Quentins

"But not with your heart, Mother."

"My heart's not important in all this. He's right. There are people worse off than we are, and it wouldn't be fair."

"I don't have to do anything about it until tomorrow night. You can have more time," Ella said.

"And what are you going to do tomorrow night?" her mother asked fearfully.

Tm not quite sure, Mother. That's the truth. I think I know, but I'm not totally certain just yet." Deirdre said she'd have everything ready by noon, and that Ella should collect Derry from the hotel and bring him along early so that he didn't have to come in to a room full of strangers.

He was horrified when he saw that Ella was driving. "Somehow I never thought of myself as trusting my life, what's left of it, to you."

I take deep offence at that. You drove me around New York and I put up with that," she said, avoiding a bus neatly.

"Are there any traffic cops here at all?" he asked through his fingers, hiding his eyes.

"Don't be silly, Derry. It's easy today. You should see a crowded weekday at rush hour. Thing to remember is that no one indicates left and right."

"Including you?" he asked.

"I don't want to confuse them," she grinned. "I'm going to change the habit of a lifetime and have a stiff drink," he said when they got to Deirdre's.

"Thanks be to God," Deirdre said. "Ella said you sipped at one white wine for three hours and I was wondering what we'd do

with you, especially when you meet everyone. Maud and Simon came an hour early to set up their puppet show."

"It's all very different," said Derry King as he sat down and allowed the panic he had felt over Ella's driving to subside.

"Ella says you and your wife were very good to her when she was in New York," Barbara Brady said.

"My former wife Kimberly talks very highly of Ella, and so do I. You have a very bright daughter, Barbara."

"We love to hear that, any parent does. Do you have children, Mr. King?" Ella's father was more formal.

"Oh, call me Derry, please. No, no children. I wish we had. We are an unusual couple in that our separation did not make us enemies. We would have shared children quite amicably. I really do wish Kim well, and she me. I was resisting coming to Ireland for a lot of personal reasons from the past. Kim is delighted that I faced up to it at last."

"And are yon delighted?" Ella's father was sharp, observant.

Tm not sure yet, Tim. It's early days."

"You and she might get back together one day," Barbara suggested.

"Oh, no, that's not going to happen. Kimberly has a new husband. They are very happy together." He spoke simply, as if stating a fact.

Just then Brenda Brennan came in. He recognised her at once from the photographs in the Quentins file he had studied so carefully in New York. They didn't need to be introduced, but talked together easily. She was as he knew already very groomed and in control. But warm as well. She seemed genuinely interested in the things they had talked about, and anxious that his stay in Ireland would be a good one.

"We'll want to keep you here in Dublin all the time, but you'll want to travel, maybe go to the west. It's not a big journey by American standards."

"A perilous one on these roads, I'd say."

"Not at all. Grand, big, wide motorways nowadays. You should have seen it back when," she said proudly. "Where are your people from, by the way?"

"I have no people."

"I'm sorry, I misunderstood. I thought Ella said you had an Irish background, as so many Americans coming here do, you see."

"I do have an Irish background on one side of my family, but no people."

"So you won't be looking for roots then?"

"No way." Derry realised he sounded sharp and short. He had better say something that made him seem less abrupt. "But as it happens, my father's people did come from Dublin."

"Great. I like to hear of Dubs doing well. My husband is from the country, you see, and he says that they are the lads who succeed abroad."

"I wouldn't say my father did well." Derry's eyes were bleak.

Brenda Brennan had had a lifetime of reading faces and moods. "No? Well, his son doesn't look too much like a loser to me," she said with a bright smile. She was rewarded. He smiled back. "Let me introduce you to a couple of people," she said efficiently. "These are Ria and Colm. They run a magnificent restaurant on Tara Road, which you must visit while you're here and drop little cards advertising Quentins on each table!"

"As if she needed it!" Ria was small, dark and curly-haired with a huge smile. Her husband was handsome and thoughtful-looking.

Derry saw Ella looking over to see that he was all right. He raised his glass to her. He felt for a moment as if he belonged here in this easy place where no demands were being made on him. He must beware that feeling. It was probably brought on by the strange, strong drink he had taken to recover from Ella's driving. He would have no more. In fact, this moment he would ask for an orange juice.

Beside him, the small, earnest face of a blonde girl aged ten or eleven appeared. "May I refresh your glass?" she asked.

"That's very good of you . .. um, do I know your name?"

"You might have been told about us. I'm Maud Mitchell. My brother Simon and I are providing the entertainment this after

noon.

"Oh, isn't that splendid. I'm Derry. Derry King."

"And what do we call you? Simon and I, we're always calling people the wrong thing."

"Derry," he said.

"Are you sure? You're much older than we are."

"Yes, but I want to feel younger than I am, you see."

Maud accepted this as normal and suggested that he have a grapefruit juice mixed with a tonic. It was meant to be refreshing. Of course, strictly speaking, it was actually two drinks, but since he was the guest of honour, it would probably be all right.

"Am I the guest of honour?" he asked.

"Yes, because we have to check with you about the entertainment. We can't dance because there isn't a proper floor, only an old carpet. We brought a puppet show but Tom and Cathy think it might be too long. We were going to sing, and with you being an American, we were going to sing awful things like "When Irish Eyes are Smiling" and "Come back to Erin", which is what they all loved when we were in Chicago."

"Are they awful things?"

"Well, they wouldn't sing them here, if you know what I mean. And then we were told you didn't want any of that stuff, you weren't a normal American."

"No, no, that's true." Derry was delighted with the child. "And what would they sing here, do you think, given your choice?"

"Well, "Raglan Road", "Carrickfergus". I'll ask Simon. He's better at judging, but the main thing is that we're not to bore you by singing too long. That's what we do sometimes, go on too long. The puppet play is seven minutes, so if we sang two songs, would that be fair?"

"That would be great," he said. "Will you start now?" "You must have very funny parties in America," Maud said. "Of course we can't start now, we have to wait until they're all sitting down with their puddings and cups of coffee." "Ella, I'm desperately sorry about the twins monopolising Mr. King," said Cathy. I've tried to break them up half a dozen times, but he says he's enchanted with them. He won't talk to anyone else."

