous to ride a motorbike, it's dangerous to drive a supermarket van, it's stupid to follow football. If he can think of anything wrong with learning Italian he'll say that. He only sees all the things that are wrong with everything, not the things that are right. It's very depressing.'

'And what does your mother say to all this?' Barry's mother was interested in the situation, her own attack on her husband seemed to be put aside for the moment.

'Well, I think over the years she started to agree with him. They're old you see, Mrs. Healy, much older than you and Barry's father. I'm the youngest of a big family. They're set in their ways, you won't change them now.' She looked so eager with her glasses glinting and a big pink bow tying back her nice shiny hair. Any mother would be glad to have a warm girl like this for her son.

Barry saw his mother beginning to relax.

'Barry, like a good lad will you go into the kitchen and put the pie into the oven, and do what has to be done out there.'

He left them and clattered around, then he crept back to the door to hear what was going on in the sitting room. They were speaking in low voices and he couldn't make it out. Please God may Fiona not be saying anything stupid. And may his mother not be telling all the fantasies about Dad having another woman. He sighed and went back to the kitchen to set the table for the three of them. He felt annoyed with his father for not being there. It was after all an attempt at restoring the situation to normal. He could have made an effort. Did Dad not see he was only giving fuel to Mam's suspicions by all this?

Why couldn't he just come in and act the part for an evening? But still, his mother had made a chicken pie and an apple tart for afterwards. This was an advance.

The supper went better than he dared hope. Fiona ate everything that was put in front of her and almost licked the plate. She said she'd love to know how to make pastry. She was no good at cooking, and then suddenly a thought struck her. 'That's what I could do, go to a cookery class,' she cried. 'Barry was asking what I'd really like to learn, and now that I see this spread I know what I'd enjoy.'

'That's a good idea,' Barry said, delighted at the praise for his mother's cooking.

'You'd want to make sure that you got someone with a light hand to teach you pastry,' his mother said.

Finding fault with the idea, of course. Barry fumed inside.

But Fiona didn't seem to mind. 'Yes, I know, and of course it would be the middle of the term and all. Listen… no, I couldn't ask… but maybe…' She looked at Barry's mother eagerly.

'Go on, what is it?'

'I don't suppose on Tuesday or Thursday when Barry's at his evening class, that you would show me, you know give me a few hints?' The older woman was silent for a moment. Fiona rushed in. 'I'm sorry, that's typical of me, open my big mouth before I think what I'm going to say.'

T'd be delighted to teach you to cook, Fiona,' said Barry's mother 'We'll start next Tuesday, with bread and scones.'

Brigid Dunne was very impressed. 'Getting his mother to teach you cooking, now that's a clever move,' she said admiringly.

'Well, it sort of came out naturally, I just said it.' Fiona was amazed at her own daring.

'And you're the one who says she's no good with men. When are we going to meet this Barry?'

'Soon, I don't want to overpower him with all my friends, particularly sexy, over-confident ones like you.'

'You have changed, Fiona,' Brigid said.

'Grania? It's Fiona.'

'Oh great, I thought it was Head Office. How are you? Have you done it yet?'

'Done what?'

'You know,' Grania said.

'No, not yet, but soon. It's all on course, I just rang to thank you.'

'Whatever for?'

'For saying I was a bit dopey.'

'I never said that, Fiona.' Grania was stung.

'No, but you told me to get my act together and it worked a dream. He's mad about me, and his mother is. And it couldn't be better.'

'Well, I'm glad.' Grania sounded pleased.

'I just rang to ask did you do your bit, go back to see your father?'

'No. I tried, but I lost my nerve at the last moment.'

'Grania!' Fiona sounded stern.

'Hey, you of all people lecturing me.'

'I know, but we did promise to keep each other up to all the things we said that evening.'

'I know.'

'And Brigid hasn't talked about low cai sweetener since then, and I've been as brave as a tiger about things. You wouldn't believe it.'

'Oh bloody hell, Fiona. I'll go tonight,' said Grania.

Grania took a deep breath and knocked on the door. Her father answered. She couldn't read his face.

'You still have your key, you don't have to have the door answered for you,' he said.

'I didn't like to waltz in as if I still lived here,' she said.

'Nobody said you couldn't live here.'

'I know, Dad.' They still stood in the hall. An awkward silence all around them. 'And where's everyone else? Are they all at home?'

'I don't know,' her father said.

'Come on, Dad. You must know.'

'I don't. Your mother may be in the kitchen reading, and Brigid may be upstairs. I was in my room.'

'How's it getting along?' she asked, to try and cover the loneliness. This wasn't a big house, not big enough for the man not to know whether his wife and daughter were at home or not. And not to care.

'It's fine,' he said.

'Will you show it to me?' Grania wondered was it going to be like this for ever, making conversation with her father like drawing teeth.

'Certainly.'

He led her into the room and she literally gasped in surprise. The evening sun came through the window, the yellow and gold colours all around the windowseat picked up the light, and the curtains in purple and gold looked as if they were for a stage in a theatre. His shelves were full of books and ornaments, and the little desk shone and glowed in the evening light.

'Dad, it's beautiful. I never knew you could make anything like this,' Grania said.

'There's a lot we never knew about each other,' he said.

'Please, Dad, let me admire your lovely, lovely room, and look at those frescoes, they're marvellous.'

'Yes.'

'And all those colours, Dad. It's like a dream.'

Her enthusiasm was so genuine he couldn't keep cold and stiff. 'It is a bit of a dream, but then I've always been a stupid sort of dreamer, Grania.'

'I inherited it from you then.'

'No, I don't think you did.'

'Not in this artistic way, I couldn't make a room like this in a million years. But I do have my dreams, yes.'

'They're not proper dreams, Grania. Truly they're not.'

'I tell you this, Dad, I never loved anyone before, apart from you and Mam, and to be honest, you more. No, I want to say this because you might not let me talk again. Now I know what love is about. It's wanting the best for someone else, it's wanting them to be happier than you are, isn't that it?'

'Yes.' He spoke in a very dead voice.

'You felt that for Mam once, didn't you? I mean, you probably still do.'

'I think it changes as you get older.'

'But I won't have much time for it to get older. You and Mam have had nearly twenty-five years, Tony'll be dead and buried in twenty-five years' time. He smokes and drinks and is hopeless. You know that. If I get a good ten years I'll be lucky.'

'Grania, you could do so much better.'

'You couldn't do better than to be loved by the person you love, Dad. I know that, you know that.'

'He's not reliable.'

'I rely on him absolutely, Dad. I would trust him with my life.'

'Wait until he leaves you with a fatherless child. You'll remember these words then.'

'More than anything else on earth I would love to have his child.'

'Well, go ahead. Nothing's going to stop you.'

Grania bent and examined the flowers on the little table. 'You buy these for yourself, Dad?'

'Who else do you think would buy them for me?'

There were tears in her eyes. 'I'd buy them for you if you'd let me, I'd come here and sit with you, and if I had your grandchild I would bring him or her here.'

'You're telling me you're pregnant, is that it?'

'No, that's not it. I'm in control of whether I will be or not, and I won't until I know the child would be welcomed by everyone.'

'That could be a long wait,' he said. But she noticed that this time there were tears in his eyes too.

'Dad,' she said, and it was hard to say which of them moved first towards the other until their arms were around each other and their tears were lost in each other's shoulders.

Brigid and Fiona went to the pictures.

'Have you been to bed with him yet?'

'No, but there's no rush, it's all going according to plan,' Fiona said.

'Longest plan since time began,' Brigid grumbled.

'No, believe me, I know what I'm doing.'

'I'm glad someone does,' Brigid said. 'Dad and Grania have gone all emotional on us. Crania's sitting in Dad's room talking to him as u a cross word had never been said between them.'

'Isn't that good?'

'Yes, it's good, of course it's good, but it's a mystery,' Brigid complained.

'And what does your mother say about it?'

'Nothing. That's another mystery. I used to think that we were

«Is the dullest, most ordinary family in the western world. Now I think I live in a madhouse. I used to think that you were the odd one, Fiona. But there you are, the little pet of the house, learning to be a gourmet chef from the mother and planning to bed the son. How did it all happen?'

Brigid hated mysteries and being confused by things. She sounded very disgruntled indeed.

The cookery classes were a great success. Sometimes Barry's father was there. Tall and dark and watchful, he looked a lot younger than his wife, but then his mind was not so troubled. He worked in a big nurseries and vegetable farm, delivering produce and flowers to restaurants and hotels around the city. He was perfectly pleasant to Fiona but not enthusiastic. He was not curious about her and he gave the impression of someone passing through rather than someone who lived there.

Sometimes Barry came back from his own Italian class and ate the results of their cooking, but Fiona said he shouldn't hurry back specially. It was too late for eating anyway, and he liked talking to the people afterwards. She would take the bus home herself. After all, they would meet on other nights.

Bit by bit she began to hear the story of the Great Infidelity. She tried not to listen at first. 'Don't tell me all this, Mrs. Healy please, you'll wish you hadn't when you're all nice and friendly with Mr. Healy again and then you'll be sorry.'

'No, I won't, you're my friend. Chop those a lot finer, Fiona. You don't want great lumps in it. You have to hear. You have to know what Barry's father is like.'