"Don't worry, he really is enjoying them. I've never seen him so happy." "It's a great party, Dee," Ella said.

"Nicky and Sandy are a little disappointed they can't talk to him more - he's spending all his time with those kids."

"He keeps shunting people away when they try to rescue him," Ella said. "I wish I knew what they were talking about."

"Brenda Brennan can actually lip-read," Deirdre said. Til ask her later." The twins were busy explaining who they were. "You see Cathy over there with the big stomach? It's a baby actually, but that's not the point."

"No," Derry agreed.

"Well, she's the daughter of Muttie and Lizzie, his wife. And we once went to live with Cathy and the husband she had then, who was Neil Mitchell, and he's our cousin. Neil's father and our father are brothers. So that's it!" Maud was triumphant.

"But you live with Muttie?"

"Yes. And his wife Lizzie."

"Good. But why, exactly?"

"Father and Mother aren't able to have us. They'd like to, but they're not able to so we go and see them on weekends to say hallo. Muttie drives us in his van."

"And why can't your parents have you?"

"Mother has bad nerves and then Father goes travelling. It's better we stay with Muttie and his wife Lizzie."

"Nerves?"

"Yes, she gets worried about things and then she drinks lots of vodka and doesn't know where she is any more."

"And why does she do that? Drink the vodka?" Derry asked.

"It helps her nerves. It's like a magic potion. She forgets whatever was upsetting her. The trouble is that she makes no sense and falls down and everyone gets cross with her," Maud said.

"But if she stopped, then you could both go and live with her, couldn't you?" Derry was unforgiving about a woman who could leave such marvellous children with strangers.

They explained that they had a brother, but he had done some crime, he was never spoken of, and he didn't come home. One time he used to work in Neil's father's office with Uncle Jock, but he didn't any more and he had gone away. "Are we talking too much about ourselves?" Maud wondered. "We haven't asked you any questions so that you could have a bit of talking."

"Not much to know about me. My father had bad nerves too. He used whiskey as a magic potion to make them better. Lots of it."

"And did it work?" Maud asked.

"No, not at all. It made him worse."

"And did your mother go wandering off on travels like our father does?" Simon was so innocent it nearly broke Derry's heart to see children accepting this intolerable state of affairs.

"No, she couldn't. She had to raise her children, and raise us without any money or support." His face was hard now.

The children noticed. Maud spoke gently. "But if his nerves were bad, what could anyone do about it?"

"He could have tried to stop drinking. He could have kept a proper tongue in his head to my mother."

"But he didn't mean all those things," Simon explained as if to a simpleton. "When Mother has been drinking she tells Father terrible things like that he has other ladies, and that we are monsters and sneak money from her purse. None of us take any notice."

"What?" Derry was amazed.

"Well, you can't take any notice, they don't mean it. Wouldn't they much prefer to be living a nice, peaceful life like everyone else?"

"And you don't hate them both?"

Simon and Maud looked at him as if he were from another world. "Hate them? Your mother and father? Nobody could do that. It isn't possible." They spoke every second sentence.

He was silent for a while. The twins looked at each other. He looked as if he might be going to cry.

"Are you all right, Mr. Derry?" Maud said.

"Did we talk too much?" Simon wondered.

Derry King shook his head.

"Do you think we should do the entertainment now?" Simon asked Maud.

"Maybe it mightn't be right for entertainment, Simon, you know the way it sometimes just isn't and everyone expects us to know."

I could check with Cathy," Simon agreed.

"But we don't want to leave him all upset," Maud said.

Derry still had said nothing. His face was working as he tried to hide his emotions.

"Maybe, Mr. Derry, you could go behind the sofa and have a big cry if you want to about your father's nerves and then you'd feel better. Often when we go to see Mother, afterwards we have a big cry to think of all she missed. Would you like to do that?"

"No, but I might have one later," he stumbled out the words.

"Yes, I bet you will." She patted him consolingly on the hand in the shared friendship of those who were children of the nervy.

Brenda Brennan, who was lip-reading, reported the conversation to Ella. "Maud is urging him to go behind the sofa and have a big cry."

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Is he going to?"

"He says he'll have one later."

"And what's the boy saying?"

"He's wondering whether they should get on with the entertainment," Brenda reported.

"I think they should start it almost at once, don't you?" said Ella. Cathy announced that the puppet play, which was about seven minutes long, was called "The Salmon of Knowledge", but the salmon puppet itself had been damaged in transit and had lost some of his scales, so everyone was to imagine it more scaly. The audience cheered it to the echo, Maud and Simon took several bows. They asked if there were any requests for songs. They were allowed to sing two, they said, looking eagerly around the room, sure of the delighted enthusiasm they would receive.

Derry King couldn't bear them to wait one more second. He heard himself calling for a song. "Carrickfergus". He didn't know it at all, he just remembered the name the twins said people liked.

They had true little voices and stood very still, side by side, singing the song of lost love and dreams. The seas are deep, love, and I can't swim over And neither more have I wings to fly I wish I met with a handy boatman Who'd ferry over my love and I ... Derry felt a very unaccustomed prickling in his nose and eyes. He hated this kind of music, glorifying loss and building up a sentimental image of the Old Country. He was not going to let two simple children who had seen no violence in their home make him change his own attitudes. Jim Kennedy was a violent man who had made life hell for everyone around him. There was no way Derry was going to go all soft on him now. There was just some small seed there that made him think he understood why his mother forgave him so often. It must have been some kind of belief, like these children had said, that Jim Kennedy like any other drunk would have preferred a different life, but it had somehow escaped him. Was that in his mother's heart as she insisted on staying in the home that Derry had been urging her to leave?

They were at the last verse now, and generously allowing the audience to join in. Even encouraging them by raising their arms. I'm never drunk but I am seldom sober A handsome rover from town to town Ah, but I'm sick now and my days are over. Come all you young men and lay me down. They all clapped and praised Maud and Simon. The twins were busy trying to decide what their second and last song should be.