Everything had been fine until two years ago. Well, you know, fine in a manner of speaking. His hours had always been difficult, she had lived with that. Sometimes up for the four-thirty run in the morning, sometimes working late at night. But there had been time off. Grand time in the middle of the day sometimes. She could remember when they had gone to the cinema for the two o'clock show, and then had tea and buns afterwards and she was the envy of every other woman around. None of them ever went to the pictures in the daylight with their husbands. And he had never wanted her to work in the old days. He had said that he brought in plenty for the two of them and the child. She should keep the home nice and cook for them and be there when he got time off. That way they could have a good life.

But two years ago it had all changed. He had met someone and started having an affair.

'You can't be sure, Mrs. Healy,' Fiona said as she weighed out the raisins and sultanas for the fruit cake. 'It could be anything, you know, like pressure at work, or the traffic getting worse, you know the way everyone's giving out about rush hour.'

'There's no rush hour at four a.m. when he comes home.' Her face was grim.

'But isn't it these awful hours?'

'I checked with the company, he works twenty-eight hours a week. He's out of here nearly twice that much.'

'The travelling to and fro?' Fiona said desperately

'He's about ten minutes from work,' Barry's mother said.

'He might just want a bit of space.'

'He has that all right, he sleeps in the spare room.'

'Maybe not to wake you?'

'Maybe not to be near me.'

'And if she exists who do you think she is?' Fiona spoke in a whisper.

'I don't know but I'll find out.'

'Would it be someone at work, do you think?'

'No, I know all of them. There's no one likely there. But it's someone he met through work though, and that could be half of Dublin.'

It was very distressing to listen to her. All that unhappiness, and according to Barry it was all in her mind.

'Does she talk to you at all about it?' Barry asked Fiona.

Fiona thought there as a sort of sacredness about the conversations over the floured boards and the bubbling casseroles, over cups of coffee after the cooking when Fiona would sit on the sofa and the huge half-blind Cascarino would lie purring on her lap.

'A bit here and there, not much,' she lied.

Nessa Healy thought that Fiona was her friend, it wasn't the action of a friend to repeat conversations back.

Barry and Fiona saw a lot of each other. They went to football matches and to the cinema and as the weather got nicer they went on the motorbike out to Wicklow or Kildare and saw places that Fiona had never been.

He had not asked her to come on the trip to Rome, the viaggio as they kept calling it. Fiona hoped that at some stage soon he would, and so she had applied for a passport just in case.

Sometimes they went out in a foursome with Suzi and Luigi, who had invited them to their wedding in Dublin the middle of June. Suzi said that mercifully the idea of a Roman wedding had been abandoned. Her parents said no, Luigi's parents said no, and all their friends who weren't in the Italian class said they were off their skulls. So it would be a Roman honeymoon instead.

'Are you learning any Italian yourself?' Fiona enquired.

'No. If they want to talk to me they have to speak my language,' said Suzi, the confident handsome girl who would have expected Eskimos to learn her language if she were passing the North Pole.

Then there was the big fund-raising party. The Italian class, all thirty of them, were to provide the food. Drink was being sponsored by various off licences and the supermarket. Somebody knew a group which would play free in return for their picture in the local paper. Each pupil was expected to invite at last five people who would pay £53 head for the party. That would raise £750 for the viaggio and then there would be a huge raffle. The prizes were enormous, and that might raise another £150 or even more. The travel agency was bringing the price down all the time. The accommodation had been booked in a pensione in Rome. There would be the trip to Florence staying overnight at a hostel, and on to Siena before they went back to Rome.

Barry was drumming up his five for the party.

'I'd like you to come, Dad,' he said. Tt means a lot to me, and remember Mam and I always went to your works outings.'

'I'm not sure I'll be free, son. But if I am I'll be there, I can't say fairer than that.'

And Barry would have Fiona, his mother, a fellow from work and a next-door neighbour. Fiona was going to ask her friends Grania and Brigid but they were going already because of their father. And Suzi was going with Luigi. It would be a great night.

The cookery lessons continued. Fiona and Barry's mother were going to make a very exotic dessert for the party; it was called cannali. Full of fruit and nuts and ricotta cheese in pastry and deep fried.

'Are you sure that's not one of the pastas?' Barry asked anxiously.

No, the women assured him, that was cannelloni. He knew nothing. They asked him to check with Signora. Signora said that cannali alla siciliana was one of the most mouth-watering dishes in the world, she couldn't wait to taste it.

The confidences continued to be exchanged between Fiona and Nessa Healy as they cooked. Fiona said that she really did like Barry a lot, he was a generous kind person, but she didn't want to rush him because she didn't think he was ready to settle down.

And Barry's mother told Fiona that she couldn't give up on her husband. There was a time she might have been able to say he didn't love her, and let him go to whoever it was that he did love. But not now.

'And why is that?' Fiona wanted to know.

'When I was in hospital that time, when I was a bit foolish you know, he brought me flowers. A man doesn't do that unless he cares. He brought a bunch of freesias in and left them for me. For all his blustering and all his saying that he's not going to be railroaded into things, he does care, Fiona. That's what I'm holding on to.'

And Fiona sat, her eyes enormous behind her glasses and her hands floury. And cursed herself to the pit of hell and back for having been so stupid. She knew that if she spoke it would have to be at that very minute, and she did consider it.

But when she looked at Nessa Healy's face and saw all the life and hope in it she realised what a problem she had. How could she tell this woman that she, the girl who worked selling coffee in the hospital waiting room, had delivered the bloody freesias? She, Fiona, who wasn't even meant to know about the suicide attempt. It had never been discussed. Whatever Fiona was going to attempt in order to try and undo the harm she had managed to create, it could not involve taking all this hope and life away. She would find some other way.

Some other way, Fiona said to herself desperately, as the days went by and the woman who might one day be her mother-in-law told how love could never be dead if someone sent a bunch of flowers.

Suzi would know what to do, but Fiona would not ask her, not in a million years. Suzi might well tell Luigi, and Luigi would tell his old pal Bartolomeo, as he insisted on calling Barry. And anyway, Suzi would despise her, and Fiona didn't want that.

Brigid and Grania Dunne would be no use in a situation like this. They'd just say that Fiona was reverting to her old ways and getting into a tizz about nothing. There was an old teacher at school who used that word. Don't get in a tizz, girls, she would cry, and they would have to stuff their fists down their throats to stop laughing. But later on Brigid and Grania said that tizz was a good world for Fiona's temperament, sort of fussy and dizzy and troubled. She couldn't let them know how frightening and upsetting the tizz was this time because they would say it was all her own fault. And of course it undoubtedly was.

'You are fond of me, Fiona?' Mrs. Healy asked after they had made a lemon meringue pie.

'Very fond,' Fiona said eagerly.

'And you'd tell me the truth?'

'Oh, yes.' Fiona's voice was a squeak at this stage. She waited for the blow to fall. Somehow the flowers had been traced back to her. Maybe it was all for the best.

'Do you think I should get my colours done?' Mrs. Healy asked.

'Your colours?'

'Yes. You go to a consultant and they tell you what shades suit you and what drain the colour from your face. It's quite scientific, apparently.'

Fiona struggled for speech. 'And how much does it cost?' she asked eventually.

'Oh, I have the money,' Mrs. Healy said.

'Well, I'm not much good at these things but I have a very smart friend, I'll ask her. She'll know if it's a good idea or not.'

'Thanks, Fiona,' said Mrs. Healy, who must be about forty-five and who looked seventy-five and still thought her husband loved her because of Fiona.

Suzi said that it was a brilliant idea. 'When are you going?' she asked.

Fiona didn't have the courage to admit that she hadn't been talking about herself. She was also a little upset that Suzi felt she needed advice. But she was trying so hard to be grown up these days and not to dither that she said firmly yes, it had been something she was thinking of.

Nessa Healy was pleased with this news. 'Do you know another thing I think we should do?' Mrs. Healy said confidingly. 'I think we should go to an expensive hair stylist's and have a whole new look.'

Fiona felt faint. All the money she had been saving so painstakingly for the viaggio, if she ever went on it, would trickle away on these huge improvements that she and Barry's mother were about to embark on.

Fortunately Suzi saved the day here by knowing a hairdressing school.

And as the weeks went on Mrs. Healy stopped wearing brown but dug out all her pale-coloured clothes and wore nice dark-coloured scarves with them. Her hair was coloured and cut short, and she looked fifty instead of seventy-five.

Fiona had her dark, shiny hair cut very short and thick, dead straight with a fringe, and everyone said she looked terrific. She wore bright reds and yellows, and one or two of the house surgeons said flirtatious things to her, which she just laughed at good-naturedly instead of thinking that they might be going to marry her as she might have done in the old days.

And Barry's father stayed at home a little more, but not a lot more, and seemed perfectly pleasant any time Fiona was in the house.

But it didn't look as if the colours or the new hairstyle were going to win him back to the way things had been before the Affair began two years ago.

'You're very good to my mother, she looks terrific,' Barry said.

'And what about me, don't I look terrific too?'

'You always looked terrific. But listen, never let her know that I told you about the suicide. She often asks me to swear that I never told you. She'd hate to lose your respect, that's what it is.'

Fiona swallowed when he said this. She could never tell Barry either. There must be people who lived with a lie for ever. It was quite possible. It wasn't even that important a lie, it was just that it had led to such false hopes.

Nothing prepared Fiona for the revelation that came as they were separating eggs and beating the whites for a meringue topping.

'I've discovered where she works.'

'Who?'