"Do you know, that was so terrific, I wonder if you'd consider quitting when you're winning?" Cathy suggested.

It was not a concept that the twins grasped easily. But Maud glanced over at Derry King. He was the guest of honour, the man they had been asked to entertain. She saw what the others had already noticed. That tears were falling unchecked down his face.

"You're right, Cathy. I think we should leave it. Not always, but just this once."

"Love you, Maud, and you, Simon," Cathy said.

"Everyone's getting very odd round here," Simon said, annoyed that they hadn't been able to sing "Low Lie the Fields of Athenry". "You don't have to be quiet just because I cried, and you don't have to drive at five miles an hour because I dared to criticise the mad speed you went at on the way here," Derry grumbled.

"Lord, but there's no pleasing you today," Ella said with a sigh.

He was contrite. "There is pleasing me as you put it. I did so enjoy that lunch. Everyone was so welcoming. Thanks, Ella."

She smiled at him. "Go on, they were delighted with you. All of them."

"Were they?" He was childishly pleased. "Oh yes, and Brenda says now that she's met you, she has less anxiety about the project. My parents don't think that you're a big bad dangerous Yank. My mathematics pupils love you to bits. You did yourself a lot of good!

"I had a happy day."

"So did I. Which is just as well, because I have a lot ahead of me," Ella said.

"You do?"

"I do, Derry. I want to sort this whole thing out about Don's computer. Finish it, once and for all. And I wonder if I can do it from your suite in the hotel."

"Sure."

"You're very restful, do you know that? You don't say big long sentences when one word will do."

"Good," he said with a smile.

"I wouldn't be able to do this without you, Derry," she said.

She was grateful that he hadn't asked her what she was going to do, but then Derry was a practical businessman. He knew he'd find out just as soon as he got to his suite. "Why don't you make Muttie and Lizzie some sandwiches?" Cathy said as she let the twins off in her old home in St Jarlath's Crescent. Til leave them some pavlova as well. Apparently Dee is on a diet and won't allow it to stay in her house overnight, in case she eats it."

"Did you ever hate Muttie and his wife Lizzie?" Maud asked Cathy in her normal conversational tone.

"No, Maud, never. Did you?"

"Of course not."

"Then why do you ask?"

"Something Derry said. He said he hated his father."

"He said that?" Cathy "was shocked.

"Not exactly, but nearly. He has cousins here, but he's not going to look them up," Simon confirmed.

"They're called Kennedy and they're house painters here in Dublin," Maud said, proud to have got the information.

I know them," Cathy said. "They work with Tom's father."

"Will we have a surprise party and bring them all together?" Maud suggested.

"No, Maud. I know I'm a dull stick, but believe me, that's not a good idea," said Cathy, who decided she must ring Dee and tell her at once. Ella and Derry made a pot of tea from the little tray in the room. "First I'll call my parents, ask them if they're sure they don't want to take the money and run." She made the call swiftly.

They wouldn't be happy to be paid off in this way, they told her.

Yes, of course, if there was compensation, if insider trading could be proved, then they'd be happy to have a share, but not this way.

"We liked Derry King," her mother ended.

"And he you, Mother."

She sat very still for a long time after that.

Derry sat equally calm, sipping his tea.

"Right," she said eventually.

"Tell me what you're going to do."

"I'm going to call his wife. Ask her what she intends to do. Does she want to have a life in Ireland again, does she own that place in Play a de los Angeles? It's the only one that's not owned absolutely by Don. Maybe he wanted that as a home for her and the children. Maybe he left her a note, too." She was very calm.

"And then?" Derry King said.

"And then, depending on what she says, I will most probably call the Fraud Squad here and ask them to come to the hotel lobby and collect the laptop."

"And what might she say that would change your mind?"

"If she says she will have nowhere to live and she can't bear the shame, I'll ask you to help me erase the stuff about her home."

"Very generous of you."

I owe him that."

"You owe him nothing. We've been through this."

"Then you'll remember I want to behave perfectly."

"He's dead, Ella. He doesn't know how well and perfectly you'll be behaving."

"Please, Derry, help me."

"How?"

"Sit beside me while I make the call."

"You've thought it all out then?"

"Yesterday, all day. I made a tour of the past, pulled it all together. This is what I want to do." "Right, I'll sit beside you," he said. The phone only rang six times, but it seemed like ages. A man answered.

"Can I speak to Mrs. Margery Brady, please?" Ella felt her voice faltering. Derry squeezed her for solidarity.

There was a pause. "Who?" the man asked.

"Mrs. Brady. Margery."

"Where did you get this number?"

Ts this 23 Playa de los Angeles?"

"Yes, but . .. this is not a number that anyone has

The voice sounded familiar. Terribly familiar.

"Don?" Ella gasped.

"Angel? Ella, is that you? Angel?"

She couldn't find the breath to say a word.

Derry had an arm around her shoulders and was offering her a sip of water. She pushed the water away but held his hand very tight"

"Don, is that really you? You're not dead?"

"Where are you, Angel?" His voice was insistent, very anxious.

"You told me you were going to die, kill yourself," she said, shaking her head in disbelief.

I was going to, but in the end ... No good at finishing anything, me." He gave a hollow little laugh. The laugh he gave when things were very serious.

I thought you were dead, Don. Dead, you know, at the bottom of the sea. I wept over you everywhere, that you would never see this lovely autumn with the leaves changing, with the sun coming through the trees. I even wept for your sons, that they wouldn't know you .. . and you never died ... you never died at all."

"But that's good, Angel Ella, isn't it? We'll be together once I sort out this mess."

"You never loved me, Don."

"Of course I did ... do."

"What had you intended to do, Don?"

"Wait until I could get the laptop so that we could sort it all out. Get our life together."

She was silent.

Derry squeezed her hand harder. She had been holding the receiver so that he could hear what was being said.

"Ella. Ella Angel, are you there?"

"You never loved me at all. Was it just sex? Was it because I was young? What was it?"

"We'll meet. Bring me the laptop. I'll tell you everything then."

"I can't do that, Don."

"Why not?" He sounded weak.

"Because I gave it to the Fraud Squad."

"And the money for your parents? I can prove you took that."

"No, I gave that back too."

"I don't believe you."

"Why not?"

"There would have been someone on to me by now."

"There will be, Don, there will."

"When did you give it to them?"

"An hour ago," she said, and hung up the phone.

Chapter Fifteen.

It all took much less time than they thought. The detectives came to the hotel. Two quiet, unassuming looking men, one a tall, dark man she had met before when she had lied about the computer.

"So it turned up eventually?" he said, looking at her.

It did," she said simply.

"And you are .. .?" he asked Derry.

Derry handed him a business card. "Derry King, friend and business partner of Ms Brady."

"And this is . . .?"

"A ticket and key for a safe deposit box. Don Richardson claims he left bank drafts or certified cheques there for me."

"And you haven't opened it?"

"No."

"If they were for you ...?"

"He defrauded my father of money. They were a sort of apology, or that's what I thought."

"All the more reason to take them, then . .." The detective never finished a sentence, just left it hanging there and someone finished it for him.

This time it was Derry. "Ms Brady and her parents, being very moral people, decided they couldn't just take money like that and say nothing. They are returning it to you."

"Quite so. Very admirable."

"And the password to the computer is Playa de los Angeles, like the city Los Angeles."

"Ah, you just guessed this . . .?"

"Not exactly

"So Mr. Richardson told you .. .?"

"Not exactly that either. He told me ages back that it was "Angel" and when I tried it recently it wasn't, so I tried words a bit like that and it opened."

"Well done, Ms Brady."

"But that's not the main thing..." she said, her words tumbling out.

"It's not?"

"No, the main thing is he's not dead. He's alive. I spoke to him this evening. He never killed himself at all."

She looked from one face to the other to see the shock register. But to her surprise there was nothing at all.

"We never really thought he was dead," said the detective. "Didn't fit the pattern. Made no sense for him to kill himself."

"I thought he was dead and I used to know him very well indeed," Ella said.

"Yes, I'm sure."

"You might have told me," she said with tears in her eyes. "Saved me all that heartbreak."

"We didn't exactly see you since it happened. We asked yo u to keep in touch in case his briefcase turned up and you didn't... so how could we have told you?"

Derry intervened. "But now the briefcase has turned up and Ella has been in touch, so is that everything?" His voice was smooth but with authority.

The two men responded to him. They stood up and shook hands. They thanked them for the co-operation and asked if Ella, and indeed Derry if he wished, would accompany them to the safe deposit box, so that the hand-over of what it contained could be authenticated.

"His name and address and contact numbers are all there," Ella told them. "He calls himself Brady, of all names. Isn't that a really nice bit of a laugh for all of us?"

There was real sympathy in the faces of the detectives. The whole thing was over in an hour. Ella called her mother. "It's done. It's given back. Well, given to the Guards, anyway," she said in a dull tone.

"Well, I'm sure that's right. Thank you, Ella."

"No, thank you, Mother, and Dad, too, for being nice and normal and believing someone I introduced you to. I will make it up to you if it's the last thing I do."

"Stop, Ella." Her mother noticed that the voice on the phone was shaking and tearful.

"And one more thing, Mother . .."

"You're not coming home tonight?" her mother guessed.

"That's it. You're psychic," she said.

"Don't get too upset, Ella. That's all I ask. The man is dead now, let him rest. We have no way of knowing how sorry he may have felt at the end. His mind disturbed and everything. We can't judge the dead."

"The man is not dead, Mother. He's alive and well and living with his family in Spain."

"No, Ella. He "was killed in that terrible boat tragedy .. ."

"He faked it. He's living out there on Dad's money, and do you know what? He's calling himself Brady, Mother. That's what he's doing." She sounded quite hysterical.

"Is Derry there?" her mother asked.

She handed him the phone. Ella could only hear his end of the conversation.

"Well, of course I will, no, have no worries. Certainly I will. No, she's actually much calmer than she sounded to you. I think it's just saying it for the first time to someone is the hard bit. No, she's in no danger, Barbara, believe me, she's not. And I too. Goodbye."

She sat there unseeing. They were talking about her as a parcel. A package of nerves and reactions. Not a person.

"Do you know, Derry, the only thing that will hold me together over all this is very hard work," she said.

"Good. I was hoping you'd say that."

She was surprised. I thought you'd say talk, examine it, analyse it."

"No, there's no point. We won't get to first base now, analysing what makes that guy tick. You've done all you said you would from this end. Now get on with your life."

"And I can stay here?"

"Of course. Let's get down to work straight away." He pulled a second chair up to the desk. "Let's look at some of these stories. See how we could tell them . . . should it be table by table . .. have Mon and Mr. Harris sitting down side by side, explaining how it all began at one table, then move to another and get another story . .. Or we could do it as an hour-by-hour thing .. . like the restaurant starts to stir at about five a.m."

Ella laughed. A real laugh. "I don't think anything stirs in Dublin at five a.m."

"Now we're changing roles. You've been busy telling me how modern it all is here."

"Make it seven and we're more realistic."

"Nonsense, Ella. Think about the garbage being collected, the stuff coming in from market. It has to be earlier."

"It would be interesting to see. We'll ask Brenda and Patrick tomorrow night," she said. "Meanwhile, we'll go through the best stories and the ones that will be hard to tell."

"The guy from Scotland, Drew, he's not going to tell his own tale, is he? Show himself up as a would-be thief?"

"Apparently he is, his luck turned that night, his fiancee admired him so much for resisting temptation. Brenda says he's only bursting to tell his story."

Derry shook his head in amazement. "Aren't people here quite extraordinary?" he said in wonder.

"No, they're not. It's not just Ireland. It's the same everywhere, in England, in the US, all dying to tell their story and have their fifteen minutes of fame."

"There's a danger that people will exploit them," he said.

"Of course there is, but we're not that kind of business. Derry, you're not having second thoughts on me, are you?"

"No, of course not. But talking about second thoughts . . .?"

"Yes?"