The woman. Dan's woman, the mistress.' Mrs. Healy spoke with satisfaction, as if of a detection job well done.

'And where is it?' Did this all mean that Barry's poor mother would get another attack of nerves and try to kill herself again? Fiona's face was anxious.

'In one of the smartest restaurants in Dublin, it would seem. Quentin's no less. Have you heard of it?'

'Yes, you often see it in the papers,' poor Fiona said.

'And you might see it in the papers again,' said the older woman darkly.

She couldn't mean she was going to go there to Quentin's Restaurant and make a scene. Could she?

'And are you sure that's where she is? I mean, how do you know exactly, Mrs. Healy?'

'I followed him,' she said triumphantly.

'You followed him?'

'He went out in his van last night. He often does on a Wednesday. Stays in and watches television and then after twelve he says he has to go and do late night work. I know it's a lie, I've always known that about Wednesday - there's no night work, and anyway he's all dressed up, brushing his teeth, clean shirt. The lot.'

'But how did you follow him, Mrs. Healy? Didn't he go out in his van?'

'Indeed he did. But I had a taxi waiting, with its lights off, and away we went.'

'A taxi waiting all that time? Until he was ready to go out?' The sheer, mad extravagance of it stunned Fiona more than the act itself.

'No, I knew it would be about midnight so I booked it for fifteen minutes earlier just in case. Then I got in and followed him.'

'And merciful Lord, Mrs. Healy, what did the taxi-driver think?'

'He thought about the nice sum clicking up on his meter, that's what he thought.'

'And what happened?'

'Well, the van went off and turned into the lane behind Quentin's.' She paused. She didn't look very upset. Fiona had often seen Mrs. Healy more strained, more stressed than this. What could she have seen on this extraordinary mission?

'And then?'

'Well, then we waited. I mean he waited, and the taxi driver and I waited. And a woman came out. I couldn't see her, it was so dark.

And she got straight into the van as if she knew it was going to be there, and they took off so quickly that we lost them.'

Fiona felt vastly relieved. But Mrs. Healy was practical. 'We won't lose them next Wednesday,' she said determinedly.

Fiona had been very unsuccessful in trying to head off this second excursion. 'Would you look at the cost of it? You could get a lovely new check skirt for what you pay the taxi-driver.'

'It's my housekeeping money, Fiona. I'll spend what I save on what gives me pleasure.'

'But suppose he sees you, suppose you're discovered.'

'I'm not the one that's doing anything wrong, I'm just going out for a drive in a taxi.'

'But what if you do see her? What difference will it make?'

'I'll know what she's like, the woman he thinks he loves.' And her voice sounded so sure that Dan Healy only thought he loved another that Fiona's blood ran chill.

'Doesn't your mother work in Quentin's?' Fiona asked Brigid.

'Yeah, she does. Why?'

'Would she know people who work there at night, like waitresses, young ones?'

'I suppose she would, she's been there long enough. Why?'

'If I were to give you a name would you be able to ask her about them, like without saying why you were asking?'

'I might, why?'

'You never stop asking why.'

'I don't do anything without asking why,' Brigid said.

'Okay, forget it then,' said Fiona with spirit.

'No, I didn't say I wouldn't.'

'Forget it. Forget it.'

'All right, I'll check it out with her. Is it your Barry? Is that what it is? Do you think he has someone else who works in Quentin's?' Brigid was all interest now.

'Not exactly.'

'Well, I could ask her of course.'

'No, you ask too many questions. Let's leave it, you'd give everything away.'

'Oh, come on Fiona, we've all been friends for ever. You cover for us, we cover for you. I'll find out, just give me the name and I'll ask dead casual like to my mum.'

'Maybe.3

'What is her name anyway?' Brigid asked.

'I don't know yet, but I will soon,' said Fiona, and itwas obvious to Brigid and anyone else who might have been listening that she was telling the truth.

'How could we find out her name?' Fiona asked Mrs. Healy.

'I don't know. I think we just have to confront them.'

'No, I mean knowing her name would give us an advantage. There might be no need to confront her.'

'I don't see how that could be.' Nessa Healy was confused. They sat in silence thinking about it.

'Suppose,' said Fiona. 'Suppose you were to say that someone from Quentin's rang and asked him to ring back, but whoever it was, she didn't leave a name, said he'd know who it was. Then we could listen who he asks for.'

'Fiona, you're wasted in that hospital,' Barry's mother said. 'You should have been a private eye.'

They did it that very evening, when Dan had been welcomed and given a little bit of peanut brittle to taste. Then, as if she had just remembered it, his wife told him about the message from Quentin's.

He went to the hall to phone and Fiona kept the sounds of the electric mixer at high blast, while Barry's mother crept to listen at the door.

They were both amongst the ingredients when Dan Healy came back into the kitchen. 'Are you sure she said Quentin's?'

'That's what she said.'

'It's just that I rang them now and they say that no one there was looking for me.'

His wife shrugged. It implied that this was business for you. He seemed troubled and he left soon to go upstairs.

'Did you hear him ask for anyone?' said Fiona.

Mrs. Healy nodded, her eyes bright and feverish. 'Yes, we have the name. He spoke to her.'

'And who was it? What was her name?' Fiona could hardly breathe with the excitement and the danger of it all.

'Well, whoever it was answered the phone and he said, "Jesus, Nell, why did you ring me at home?" That's what he said. Her name is Nell.'

'WHAT?'

'Nell. Little bitch, selfish, thoughtless little cow. Well, she needn't think he loves her, he sounded furious with her.'

'Yes,' said Fiona.

'So now we know her name, that gives us power,' said Nessa Healy.

Fiona said nothing.

Nell was the name of Brigid and Crania's mother. It was Nell Dunne who worked at the reception desk in Quentin's and answered the phone when it rang.

Barry's father was involved with her friends' mother. Not a silly little good-time girl as they had thought, a woman as old as Nessa Healy. A woman with a husband and grown-up daughters of her own. Fiona wondered were the complications of this ever going to end.

'Fiona? It's Brigid.'

'Oh yes, listen, I'm not meant to get phone calls at work.'

'If you'd done your Leaving Cert and got a proper job you'd have been able to have people phone you,' Brigid complained.

'Yeah, well, I didn't. What is it, Brigid? There's a crowd of people here waiting to be served.' There was nobody as it happened, but she felt ill at ease talking to her friend now that she knew such a terrible secret about their family.

'This bird, the one that you think Barry fancies, the one working in Quentin's… you were going to tell me her name and I was going to get the low-down on her from my mam.'

'No!' Fiona's voice was almost a screech.

'Hey, you were the one who asked me.'

'I've changed my mind.'

'Well, if he is having a bit on the side you should know. People should know, it's their right.'

'Is it, Brigid? Is it?' Fiona knew she sounded very intense.

'Of course it is. If he says he loves you and if he tells her he loves her, then for God's sake…'

'But it's not exactly like that, you see.'

'He doesn't say he loves you?'

'Yes he does. But well, what the hell!'

'Fiona?'

'Yes?'

'You are becoming quite seriously mad. I think you should know this.'

'Sure, Brigid,' said Fiona, grateful for once that she had always been considered a person in a permanent tizz.

'Would you mind more if she were young or old?' Fiona asked Barry's mother.

'Nell? She has to be young, why else would he have strayed?'

'There's no understanding men, everyone says that. She could be as old as a tree, you know.'

Nessa Healy was very serene. 'If he had a dalliance it was because some young one threw herself at him. Men go for flattery. But he loves me. That was always clear. When I was unavoidably in hospital that time I told you about, he came in when I was asleep and left me flowers. Whatever else there is to hold on to, there's that.'

Barry came in full of excitement. The party on Thursday had been so well subscribed, you would never believe it. It was going to be fantastic. Magnifico. Mr. Dunne had said that he would be able to announce that with a success like this on their hands a whole new programme in adult education might start next year.

'Mr. Dunne?' Fiona said in a hollow voice.

'He was the one who set it up, he's a great pal of Signora's. You told me you knew his daughters.'

'Yes, I do.' Fiona spoke in a hollow voice.

'So he's delighted about the whole thing. It makes him look good too.'

'And he'll be there?'

'Hey, Fiona are you asleep or something? Didn't you tell me we couldn't sell tickets to his daughters because they're going with him?'

'Did I say that?' She must have, but it was long ago, before she knew all that she knew now.

'And do you think his wife is coming?' she asked.

'Oh, I'd say so. Any of us who have a wife or a husband, a mother or a father, not to mention a loving girlfriend… well, we're making sure they're coming.'

'And your father is coming?' Fiona said.

'As of today he says he is,' said Bartolomeo, Italian speaker, pleased and happy that he was able to field a good team.

The night of the festa in Mountainview school was eagerly awaited.

Signora had been going to buy a new dress but she decided at the last moment to spend the money on coloured lights for the school hall.

'Aw, come on Signora,' said Suzi Sullivan. 'I have a great dress picked out for you in the Good as New shop. Let them have whatever old lights are there, up in the school.'

'I want them to remember this evening always. If there are nice coloured lights it will add to the romance of it… What will anyone care if I spend forty pounds on a dress? Nobody will notice.'

'If I can get you the lights will you get the dress?' Suzi asked.

'You're not going to suggest that Luigi…' Signora looked very doubtful about it indeed.