"I just wanted to say when your anger dies down, you'll probably be relieved that he's alive. Don, I mean. It's only natural. You loved him and he loved you. It has to be better that he's alive, not dead at the bottom of the ocean. So, if you have second thoughts about him and are glad he's still around, then that's normal. That's all I wanted to say." He looked oddly uncomfortable, as if he didn't really believe all this, but felt that it should be said from a fairness point of view.

"No, I won't ever be glad about anything connected with him. Whether he is alive or dead doesn't really matter to me. I think I preferred him dead. I certainly don't love him or anything about him. So there'll be no second thoughts. But I'm not going to spend

my life consumed with hate, either. That would really make me the loser."

She thought he looked very pleased, but maybe it was just his pleasant smile. When she awoke on the sofa yet again there was a note. I've already gone to investigate this early-morning Dublin. See you tonight at Quentins, 7.30. Call my mobile anytime if you need me. Love, Derry Ella spent the day at Colm's restaurant on Tara Road.

"I don't know why you should think I should help you boost a rival restaurant," Colm grumbled.

"Because I'm a neighbour's child, because you're not remotely in competition with me, and you love to talk about your pride and joy. I just want to know what's a typical day?"

"As if there ever was one. Come on in and have coffee and I'll walk you through it."

By lunchtime, she thought she had understood the routine. It would be very visual. Derry would like it. Patrick and Brenda wouldn't object, their place was immaculate and all that backstage stuff would be something to be proud of.

"You look tired, Ella. Stay and have lunch. You've seen it all being cooked. Enjoy it."

"No, I have a lot of things to do. I have to tell several people something but I want to rehearse on you, Colm. Just to make sure I can do it without crying."

"Fire ahead."

"Don Richardson's not dead. I spoke to him yesterday. He's in Spain, on the run."

"Is it a secret?" Colm asked.

"No, not now."

"Good. I'll tell Ria's ex-husband Danny that he might go out and kill him for all of us. Would that help?"

Ella laughed nervously. "No, not really, but it did make me laugh. I don't suppose everyone else will be as practical as you are, Colm." She told Deirdre. Deirdre sat and listened with a stony face.

"Mother of God! Why couldn't he have done it properly? Did he wash up somewhere?"

"No, I don't think he tried it at all," Ella said.

"And now of course you're taking him back?" Deirdre was anguished.

We, Dee, I'm only telling you in case it was in the papers."

"No! You are taking him back or going out to him, I know you are."

"Oh, Deirdre, shut up. You're meant to be cheering me up, telling me some old song like "There Ain't No Good in Men". Not telling me I'm going back to him."

"I "wonder if Nuala knows," Dee said.

"Let's tell her, then," Ella said, her eyes dancing. And for a glorious moment Deirdre thought maybe it was going to be all right. That the one great love of Ella's life might not be able to seduce her back in again. "Nuala! It's Dee."

"No, Dee, I'm not going to talk to you. Last time you frightened me to death - I've had to blackmail them all with the threat of telling Carmel about your disgraceful antics with Eric to get them off Ella's back. Fine pair of friends you both turned out to be."

"Shut up, Nuala. I told you if we had anything to tell you we would."

"Did you?" Nuala was confused.

"Yes, and now we have. I have Ella here and now we do have news for Frank and his brothers."

"You do?"

"Will I put Ella on?"

"Well, not if she's going to be cross with me," Nuala said.

"Not at all. She won't be cross with you. Here's Ella now."

"Hi, Nuala."

"Oh, Ella, I'm sorry. I don't think Dee explained it all properly at the time."

"No, Nuala, I'm sure she didn't. Have you got pen and paper?"

"Yes, I have." Nuala sounded very nervous.

"Write this. It's Don's telephone number in Spain. Oh, and he's not dead, by the way. That was a mistake. He's alive, but he calls himself Mr. Brady. I know, isn't it a scream? No, I'm not drunk, Nuala. That's the number and the other thing is that the Fraud Squad has his computer, with all the details, everything it contains.

Oh, and the last thing is that Dee would have gone the distance and told Carmel every last detail. She's been a marvellous friend."

"Ella," Nuala's voice was hoarse with fright. "They're going to be in terrible trouble if it all gets out. Not only will they have lost money and property but there's a matter of tax, you see." She ended in a near whisper.

"Oh, there often is, Nuala. Anyhow, we're all fair and square now."

Ella hung up and they giggled as they had done for so many years. "What I've been saying is getting easier to say as the day goes on," Ella said as she walked into Firefly Films.

"I hate mystery statements," Nick said.

"Don Richardson's alive and presumably coming back to this land in leg irons," Ella said.

"You're not serious? Sandy and I once wondered if he might have staged it," Nick said.

"You were right," she said crisply.

"How did you find out?" Sandy asked.

"I spoke to him on the phone," Ella said, and it didn't make her feel even slightly tearful. "I spoke, and he called me Angel as he always did, and he had never died at all. Imagine."

"Are you okay?"

"Yes, I'm fine, I'm fine, but I need to be kept very busy. Could I work here this afternoon until we all go to Quentins? I'm just a bit jumpy and I need to be with people."

"Why did he ring you?" Nick asked.

"He didn't. I rang him, or rather his wife. I didn't know he was still alive."

"And are you glad?" Sandy asked.

"I don't care, really and truly, I don't. Too much has happened to care."

They believed her, got her a sandwich, and sat her down so that she could write out a type of running order that they might go through at tonight's meeting at the restaurant. They watched her through the glass door, her head down over the paper as she planned out a very rough shooting schedule.

"Do you think she'll go back to him?" Sandy wondered.

"With any luck he won't be in a position to ask her." Cathy and Tom at Scarlet Feather heard from Ria and Colm that Don Richardson was still alive. Nora O'Donoghue heard it from them because she had gone into their premises to book a little wedding party. Nora was busy costing out the possibility of having canapes and wine in the back of a bookshop, which would let them have the premises free. There wouldn't be a huge number, but they had really very little money. Still, some things called for the equivalent of fireworks.

Cathy knew that the discussions were irrelevant since Brenda and Patrick had planned to give them a wedding present of a reception in Quentins. But they were only being told this much nearer to the time. Nora had been pushing Cathy for details of how many canapes each there would be for so many euros.