'No, I swear I won't let him get in touch with the underworld again. It took me long enough to get him out of it. No, I really do know someone in the electrical business, a fellow called Jacko. I needed someone to re-wire the flat and Lou asked in the Italian class and Laddy knew this guy who did up the hotel where he works. He'd know what you want, will I send him up to you?'

'Well, Suzi…'

'And if he's cheap, as he will be, then you'll buy the dress?' She looked so eager.

'Of course, Suzi,' Signora said, wondering why people set such a store by clothes.

Jacko came up to look at the school hall. 'Built like a bloody barn, of course,' he said.

'I know, but I thought if we had three or four rows of coloured lights, you know, a bit like Christmas lights…'

'It would look pathetic,' Jacko said.

'Well, we don't have enough money to buy anything else.' Signora looked distressed now.

'Who said anything about buying? I'll light the place properly for you. Bring proper gear up, do it like a disco. Install it for the night, take it away after.'

'But you can't do that. It would cost a fortune. There'd have to be someone to operate it.'

'I'll come and see it doesn't blow up. And it's only for a night, I won't charge you.'

'But we couldn't expect you to do all that.'

'Just a nice big board advertising my electrical business,' Jacfco said, grinning from ear to ear.

'Could I give you a couple of tickets, in case you would like to bring a partner or anything?' Signora was desperate to return his kindness.

'No, I travel alone these days, Signora,' he said with his crooked smile. 'But you never know what I might pick up at the party. Minding the lights won't take up all my time.'

Bill Burke and Lizzie Duffy had to get ten people between them and Bill found it hard to sell tickets at the bank because Grania Dunne had got in first. As it happened, Lizzie's mother was going to be in Dublin for the night.

'Do you think we dare?' Bill said. Mrs. Duffy was very much a loose cannon, the dangers might be greater than the rewards.

Lizzie thought about it seriously. 'What's the very worst she could do?' she wondered.

Bill gave it serious thought. 'She could get drunk and sing with the band?' he suggested.

'No, when she gets drunk she tells everyone what a bastard my father is.'

'The music will be very loud, no one will hear her. Let's ask her,' said Bill.

Constanza could have bought every ticket and not noticed the dip in her bank balance, but that wasn't the point. She had to invite people, that's what it was about.

Veronica would come, of course, and bring a friend from work. Daughters were marvellous. More diffidently she asked her son, Richard, would he like to take his girlfriend, and to her surprise he sounded eager. The children had been a huge support to her after the trial and sentence. Harry was serving a minimum prison sentence, as she had foretold. Every week in her small seaside apartment she got phone calls and visits from her four children. She must have done something right.

'You won't believe this.' Richard rang her a couple of days later. 'But you know your Italian festa thing up in Mountainview school? Mr. Malone, my boss, is going. He was just talking to me about it today.'

'What a small world,' said Connie. 'Maybe I'll ask his father-in-law, then. Is Paul bringing his wife?'

'I imagine so,' said Richard. 'Older people always do.' Connie wondered who on earth at their Italian class could have invited Paul

Malone.

Gus and Maggie told Laddy that of course they would come to the festa. Nothing would keep them away. They would ask their friend who ran the chip shop to come too, to thank him for all his interpreting, and they would give prizes of free dinners in the hotel with wine for the raffle.

Jerry Sullivan in the house where Signora stayed wanted to know what was the lower age limit.

'Sixteen, Jerry. I keep telling you that,' Signora said. She knew there was an inordinate interest in the school in a dance in their school hall which would have disco lights and real liquor.

Mr. O'Brien, the Principal, had discouraged even the older children from attending. 'Don't you all spend enough time on these premises?' he had said. 'Why don't you go to your horrible smoke-filled basements listening to ear-injuring music as usual?'

Tony O'Brien was like a devil these days. In order to please Grania Dunne, the love of his life, he had given up smoking and it didn't suit him. But Grania had worked a miracle for him so in fairness he had to trade the smoking business. She had gone to visit her father and got him on their side.

He never knew how she had managed it, but the following day Aidan Dunne had strode into his office and offered his hand.

'I've been behaving like a father in a Victorian melodrama,' he had said. 'My daughter is old enough to know her own mind and if you make her happy then that's a good thing.'

Tony had nearly fallen out of his chair with the shock. 'I've lived a rackety old life, Aidan, and you know this. But honestly, Grania is the turning point for me. Your daughter makes me feel good and young and full of hope and happiness. I'll never let her down. If you believe anything you must believe that.'

And they had shaken hands with such vigour that both of their arms were sore for days.

It made everything much simpler both at school and at home. She had stopped taking her contraceptive pill. He knew it had taken a lot for Aidan to make that gesture. He was an odd man… If he hadn't known him better Tony O'Brien would have believed that the Latin master really did have a thing going with Signora. But there wasn't a chance of that.

Signora's friends Brenda and Patrick Brennan were both coming to the party. What was the point of being successful, they said, if they could not delegate? There was an under chef, there was another greeter, the place could survive one evening without them or it wasn't run properly in the first place. And of course Nell Dunne from the cash desk -would be there too, so Quentin's would be really running on the B team, they laughed to each other.

'I don't know why we're all going at all, we must be touched in the head,' Nell Dunne said.

'For solidarity and support of course, what else?' Ms Brennan said, looking at Nell oddly.

Nell felt, as she so often felt, that Ms Brennan didn't really like her. It was after all a reasonable question. Smart people like the Brennans and yes, even herself, Nell Dunne, a person who mattered in Dublin in her black dress and yellow scarf sitting like a queen in Quentin's, and all of them traipsing up to that barracks of school Mountainview, where Aidan had soldiered on so long and for nothing.

But she wished she hadn't spoken. The Brennans thought less of her for it somehow.

Still, she might well go. Dan wasn't free that night, he had to go to something with his son he said, and her own children would be annoyed with her if she didn't make the effort.

It would be dreary, like everything always had been in that school. But at least it wasn't the kind of outing that you'd bother dressing up for. Five pounds for a bit of pizza and a band that would deafen you belting out Italian songs. God almighty, what she did for her family!

Grania and Brigid were getting dressed for the festa.

CI hope it goes well, for Dad's sake,' Grania said.

'Dad can take anything if he accepts that you go to bed with his boss. Nothing's going to knock him off his perch now.' Brigid was back combing her hair in front of the sitting room mirror.

°

Grania was annoyed. 'I wish you'd stop dwelling on the going to bed bit. There's a lot more to it than that.'

'At his age would he not get exhausted?' Brigid giggled.

'If I were into talking about it I'd have you green with jealousy,' Grania said, putting on her eyeshadow. Their mother came in. 'Hey, Mam, get a move on, we're going in a few minutes,' Grania said.

'I'm ready.'

They looked at their mother, hair barely combed, no make-up, an ordinary dress with a loose cardigan over her shoulders. There was no point in saying anything. The sisters exchanged a glance and made no comment.

'Right then,' said Grania. 'Off we go.'

This was Nessa Healy's first outing since she had been in hospital. The woman who had done her colours had given her very good advice.

Barry thought he hadn't seen his mother looking so well in years. There was no doubt but that Fiona had been a wonderful influence on her. He wondered should he ask Fiona to go on the viaggio with him. It was implying a lot, like they would share a room, and that side of things had not progressed very far in the weeks they had been together. He wanted to, but there was never the opportunity or the place or the right occasion.

His father looked uneasy. 'What kind of people will be there, son?'

'All the people who go to the class, Dad, and whoever they could drag like I'm dragging you. It'll be great, honestly.'

'Yes, I'm sure.'

'And, Dad, Miss Clarke says I can drive the supermarket van even though it's a social outing. So I can take you home or Mam home if you get bored or tired or anything.'

He looked so eager and grateful that his father felt ashamed. 'When did Dan Healy ever leave a party while there was still drink on the table?' he asked.

'And Fiona's meeting us there?' Mrs. Healy would have liked the moral support of this lively young girl she had grown so fond of. Fiona had made her promise to hold off about confronting everyone with Nell. Just for a week. One week. And reluctantly Nessa Healy had agreed.

'Yes, she was very insistent She wanted to go on her own,' said Barry. 'Right, are we off?' They were off.

Signora was there in the hall.

She had looked at herself in the long mirror before she left the Sullivan's house. Truly she hardly recognised herself as the woman who had come to Ireland a year ago. The widow, as she saw herself, weeping for her dead Mario, her long hair trailing behind her, her long skirt hanging unevenly. Timid, unable to ask for work or a place to live, frightened of her family.

Today she stood tall and elegant, her coffee and lilac dress somehow perfect with her odd-coloured hair. Suzi had said that this dress might have cost £300. Imagine. She had let Suzi make up her face.

'Nobody will see me,' she had protested.

'It's your night, Signora,' Peggy Sullivan had insisted.

And it was. She stood there in a hall with flashing coloured lights, with pictures and posters all over it, with the sound system playing a loop tape of Italian songs and music until the live band would arrive with a flourish. They had decided that Nessun Dorma, Volare and Arnvederci Roma should be played often on the tape. Nothing too unfamiliar.

Aidan Dunne came in. 'I'll never be able to thank you,' he said.

'It's I who have to thank you, Aidan,' He was the only person around them who had not been given an Italianised form of his name. It made him more special.

'Are you nervous?' he asked.

'A little. But then, we are surrounded by friends, why should I be nervous? Everyone is for us, there's nobody against us.' She smiled. She was putting out of her mind the fact that not one of her family, her own family, would come to support her tonight. She had asked them gently but had not begged. It would have been so nice, just once, to have said to people, this is my sister, this is my mother. But no.