Then this news came suddenly out of the blue.

"I knew he wasn't dead," she said calmly.

"How on earth did you know that, Nora?" Tom was sceptical.

"I saw him this morning," she said simply, "getting out of a taxi in Stephen's Green." Tom and Cathy called Deirdre to alert her.

"Is she sure? She can be quite odd, Nora O'Donoghue."

"No, she's fine, she saw him, she said nothing and was going to say nothing because of Aidan, this guy she's going to marry, he was the one who knew him, taught Don Richardson's kids, and was conned out of money by him, she didn't want to upset him coming up to the wedding."

"Thank God she mentioned it to you," Deirdre said. "Now we can alert Ella."

"And maybe the Guards as well," said Cathy.

Ella's mobile number was engaged. So Deirdre rang Nick at Firefly Films.

"Don't panic, it's okay, I can see her, she's in the next room talking away on the phone."

"She's not talking to him, is she?"

"He doesn't have that number. It's a new phone."

"What will we do, Nick?"

"Why don't you find Derry somehow. I'll tell her parents. It's not as if he's going to do anything in broad daylight."

"It's just so that he takes nobody by surprise. Will you tell her, Nick? Gently, you know?"

"Sure thing, Dee," he said. "As soon as she gets off the phone." Ella was phoning Sasha, the girl who was now living in the Richardsons" Killiney house, the girl with Max, the lovely baby, and whose uncle Michael Martin was a great friend of Don's.

"Do you remember me, Ella Brady? I came to visit you on Saturday," she began.

"Well, am I glad you called."

"You are?"

"I was looking everywhere for anyone who might tell me where you lived."

"But why? What for, Sasha? I was just going to tell you that. .."

Sasha interrupted. "He's not dead, he never died. It was all a pretend suicide. He's alive, and he's coming back to look for you."

"No, he can't, the police know, he wouldn't dare to come back here."

"Well, he left his home in Spain last night. He'll be here today. He says if he can get to you first you won't sell him out."

"But I've done it. I've given everything to the police."

"He doesn't believe it."

"Who told you all this, Sasha? Who says he doesn't believe it?"

"Michael Martin, my uncle. He told me to pack up everything of mine and Max's to have the place looking perfect in case Mr. Richardson wants to stay here."

"In his own house? But he's wanted for huge frauds. He wouldn't go there in a million years."

"I know. That's why I wanted to find you. It's obvious he's not coming here, he's going after you." Derry King had begun his day at 5.30 when he walked to Quentins Restaurant to see if there was any sign of life and indeed he was proved right.

Eight large rubbish bags stood in bin containers, each bag tied and labelled. A private rubbish collector was removing them to a truck. The empty bins were left in the alleyway behind, some on their sides.

Derry nodded with satisfaction. This was one point he could score over Ella. She said no one was awake then.

She was such a courageous girl. She had faced everything so bravely. And there had been a lot to face. The only good thing was that this guy Don Richardson could not come back to Ireland now. It would be far too dangerous for him. So at least Derry didn't have to worry about Ella being in any danger. He went to get himself an early mug of tea. A small cafe not far away obliged. It was at times like this that Derry longed for a New York diner. Still, it wasn't too bad.

He nodded at the men sitting there. "You're up early," Derry said pleasantly.

"Big rush job, office block over there. We get treble time before seven o"clock in the morning," one of them said.

"Nothing wrong with that kind of money. Did it take much negotiating?"

"No, Kennedys are tough but they're fair. If you do the work right, paint well and put in the hours, then you go home with a decent pay packet at the end of the week."

"Kennedys?" he asked.

"That's us, well, that's the bosses."

"Two guys called Sean and Michael?" Derry enquired.

"The very ones."

"Well, isn't that a small world."

"You know them?"

"No, my ex-wife met them a few years back, said they were good guys."

"They're not bad at all."

"Will they be round during the day, do you think?"

"Bound to be, they usually come in round seven when we"re meant to be clearing out of the place. Will I tell them who was looking for them?"

"No, it's okay. I'll come back and tell them myself." He had no intention of coming back. It was such an extraordinary coincidence that he should walk into his father's family by accident. What was anyone doing, calling this place a city? They were mad. It was a village. Sandy called Tim and Barbara Brady to tell them that Don Richardson had been seen in Dublin.

"Thank you, Sandy. As it happens, Mr. Richardson is here with me at this very moment. I'm telling him that we have no idea where Ella is and that you don't either."

"She's here, Mrs. Brady, don't worry. We'll get the Guards," Sandy whispered.

The phone was hung up.

"Ring them again, Nick, quick, tell them he's in Tara Road."

"They're not taking it as urgently as I thought," Nick said. "They

seem to think it's all a matter for Fraud, they don't think she's in any danger."

"Well, can't we speak to Fraud?" Sandy said. "They may think differently."

"They've passed my message on," Nick said. "But I'll ring again saying where he is now." "We didn't expect to see you again, Don," Barbara Brady said when she got over the shock of seeing him on her doorstep.

"I know, I know. But you did know I was alive? Ella must have told you."

"Yes, she did, last night. She was very startled, shocked."

"Is your husband at home, Barbara? I'd like a quick word with you both. It won't take long."

"Tim isn't here. He's at the doctor. He doesn't sleep at all well, and there's a matter of his getting counselling."

I can't tell you how sorry I am." Don looked sun-tanned but thinner than he had before. He had lost his lazy, easy confidence and his eyes darted around all the time.

"Yes," Barbara Brady said bleakly.

"I have had so many regrets in this sad business. I truly did enjoy talking to him. He was a man of such integrity and a, well, a man of faith in a way."

"He's not that now," Tim Brady's wife said, looking around the small house they lived in, her face showing just how disturbed and upset the man of integrity and faith was these days.

I did everything I could to make it up to him. I sent money. Ella surely told you that?"

"We couldn't take that," Barbara said as if it were obvious.

"May I sit down, please?" Suddenly the great Don Richardson looked tired and even a little frightened.

"I'd prefer if you didn't, Don, it would be hypocritical to pretend that you are welcome here."