'You look really terrific, Nora. Yourself, I mean, not just the whole place.'

He had never called her Nora before. She hadn't time to take it in because people were arriving. At the door a friend of Constanza, an extremely efficient woman called Vera, was taking the tickets.

In the cloakrooms, young Caterina from the Italian class and her friend, a bright girl called Harriet, were busy giving people cloakroom tickets and telling them not to lose them. Strangers were coming in and marvelling over the place.

The Principal, Tony O'Brien, was busy passing all compliments their way. 'Nothing to do with me, I'm afraid, all down to Mr. Dunne whose project this is, and to Signora.'

They stood there like a bride and groom accepting compliments.

Fiona saw Grania and Brigid come in with their mother. She gasped. She had met Mrs. Dunne many times before, but tonight she hardly recognised her. The woman looked a complete wreck. She had barely bothered to wash her face.

Good, thought Fiona grimly. She felt a horrible sensation in her chest, as if she'd swallowed a lump of something that would not go up or down, like a piece of very hard potato or a piece of raw celery. She knew it was fear. Fiona, the mouse in spectacles, was going to interfere in everyone else's life. She was going to tell a whole lot of people a pack of lies and frighten them to death. Would she be able for it, or would she fall on the floor in a swoon and make everything worse?

Of course she would be able for it. Remember that night around in the townhouse when the old man had gone out and Grania had bought the Chinese takeaway. Fiona had changed her whole style then, and look how much good had come out of it. She had single-handedly persuaded Nessa Healy to dress up and come to this party. That wasn't the action of a mouse in spectacles. She had gone so far she must get over this last fence. She must end the affair that was breaking everyone's heart. As soon as she had done this then she could get on with her own life and begin her own affair properly.

Fiona looked around her, trying to fasten a confident smile on her face. She would just wait until it began to warm up a bit.

It took no time at all for it all to warm up. There was the roar of conversation, the clink of glasses and then the band arrived. The dancing started to serious sixties music which suited every age group.

Fiona went up to Nell Dunne, who was standing on her own looking very scornful. 'Do you remember me, Mrs. Dunne?'

'Oh, Fiona?' she seemed to drag up the name with difficulty and not great interest.

'Yes, you were always nice m me when I was young, Mrs. Donne, I remember that.'

'Was I?'

'Yes, when I'd come to tea. I wouldn't want you to be made a fool of.'

'Why would I be made a fool of?'

'Dan, the man over there.'

'WHAT?' Nell looked to where Fiona was pointing.

'You know he goes round telling everyone he has this frump of a wife, and that she's always committing suicide and he can't wait to leave her. But he has a string of women, and he tells them all the same story.'

'I don't know what you're talking about.'

'And you're probably, let me see, Wednesday's woman and one other day. That's the way he works it.'

Nell Dunne looked at the smart woman with Dan Healy, laughing easily. This couldn't be the wife he had spoken of. 'And what makes you think you know anything about him?' she asked Fiona.

'Simple,' Fiona said. 'He had my mother too. Used to come up in the van and collect her outside work and take her off. She was besotted over him. It was awful.'

'Why are you telling me this?' Her eyes were wild, her voice was hushed. She was looking to the right and left of her.

Fiona realised that Mrs. Dunne was greatly rattled. 'Well, he delivers vegetables and flowers to where I work you see, and he's always talking about his women, even you, and how you're just mad for it. "Posh lady from Quentin's", he calls you. And then I realised it was Brigid and Crania's mum he was talking about, just like it was once my mum… and I felt sick.'

'I don't believe a word of this. You're a very dangerous and mad girl,' Mrs. Dunne said, her eyes narrow as slits.

Luigi was dancing up a storm with Caterina from the class. Caterina and her friend Harriet had been released from cloakroom duty now and were making up for lost time.

'Excuse me.' Fiona dragged Luigi off the dance floor.

'What is it? Suzi doesn't mind, she likes me to dance.' He looked indignant.

'Do me one big favour,' Fiona begged. "On? tiring without asking any questions at all.'

'That's me,' Luigi said.

'Could you go over to that dark man over there near the door, and tell him that if he knows what's good for him, he'll leave his Wednesday night lady alone.'

'But…?'

'You said you wouldn't ask why!'

'I'm not asking why, I'm only asking would he hit me?'

'No, he won't. And Luigi?'

'Yeah?'

'Two things. Could you not say anything at all about this to Suzi or Bartolomeo?'

'That's done.'

And could you try and look a bit ferocious when you're talking to him?'

'I'll try,' said Luigi, who thought it was something he might have to work at.

Nell Dunne was about to approach Dan. He was talking to a thickset, j owlish man with a very angry expression. She thought she would walk by and speak to him out of the corner of her mouth. Say she needed a word. Jerk her head to the corridor outside.

Why hadn't he told her he was coming to this anyway? So secretive. So hidden. There could be a lot more she didn't know. But just before she approached him he looked up and saw her, and a look of fear came into his eyes. He started to move away from her. She saw him grab his wife's arm and ask her to dance.

The band was playing Ciao Ciao Bambino. They hated it but a job was a job. They were going to appear in tomorrow's evening paper.

And Fiona stood on a chair so that she could observe it all. And remember it for ever. Barry had just asked her if she would come on the viaggio with him and she had said yes. Her future mother-and father-in-law were dancing with each other.

Grania and Brigid's mother was struggling to get out and look for her coat. She was demanding that Caterina and her friend Harriet open up the cloakroom for her. Only Fiona saw her go. Barry certainly didn't notice her. Maybe he might never have to know about her any more than anyone ever had to know about the freesias.

'Will you dance with me?' he said. It was Three Coins in the Fountain. Sugary and sentimental.

Barry held her very tight. 'Ti amo, Fiona, carissima Fiona.'

'Anch'io,' she said.

'WHAT?' He could hardly believe it.

'Anch'io. It means me too. I love you too. Ti amo da morire.'

'God, how did you learn that?' he asked, impressed as he never had been.

'I asked Signora. I practised it. Just in case.'

'In case?'

'In case you said it, so that I'd know what to say.'

Around them people danced and sang the silly words of the song. Grania and Brigid's father hadn't gone hunting for his wife, he was talking to Signora. They looked like people who might dance at any moment if it occurred to one of them. Barry's father wasn't looking around anxiously, he was talking to his wife as if she were a real person again. Brigid wasn't laced into some tight skirt tugging at it, she wore a scarlet, loose dress and had her arms around the neck of a man who would not escape. Grania was leaning on the arm of Tony, the old man. They didn't dance but they were getting married. Fiona had been invited to the wedding.

Fiona thought it was wonderful to be grown up at last. She hadn't made all this happen, but she had made a very important part of it happen.

VIAGGIO

^^C'VTThy are we asking Mr. Dunne to our wedding?' Lou 't 't I wanted to know.

V V 'Because it would be nice for Signora, she won't have anyone.'

'Won't she have everyone else? Doesn't she live with your family, for God's sake?'

'You know what I mean.' Suzi was adamant.

'Do we have to have his wife as well? The list is getting longer every minute. You do know it's seventeen pounds a head and that's before a drink passes their lips?'

'Of course we're not asking his wife. Are you soft in the head?' Suzi said, and the look came over her face that Lou didn't like, the look that said she wondered was she marrying someone as thick as the wall.

'Certainly not his wife,' Lou said hastily. 'I must have been dreaming, that's all.'

'Is there anyone else from your side that you'd like?' Suzi asked.

'No, no. In a way they're my side as well, and aren't they coming on the honeymoon with us?' Lou said brightening up.

'Together with half of Dublin,' said Suzi, rolling her eyes.

'A Register office, I see' said Nell Dunne when Grania told her the date.

'Well, it would be hypocritical to get the job done in a church, neither of us ever going into one.' Nell shrugged. 'You will be there, Mam, won't you?' Grania sounded concerned.

'Of course I will, why do you ask?'

'It's just… it's just…'

'What is it, Grania? I've said I'll be there.'

'Well, you left that party up in the school before it even got going, and it was Dad's big night. And you're not going on his trip to Italy or anything.'

'I wasn't asked on his trip to Italy,' Nell Dunne said in a tight hard voice.

'Can everyone come on this holiday to Rome and Florence?' Bernie Duffy asked her daughter Lizzie.

'No, Mother. I'm sorry, but it's restricted to the people in the class,' Lizzie apologised.

'Wouldn't they want more people to swell the numbers?' Bernie had enjoyed herself boisterously at the festa. She thought the viaggio might be more of the same.

'What will we do, she's at me all the time?' Lizzie asked Bill later.

'We'll take her to Galway to see your father instead,' Bill said suddenly.

'We can't do that, can we?'

'Wouldn't it sort a lot of things out? It would distract her, and one way or the other it would take up her time and she wouldn't feel she was being left out of any fun if she was in the thick of all that drama.'

'That's a great idea.' Lizzie was full of admiration.

'And anyway, I should meet him, shouldn't I?'

'Why? We're not getting married till we're twenty-five.'

'I don't know. Luigi's getting married and Mr. Dunne's daughter is getting married… I think we should get married sooner, don't you?'

'Perché non?' said Lizzie with a huge smile all over her face.

'I've asked Signora to write the letter to the Garaldis for me,' Laddy said. 'She said she'd explain everything.'

Maggie and Gus exchanged glances. Surely Signora would realise how casual the invitation had been to Laddy, the exuberance and gratitude of a warm-hearted family touched at the honesty of an Irish porter. They'd never expect him to take it so seriously, to go to Italian classes and to expect a huge welcome.

Signora was a mature woman who would understand the situation, wasn't she? Yet there was something childlike about the woman in the coffee and lilac dress, the woman at the festa that night who was so innocently thrilled with the success of the lessons and the support that had been given to her evening class. She was an unworldly sort of person, perhaps she would be like Laddy and think that these Garaldis were waiting with open arms for someone they must have well forgotten by now.

But nothing would let Gus and Maggie take from Laddy's excitement. He had his passport in the hotel safe and he had changed money into lire already. This trip meant everything to him, not a shadow must be allowed to fall on it. It will all be fine, Gus and Maggie told each other, willing it to be so.

'I've never been abroad in my life and imagine, I'm going twice this summer,' Fran told Connie.

'Twice?'

'Yes, as well as the viaggio Kathy won two tickets to America. You wouldn't believe it, she entered a competition in some business magazine that her friend Harriet brought into the school, and she won two tickets to New York, so we're both going.'

'Isn't that great. And have you anywhere to stay when you get there?'

'Yes. I have a friend, a fellow I used to go out with, he's going to drive to meet us. It's over four hundred miles, but they think nothing of that over there.'

'He must like you still if he's going to drive that distance.'

Fran smiled. 'I hope so, I still like him,' she said. 'Wasn't it a miracle that Kathy won the tickets?'

'Yes.'

'Do you know, when she told me I thought her father had given them to her. But no, when they came they were paid for by this magazine and all, so it's all above board.'

'Why would her father have given them and not told you?'

'Well, I don't see him now, and he's married to one of the richest women in Ireland, but I wouldn't take them from him as a pat on the head.'

'No, of course not. And do you still have feelings for Kathy's father?'

'Not at all, it was all years and years ago. No, I wish him well, for all that he's married to Marianne Hayes and owns a quarter of Dublin.'

'Bartolomeo, will you and Fiona be able to share a room, do you think?' Signora asked.

'Si, grazie, Signora, that's all sorted out.' Barry blushed a bit at the memory of how very pleasurably it had been sorted out.

'Good, that makes it all easier, single rooms are a big problem.'

Signora was going to share with Constanza and Aidan Dunne with Lorenzo. Everyone else had partners of some sort.

The travel agency had been marvellous, it was the place where Brigid Dunne worked. They had given the best price when it had all been analysed down to the bone. Brigid Dunne said she almost wished she was going herself.

'Why don't you and the Old Man of the Sea go?' she asked Grania.

Grania just laughed at her now when she made these remarks. 'Tony and I don't want to crowd Dad out on this, and anyway we're getting ready for the geriatric wedding of the century.'

Brigid giggled. Grania was so happy that you couldn't offend her.

They were both thinking how odd it was that no mention at all of their mother had been made in the planning of this famous viaggio. But it was something they didn't speak of. It was somehow too trivial and too serious at the same time. Did it mean that Mam and Dad were over? Things like that didn't happen to families like theirs.

Fiona brought Barry home to supper in her house shortly before the viaggio.

'You practically live in my house,' he complained, 'and I'm never allowed into yours.'

'I didn't want you to meet my parents until it was too late.'

'What do you mean too late?'

'Too late for you to abandon me. I wanted you to be consumed with physical lust for me, as well as liking me and admiring me as a person.'

She spoke so seriously and earnestly Barry found it hard to keep a straight face. 'It's just as well then that the physical lust bit has taken over so strongly,' he said. 'I'll be able to put up with them however awful they are.'

And they were fairly awful. Fiona's mother said that Ireland was very nice for a holiday because you wouldn't get yourself sunburned or people wouldn't snatch your handbag.

'They do here just as much as anywhere else.'

'But at least they speak English here,' her father said.

Barry said he had been learning Italian in readiness, he would be able to order food and deal with police stations, hospitals and breakdowns of the bus.

'See what I mean?' Fiona's father was triumphant. 'Must be a very dangerous place if that is what they taught you.'

'How much is the supplement for a single room?' her mother asked.

'Five pounds a night,' Fiona said.

'Nine pounds a night,' Barry said at exactly the same time. They looked at each other wildly. 'It's… um… more for the men you see,' poor Barry said in desperation.

'Why is that?' Fiona's father was suspicious.

'Something to do with the Italian character, really. They insist men have bigger rooms for all their clothes and things.'

'Wouldn't you think women would have more clothes?' Fiona's mother was now suspicious. What kind of a peacock was her daughter involved with, needing a huge room for all his wardrobe?

'I know, that's what my mother was saying… By the way, she's very much looking forward to meeting you, getting to know you.'

'Why?' asked Fiona's mother.

Barry couldn't think why so he said: 'She's like that, she just loves people.'

'Lucky for her,' said Fiona father.

'What's the Italian for "Good luck, Dad"?' Crania asked her father the night before the maggio.

'In bocca al lupo, Papa.' She repeated it. They sat in his study. He had all his maps and guidebooks but. He would bring a small suitcase which he would carry with him containing all this. It didn't really matter, he said, if his clothes got lost, but this was what counted.

'Mam working tonight?' Grania said casually.

'I suppose so, love.'

'And you'll have a suntan for the wedding?' She was determined to keep the mood cheerful.

'Yes, and you know we'd have it here for you, you know that.'

'We'd prefer it in a pub, really, Dad.'

'I always thought you'd marry from here and I'd pay for it all.'

'You're paying for a big cake and champagne, isn't that enough?'

'I hope so.'

'It's plenty. And listen, are you nervous about this trip?'

'A little, in case it's not as good as we all promised, hoped, and remembered even. The class went so well, I'd hate this to be an anticlimax.'

Tt can't be, Dad, it will be great. I wish I were going in many ways.'

'In many ways I wish you were too.' And neither of them said a word about the fact that Aidan's wife of twenty-five years was not going, and according to herself had not been invited to go.

Jimmy Sullivan had a driving job on the Northside, so he drove Signora to the airport.

'You're miles too early,' he said.

'I'm too excited. I couldn't stay at home, I want to be on my way.'

'Will you go at all to see your husband's people in that village you lived in?'

'No, no, Jimmy, there won't be time.'

'It's a pity to go all the way to Italy and not visit them though. The class would let you off for a day or two.'

'No, it's too far away, right at the far end of Italy on the island of Sicily.'

'So they won't hear you're there and take a poor view?'

'No, no they won't hear I'm there.'

'Well, that's all right then, so long as there's no offence.'

'No, nothing like that. And Suzi and I will tell you every detail when we get back.'

'God, the wedding was something else, wasn't it Signora?'

'I did enjoy it, and I know everyone else did too.'

'I'll be paying for it for the rest of my life.'

'Nonsense, Jimmy, you loved it. You've only one daughter and it was a real feast. People will talk about it for years.'

'Well, they were days getting over their hangovers all right,' he said, brightening at the thought of his legendary hospitality. 'I hope that Suzi and Lou will get themselves out of that bed and make it to the airport.'

'Oh, you know newly-weds,' Signora said diplomatically.

'They were in that bed for many a month before they were newly-weds,' Jimmy Sullivan said, brow darkening with disapproval. It always annoyed him that Suzi was so utterly uncontrite about her bad behaviour.

When she was alone at the airport Signora found a seat and took out the badges she had made. Each one had Vista del Monte - the Italian for Mountainview - on it, and the person's name. Surely nobody could get lost. Surely if there was a God he would be delighted that all these people were visiting the Holy City and he wouldn't let them get lost or killed or into fights. Forty-two people including herself and Aidan Dunne, just enough to fill the coach they had arranged to meet them. She wondered who would be the first to arrive. Maybe Lorenzo? Could be Aidan. He said he would help her distribute the badges.

But it was Constanza. 'My room mate,' Constanza said eagerly and pinned on her badge.

'You could easily have afforded the single room, Constanza,' Signora said, something that had not been mentioned before.

'Yes, but who would I have talked to… isn't that half the fun of a holiday?'

Before she could answer Signora saw the others arriving. A lot of them had come on the airport bus. They came to collect their badges and seemed pleased to see that they were from such an elegant-sounding place.

'No one will know in Italy what kind of a dump Mountainview really is,' Lou said.

'Hey, Luigi be fair, it's improved in leaps and bounds this year.' Aidan was referring to the rebuilding, the paint job, the new bicycle sheds. Tony O'Brien had delivered all he had promised.

'Sorry, Aidan, I didn't realise you were in earshot,' Lou grinned. Aidan had been good company at the wedding. He had sung La donna è mobile and knew all the words.

Brenda Brennan had come to the airport to wave them off. Signora was very touched. 'You're so good, everyone else has a normal family.'

'No, they don't.' Brenda Brennan jerked her head towards where Aidan was talking to Luigi. 'He doesn't for one thing. I asked his pill of a wife why she wasn't going to Rome with the rest of you, and she shrugged and said that she hadn't been asked, wouldn't push herself where she wasn't wanted and wouldn't have enjoyed it anyway. So how's that for normal?'

'Poor Aidan.' Signora was sympathetic.

Then the flight was called.

The sister of Guglielmo was waving like mad to everyone. For Olive just going to the airport was a treat. 'My brother is a bank manager, he's going to see the Pope,' she said to strangers.