"Ella?" he asked.

"I don't know, I really don't. She didn't come home last night."

"Please."

"I can't tell you what I don't know."

Til only talk to her for ten minutes, in front of you and Tim if you like, or here in the house. Please, I have to ask her something."

"I think you asked her enough over the years."

"No, I'll tell you what it is. I know her. I know her, for God's sake. When I was talking to her last night, she said she had given in the laptop. She wasn't telling the truth. All I have to do is meet her and tell her how much she can save, for everyone, if she doesn't give it in. I can get it back together, that's what I'm trying to do. I can rescue people's investments, your Tim's, too."

"I don't think she cares about the computer," Barbara said.

"I agree with you and I don't believe she's handed it in."

"She told me she had given it back."

"She said given it back?"

"Those were her words. Then she said, "Well, to the Guards anyway"."

He was thinking hard. I still don't believe she would have done it. I know her voice, you see."

The telephone rang. "Can you answer it? It just might be her," he pleaded.

But it was Sandy at Firefly Films.

He stood listening.

"Who was that?"

"Just friends concerned for her."

"So they know I'm back, you can see I haven't much time."

"Do you know that I don't give a damn how much time you have, Don Richardson, or how little? Our only daughter had the misfortune to love you and she has ended up a hurt, damaged girl as a result. She lives with a sense of guilt and shame on account of you, and the fact that her father is a shell of a man, disgraced and empty, and that I live in a prefabricated hut instead of that house over there. She has wept oceans over your leaving her to live in a marriage that she thought was over. She wept further oceans when she thought you were dead. Now do you understand how little I care about how much time you have or don't have ? I do not know where Ella is, and if I did know, then by God I wouldn't tell you."

"I'll go now, Barbara, and I won't say any more. I urge you not to, either. Remember, there is still the possibility that Ella may forgive me and come with me. I don't want her to feel that the door to her mother and father is closed."

He was gone and Barbara Brady stood in her doorway shaking at the courage she had shown and her fear that Don Richardson might be right. Was it possible that, after everything, Ella would go back to him again? Derry walked by Quentins again. This time there was activity

inside. He knocked at the back door. "I'm Derry King. I'll be meeting you tonight," he said.

The tall dark man dusted the flour and sugar off his hands and gripped Derry's warmly. "Brenda told me all about meeting you at lunch. I couldn't be there. Someone had to run the shop."

"And it's an elegant shop I hear from all."

"Well, thanks to you we're going to make it more widely known, certainly. Come on in, won't you?"

If Patrick Brennan was the slightest bit surprised to see a caller at 6.30 in the morning, he showed no sign of it. He was always here at this hour to do the pastry cooking. He was bad at delegating, he admitted, and just couldn't hand it over to someone else. This was his real skill, and what he enjoyed most. Today he had to make two lemon tarts, a chocolate roulade, a chocolate mousse, a tray of poached pears, a great bowl of chocolate curls, two litres of praline ice-cream and a raspberry coulis.

"But do you have to start so early?"

"Well, I do, really, you need constant exact temperatures for desserts. Later in the day the ovens are always opening and closing. It's not as good."

And before the city woke up properly, Quentins seemed to be buzzing. A lad called Buzzo came in to hose out the dustbins in the lane and line them with heavy-duty rubbish sacks. He scrubbed out the kitchen and made a note of supplies needed.

"My brother used to do this at the start," Patrick explained. "But he's a family man now and he'll be going out to get us the vegetables, so we hired Buzzo. Poor divil, it's his only way of having a proper breakfast, getting a few euros together and still getting to school by nine a.m. He gets the money in his hand from me. I don't really approve, but if you had Buzzo's family . .."

"Drink, I guess?" Derry enquired.

"Oh, no. Drink they could cope with. Drugs, I'm afraid. Lives in a bad area. All his brothers are addicts and his father's a dealer."

"His mother?"

"Away with the fairies, spaced out for years now."

"No hope for the kid then?"

"He's survived so far. He's very bright, you see, so a few of us just make it easier for him to get by without having to be tempted by the drug money. Soon he'll be old enough to have a place on his own. He's gone down now to make tea and tidy up a bit for Kennedys" men, who are doing a job down the road." "Are they a good firm?"

"About the best. They did our last repaint job and I couldn't praise them enough."

There was the sound of a horn outside.

"It's the linen, Mr. Brennan. I'll take the sack down to them now," Buzzo called out.

Yesterday's dirty tablecloths and napkins went off at speed down the lane and Buzzo returned carrying a large box of folded replacements. This had just been placed in what was called Brenda's cupboard when the meat arrived.

By now the chef trainee had arrived, so he took over and Buzzo, with his folded bank note in his pocket, was heading off for the second job of the day. It reminded Derry so much of his own early years, finding any job that was going and nailing it down. He wished he could tell Buzzo how well it had turned out for him, but kids hated these preaching speeches, so he would say nothing.

The trainee, who was called Jimmy and was a bit slow for Patrick's liking, was being hastened through his coffee. His job now was to cut up the meat and have it ready for Chef to cook when the time came. At the same time he was to make a stock with the bones, chicken carcasses and vegetables that were in the cool room all tied up in plastic bags.

And then Blouse Brennan appeared to check the list of what they needed. "I'll have to buy courgettes. My own are ludicrous," he apologised.

"That's all right, Blouse, a lot of places buy all their vegetables," Patrick assured him.

Then the fish box came, from the fishmonger, and then boxes of wine from the supplier and the cheeses.

The assistant chef, Katie, said that there were three new cheeses today. She laid them out expertly on a marble-topped trolley in the cool room. "That's three more to teach the waiters how to explain and pronounce. I'll have to ring up the cheese man and check myself first. We don't want to look like eejits."

Derry smiled at her. If she were to say that to the camera, it would be very endearing. Ella had been right. Following a day in the restaurant was a good way to let the story unfold.

Ella! She was going to be fine. She had promised to ring if she wasn't. Ella wanted to be alone. She needed to think. She did not need endless helpful voices of friends telling her she was all right and that it was all right and everything was going to be all right. None of these things was true.