'Well, if he lays his hands on some of that money they'll be pleased with him,' said a passer-by. Bill just smiled, and he and Lizzie waved to Olive while they could still see her.

'Forty-two people, we'll have to lose one of them,' Aidan said as they counted the flock into the departure lounge.

'Aren't you optimistic! I keep thinking we'll lose all of them,' Signora smiled.

'Still, the counting system should work.' Aidan tried to sound more convinced than he felt. He had divided them into four groups of ten and appointed a leader of each. When they arrived anywhere or left anywhere the leader had to report that all were present. It worked for children, but adults might resent it.

They didn't seem at all put out by it, in fact some of them positively welcomed it.

'Imagine, Lou is a leader,' Suzi said in admiration to Signora.

'Well, a responsible married man like Luigi, who better?' Signora asked. The truth was of course that she and Aidan had chosen him because of his fierce scowl. Nobody in his team would be late if they were reporting to Luigi.

He marched them on to the plane as if he were taking them into war. 'Can you raise your passports?' he asked them. Obediently they did 'Now, put them away very carefully. Zip them away, I won't want to see them unzipped until we get to Roma.'

The announcements were made in Italian on the plane as well as in English. Signora had prepared all this with them so it was familiar. When the air stewardess began to speak the evening class all nodded at each other, pleased to hear familiar words and phrases. The girl pointed out the emergency doors on the right and the left, the class repeated them all happily, destra, sinistra. Even though they had heard it all in English already.

When it was over and she said grazie all the evening class shouted prego and Aidan's eyes met Signora's. It was really happening. They were going to Rome.

Signora was seated beside Laddy. Everything was new and exciting to him, from the safety belt to the meal with its little portions of food.

'Will the Garaldis be at the airport?' he asked eagerly.

'No, Lorenzo. The first few days we get to know Roma… we do all the tours we talked about, remember?'

'Yes, but suppose they want me straight away?' His big face was worried.

'They know you're coming. I've written to them, they know we'll be in touch on Thursday.'

'Giovedì,' he said. ,'

'Bene, Lorenzo, giovedì.'

'Aren't you going to eat your dessert, Signora?'

'No, Lorenzo. Please have it.'

'It's just that I'd hate to waste it.'

Signora said she would have a little sleep now. She closed her eyes. Please may it go well. May they all find magic there. May the Garaldis remember Lorenzo and be nice to him. She had put her heart into the letter and was distressed that there had been no reply.

The bus was there. 'Dov'è l'autobus? Bill asked to show he remembered the phrase.

'It's here in front of us,' Lizzie said.

'I know, but I wanted to talk about it,' Bill explained.

'Don't the girls all have enormous bosoms and bums,' Fiona whispered admiringly to Barry as she looked around her.

'I think it's rather nice actually,' Barry said defensively. This was his Italy, he was the expert on the place since his visit for the World Cup, he didn't want any aspersions cast.

'No, I think it's great,' Fiona explained. 'It's just that I'd love Brigid Dunne to see them… the way she's always bellyaching about herself.'

'You could tell her father to tell her, I suppose.' Barry was doubtful of the suitability of this.

'Of course I couldn't, she'd know I was talking about her. She says the hotel isn't going to be any great shakes. She says we're not to be disappointed.'

'I won't be disappointed,' Barry said, putting his arm around Fiona.

'Neither will I. I was only in a hotel once before, in Majorca. And it was so noisy that none of us could sleep at all, so we all got up and went back to the beach.'

'I suppose they had to keep the prices down.' Barry was terrified that there would be any criticism.

'I know it's dead cheap, and Brigid was telling me that some half cracked one came in wanting to know where we were all staying, so the word must be out that we got good value.'

'Did she want to join the group?'

'Brigid said she couldn't join, that we had been booked at this rate for ages. But she just insisted on knowing the name of the hotel.'

'Well, now.' Barry was pleased as they stepped out into the sunshine and the head counting began. Uno, due, tre. The team leaders were very serious about their roles for Signora.

'Did you ever stay in a hotel, Fran?' Kathy asked as the bus sped through the traffic, which seemed to be full of very impatient drivers.

'Twice, ages ago.' Fran was vague.

But Kathy probed. 'You never told me.'

'It was in Cork, with Ken if you must know.'

'Oho, when you said you were staying with a schoolfriend?'

'Yes, I didn't want them thinking I was going to produce yet another child for them to look after.' Fran nudged her good-naturedly.

'You'd be far too old for that sort of thing surely?'

'Listen here to me, if I get together with Ken again for a bit in America, now that you've won me a ticket there… I may well produce a little sister or brother for you to take home with us.'

'Or maybe even stay there with?' Kathy said.

'It's a return ticket, remember.'

'They're not born overnight, remember,' Kathy said.

The two laughed and pointed out sights to each other as the bus pulled at a building in the Via Giolitti.

Signora was on her feet and an excited conversation took place.

'She's telling him that we must be left at the hotel itself, not here at the terminus,' Suzi explained.

'How do you know, you're not even in the evening class?' Lou was outraged.

'Oh, if you work as a waitress you get to understand everything sooner or later.' Suzi dismissed her skill. Then, looking at Lou's face she added, 'Anyway, you're always speaking bits of it at home so I pick up words here and there.' That seemed entirely more suitable.

And Suzi was indeed right. The bus lurched off again and dropped them at the Albergo Francobollo.

'The Stamp Hotel,' Bill translated for them. 'Should be easy to remember. 'Vorrei un francobollo per l'Irlanda', they all chorused aloud and Signora gave them a broad smile.

She had got them to Rome without any disaster, the hotel had their booking and the class were all in high good spirits. Her anxiety was not necessary. Soon she would relax and enjoy being back in Italy again, its colours and sounds and excitement. She began to breathe more easily.

The Albergo Francobollo was not one of the smarter hotels in Rome but its welcome was gigantic. Signor and Signora Buona Sera were full of admiration and praise over how well they all spoke Italian.

'Bene, bene benissimo,' they cried as they ran up and down the stairs to the rooms.

'Are we really saying "Good evening Mr. Good Evening"?' Fiona asked Barry.

'Yes, but look at the names at home like Ramsbottom, and we've even a customer in the supermarket called O'Looney.'

'But we don't have people called Miss Goodmorning and Mr. Goodnight,' Fiona insisted.

'We do have a place in Ireland called Effin, and they talk about the Effin football team and the Effin choir will sing at eleven o'clock Mass… what would outsiders make of that?' Barry asked.

'I love you, Barry,' Fiona said suddenly. They had just arrived at their bedroom and Mrs. Good Evening heard the remark.

'Love. Very, very good,' she said, and ran down the stairs to settle more people in their rooms.

Connie hung her clothes up carefully on her side of the small cupboard. Out the window she could see the roofs and windows of tall houses in the little streets that led off the Piazza Quintacenta. Connie washed at the small handbasin in the room. It had been years since she had stayed in a hotel without its own bathroom. But it had also been years since she had gone on a trip with such an easy heart. She did not feel superior to these people because she had more money. She wasn't even remotely tempted to hire a car which she could have done easily, or to treat them to a meal in a five star restaurant. She was eager to join in the plans that had been made in such detail by Signora and Aidan Dunne. Like every other member of the evening class Connie sensed that their friendship was deeper than a merely professional one. Nobody had been surprised when Aidan's wife had not joined the group.

'Signor Dunne, telefono,' Signora Buona Sera called up the stairs.

Aidan had been advising Laddy not to suggest immediately that he should clean the brasses on the door, maybe they should wait until had been there for a few days.

'Would that be your Italian friends?' Laddy asked eagerly.

'No, Lorenzo, I have no Italian friends.'

'But you were here before.'

'A quarter of a century ago, no one who would remember me.'

'I have friends here,' Laddy said proudly. 'And Bartolomeo has people he met during the World Cup.'

'That's great,' Aidan said. 'I'd better go and see who it is that does want me.'

'Dad?'

'Brigid? Is everything all right?'

'Sure. You all got there then?'

'Absolutely, all in one piece. It's a gorgeous evening, we're going to walk down to the Piazza Navona and have a drink.'

'Great, I'm sure it'll be terrific.'

'Yes. Brigid, is anything… you know…?'

'It's probably stupid, Dad, but a kind of loopy woman came in twice wanting to know what hotel you're all staying at. It might be nothing but I didn't like the feel of her, I thought she was off her rocker.'

'Did she say why?'

'She said that it was a simple question and could I answer her and give her the name of the hotel or would she have to speak to my boss.'

'And what did you do?'

'Well, Dad, I did think she was out of a funny farm so I said No. I said my father was out there and if she wanted a message passed to anyone I'd get in touch.'

'Well, that's it then.'

'No, it's not. She went to the boss and said it was very urgent she contact a Mr. Dunne with the Mountainview party, and he gave the hotel name to her and gave me a ticking off.'

'She must know me if she knew my name.'

'No, I saw her reading my name Brigid Dunne from my badge. Look, I suppose I just wanted to say…'

'Say what, Brigid?'

'That she's sort of crazy and you should look out.'

'Thank you very much, my dear, dear Brigid,' he said, and realised that it had been a long time since he had called her that.

It was a warm evening as they set out to walk through Rome.

They passed near Santa Maria Maggiore, but not near enough to stop and go in.

'Tonight is just a social night… we all have a drink in the beautiful square. Tomorrow we look at culture and religion for those who want to, and for those who want to sit and sip coffee they can do that too.' Signora was anxious to remind them that they were not going to be herded, but she saw in their eyes that they wanted a little looking after still. 'What do you think we might say when we see the wonderful square with all the fountains and statues in the Piazza Navona?' she asked, looking around.

And there on the side of the street they all shouted out, 'In questa piazza ci sono multi belli edicifil'

'Benissimo,' said Signora. 'Avanti, let's go and find them.'

They sat at peace, forty-two of them, and watched the night fall on Rome.

Signora was beside Aidan. 'No problems with the phone call?' she asked.

'No, no, just Brigid ringing to know if the hotel was all right for us. I told her it was wonderful.'

'She was very helpful over it all, she really wanted it to be a success for you, for all of us.'

'And it will.' They sipped their coffees. Some of the group had a beer, others a grappa. Signora had said there were tourist prices here and she advised only one drink for the atmosphere. They had to keep something to spend when they got to Firenze and Siena. They smiled almost unbelievingly when she mentioned the names. They were here in Italy to begin the viaggio. It wasn't just talk any more in a classroom on a wet Tuesday and Thursday.

'Yes, it will be a success, Aidan,' Signora said.

'Brigid said something else too. I didn't want to bother you with it, but some kind of madwoman came in to the agency and wanted to know where we were all staying. Brigid thought she was someone who might cause trouble.'

Signora shrugged. 'We've got this lot here, we'll cope with whatever else turns up, don't you think?'

In small groups, the evening class were posing each other by the Fountain of the Four Rivers.

He reached out his hand and took hers. 'We can cope with anything,' he said.

'Your friend arrived, Signor Dunne,' said Signora Buona Sera.

'Friend?'

'The lady from Irlanda. She just wanted to check the hotel and that all of you were staying here.'

'Did she leave her name?' Aidan asked.

'No name, just interested to know if everyone was staying here. I said you were going on a tour tomorrow morning in the bus. That's right, yes?'

'That's right,' Aidan said.

'Did she look like a madwoman?' he asked casually.

'Mad, Signor Dunne?'

'Pazza? Signora explained.

'No, no, not at all pazza.' Signora Buona Sera seemed offended that a madwoman might be assumed to have called at the Hotel Francobollo.

'Well then,' Aidan said.

'Well then,' Signora smiled back at him.

The younger people would have smiled if they had known how much it had meant to them to sit there with their hands in each other's as the stars came out over the Piazza Navona.

The bus tour was to give them the feel of Rome, Signora said, then they could all go back at their leisure to see particular places. Not everyone wanted to spend hours in the Vatican museum.

Signora said that since they served cheese at breakfast people often made themselves a little sandwich to eat later on in the day. And then there would be a big dinner tonight in the restaurant not far from the hotel. Somewhere they could all walk home from. Again, nobody had to come she said. But she knew that everyone would.

There was no mention of the woman who had called to look for them. Signora and Aidan Dunne were too busy discussing the bus route with the driver to give it any thought.

Would there be time to get out and throw a coin into the famous Trevi fountain? Was there room for the bus to park near the Bocca della Verità? The party would enjoy putting their hands into the mouth of the great weatherbeaten face of stone which was meant to bite the fingers off liars. Would he leave them at the top of the Spanish Steps to walk down or at the bottom to walk up? They hadn't time to think of the woman who was looking for them. Whoever she might be.

And when they came back exhausted from the tour everyone had two hours' rest before they assembled for dinner. Signora walked around to the restaurant, leaving Connie asleep in their bedroom. She wanted to check about the menu and to arrange that there would be no grey areas. Only a fixed menu was to be offered.

On the door she saw a notice draped in black crepe CHIUSO: morte in famiglia. Signora fumed with rage. Why couldn't the family member have died at some other time? Why did he or she have to die just as forty-two Irish people were coming to have supper? Now she had less than an hour to find somewhere else. Signora could feel no sympathy for the family tragedy, only fury. And why had they not telephoned the hotel as she had asked them to do if there was any hitch in arrangements?

She walked up and down the streets around Termini. Small hotels, cheap accommodation suitable for the people who got off trains at the huge station. But no jolly restaurant like the one she had planned. Biting her lip she went towards a place with the name Catania. It must be Sicilian. Was this a good omen? Could she throw herself on their mercy and explain that in an hour and a half, forty-two Irish people were expecting a huge inexpensive meal? She could but try.

'Buona sera,' she said.

The square young man with dark hair looked up. 'Signora?' he said. Then he looked at her again in disbelief. 'Signora?' he said again, his face working. 'Non è possibile, Signora,' he said coming towards her with hands stretched out. It was Alfredo, the eldest son of Mario and Gabriella. She had walked into his restaurant by accident. He kissed her on both cheeks. 'E un miracolo,' he said, and pulled out a chair.

Signora sat down. She felt a great dizziness come over her she gripped the table in case she fell.

'Stock Ottanto Quattro,' he said and poured her a great glass of the strong sweet Italian brandy.

Wo grazie…' she held it to her mouth, and she sipped. 'Is this your restaurant, Alfredo?' she asked.

'No, no, Signora, I work here, I work here to make money…'

'But your own hotel. Your mother's hotel. Why do you not work there?'

'My mother is dead, Signora. She died six months ago. Her brothers, my uncles, they try to interfere, to make decisions… they know nothing. There is nothing for us to do. Enrico is there, but he is still a child, my brother in America will not come home. I came here to Rome to learn more.'

'Your mother dead? Poor Gabriella. What happened to her?'

'It was cancer, very, very quick. She went to the doctor only a month after my father was killed.'

'I am so sorry,' Signora said. 'I can't tell you how sorry I am.' And suddenly it was all too much for her. Gabriella to die now instead of years ago, the hot brandy in her throat, no place for dinner tonight, Mario in his grave near Annunziata. She cried and cried while Mario's son stroked her head.

In her bedroom Connie lay on her bed, each foot wrapped in a face cloth wrung through in cold water. Why had she not brought some foot balm with her, or those soft leather walking shoes that were like gloves? She had not wanted to unpack a spongebag full of luxury cosmetics in front of the unworldly Signora, that was probably it. But who would have known that her soft shoes had cost what none of her companions would have been able to earn in three weeks? She should have taken them, she was paying the penalty now. Tomorrow she might slip away to the Via Veneto and buy herself some beautiful Italian shoes as a treat. Nobody would notice, and if they did what the hell? These weren't people obsessed by wealth and differences in standards of living. Not everyone thought about the whole business of wealth. They weren't all like Harry Kane.

How strange to be able to think about him without emotion. He would be out of gaol by the end of the year. She had heard from old Mr. Murphy that he intended to go to England. Some friends would look after him. Would Siobhan Casey go with him? she had enquired, almost as you ask after strangers who have no meaning to you, or characters in a television series. Oh no, hadn't she heard, there had been a definite cooling of relationships there. He had refused to see Miss Casey when she went to visit him in prison. He blamed her for everything that had happened, apparently.

It had given Connie Kane no huge pleasure to hear this. In a way it might have been easier to think of him in a new life with a woman he had been involved with for ever. She wondered had they ever come here together, the two of them, Siobhan and Harry. And had they felt touched by this beautiful city, the way everyone did whether or not they were in love? It was something she would never know now, and it was of no importance really.

She heard a gentle knock at the door. Signora must be back already. But no, it was the small bustling Signora Buona Sera. 'A letter for you,' she said. And she handed her an envelope.

It was written on a plain postcard. It said: 'You could easily die in the Roman traffic and you would not be missed.'

The leaders were counting heads to go to dinner. Everyone was present and correct except for three, Connie and Laddy and Signora. They assumed Connie and Signora were together and they would be there any moment.

But where was Laddy? Aidan had not been in the room they shared, he had been busy getting his notes together for the tour the next day to the Forum and the Colosseum. Perhaps Laddy had fallen asleep. Aidan ran lightly up the stairs but he was not to be found.

At that moment Signora arrived, pale-faced and with the news that the venue had been changed but the price was the same. She had managed to secure a booking at the Catania. She looked stressed and worried. Aidan didn't want to tell her about the disappearances. At that moment Connie arrived down the stairs, full of apologies. She too looked pale and worried. Aidan wondered was it all too much for these women, the heat, the noise, the excitement. But then he realised he was being fanciful. It was his job to find Laddy. He would take the address of the restaurant and join them later. Signora gave him a card; her hand was shaking.

'All right, Nora?'

Tine, Aidan,' she lied to him.

They were gone chattering down the street, and Aidan began the hunt for Laddy. Signor Buona Sera knew Signor Lorenzo, he had offered to clean windows with him. A very nice gentleman, he worked in a hotel in Irlanda too. He had been pleased to hear that there was a visitor for him.

'A visitor?'

'Well, somebody had come and left a letter for one of the Irish party. His wife had mentioned it. Signor Lorenzo had said this must be the message he was waiting for and he was very happy.'

'But was it for him? Did he get a message?'

'No, Signor Dunne, my wife she told him she had given the letter to one of the ladies but Signor Laddy said it was a mistake, it was for him. There was no problem, he said, he knew the address, he would go there.'

'God Almighty,' Aidan Dunne said. 'I left him for twenty bloody minutes to do my notes and he thinks that bloody family have sent for him. Oh Laddy, I'll swing for you yet, I really will.'