Don Richardson was coming after her. Or was he?

Could she take Sasha seriously? She needed to talk to somebody. It wasn't fair to wear Derry down with it all again. Perhaps Don would go to her parents" house.

She called her mother. And discovered that he had just left.

"How was he, Mother?"

The question seemed to upset Barbara Brady. "He was ... well, he was all right."

"No, Mother, I mean it."

"Well, what do you want to know? He wasn't pale or anxious .. ."

"I mean, was he sane or did he look as if he were going to come after me with a cleaver?"

"He thinks he's coming after you with an offer you can't refuse. He thinks you're going back to him."

"Then you've answered my question, Mother. He's far from sane and we must bring in the cavalry."

She phoned the Fraud Squad. They had heard. He would be in custody by evening.

Dee wasn't able to come to the phone, her message said. Ella saw Nick and Sandy watching her covertly through the glass door .. . she couldn't wait like this in a trap until he arrived. She had to get out. But she knew they wouldn't let her.

Leaving her jacket over the back of her chair and her handbag on the desk so that they would think she was coming back, she took her telephone and her wallet with her. She slipped out to the bathroom and to the side door into the lane. They would be annoyed, but she had to be alone. She hailed a cab and asked to be taken to Stephen's Green. From the back of the cab she dialled directory enquiries and got Michael Martin's number. She got through straight away.

"Yes?" he said crisply.

"Tell him to stop looking. I'm on my way to Stephen's Green. I'll be beside the duck pond. I'll see him there."

"Yeah, you and half the Guards in Ireland."

If they're there it's not because I'll have brought them," she said and hung up.

"You okay?" the driver asked, looking at her in the mirror.

"I don't know," Ella said. "Why do you ask?" "You're shivering. You've no coat. You look worried." "All of these things are true," Ella agreed. "So?"

"So I have to do something I don't want to do and I'm a little bit afraid," she said.

"Take someone with you," the driver suggested.

"I can't."

"You've got a phone. Then tell someone where you're going."

"But I don't want anyone coming in and interrupting it."

"You're in a mess then, aren't you," the driver said agreeably.

"I am indeed," she said. Derry King walked back to the building where the major painting job was taking place. He saw the professional sign for the painters. His father could have been part of this firm, lived in this city. Derry could have grown up here. But then, if he had, he might well have been like that boy Buzzo, cleaning out dustbins, making tea on sites before school. Like his own childhood in New York.

He saw two men walking towards a van with the name Kennedy on it. They stood discussing a sheaf of papers, some attached to clipboards. He watched them for a long time with a lump in his throat. They were square men like himself, same bristly hair, a little taller than he was, but they had the same lines coming out like stars around the eyes. You would not need a college degree in genetics to know that these were his relations.

He should be their friend. They were, after all, the sons of brothers. But there was so much to regret. To try to forget. He would walk way.

At that moment they looked over. He couldn't run.

"Scan? Michael?" he said.

"Well, Derry, you came to see us at last," said one of them.

"You knew me?" He didn't know whether to be pleased or outraged.

"Of course we did."

"Kim, I suppose?" he said.

"Well, she did show us a photo of you when she was here, but that was a while ago, and anyway, aren't you the spit of us?"

"That's right."

Derry still seemed uneasy.

The bigger man said, "Now it's easy for us to know you. There's

only one of you. You don't have an idea which of us is which. I'm Scan and this is Michael, the brains of it all, and can we buy you breakfast?"

"I've been eating breakfast for hours," he said with a half-smile.

"It's the one meal you can't overeat on, they say." Scan was eager. Touchingly eager to treat the cousin who had ignored them for decades.

He looked from one to the other. "You don't seem surprised to see me," he said.

"Kimberly sent us a message saying you might be here and to look out for you," said Michael.

"And one of the painters said there was a Yank who was the dead image of us, asking about us in the cafe," added Sean.

And they laughed like old family friends as they went to Derry's third breakfast of the day. Possibly ducks were not as content as they looked. Maybe they were up to their little feathered armpits with worry, but they looked fairly sound, Ella thought. As if they had it sorted.

She looked around. There was no sign of him yet.

She sat down on a bench and found a paper bag with the remains of someone's breakfast croissant. Normally she would have been appalled at the Dublin litter problem. Now she could give it to these quacking ducks as she pleased. Maybe it was what they called an Act of Random Kindness to leave the bag there.

She saw people moving around, some of them hurrying, others idling. None of them was Don. And yet she knew he would come. He had moved so quickly from Spain. He must be desperate to find her. Perhaps he had known she was lying when she spoke to him last night about having given the laptop in already. He must have flown out of Spain immediately, gone by London possibly. What passport had he used?

Suddenly she felt frightened. Why had she arranged to meet him here?

She dialled the number of Derry King's mobile. It was up on the screen, but she needed to press the green button for it to start ringing. Before she could do that she saw Don. He was moving towards her, arms out.

"Angel," he cried. "Oh, Angel, nothing matters now. I'm just so glad to see you again." Derry didn't know how the day passed, so much happened, so much was seen and noted. Even in his busiest days setting up his own business in the USA, he had not met so many people in the space of one day.

His cousins brought him back to their headquarters and explained the business from the ground up. How it had seemed such a great idea to hire themselves out to builders as master painters, to put a seal on their work as it were. But there were problems.

They told him unemotional stories about their own father, now dead, and their mother, who was in an old people's home and would love to see him, but maybe in another visit, not this one. They pushed him not at all and he felt he had known them all his life.

He went back to Quentins to follow how the day was unfolding there. He met the staff, saw them learning the names and nature of the new cheeses, watched the clever switching of tables as bookings changed minutes before lunch was served. And noted the clockwork precision of the kitchen, where everything had its own rhythm.

Derry saw Brenda on the phone and she told him she had just heard that Don Richardson was in Dublin.

"Does Ella know?" he asked immediately.

"Apparently so, she's safe at Firefly Films. With Nick and Sandy." .

"He didn't waste much time," Derry said.

"No, I suppose he thought he'd better run in before the Guards got their paperwork ready," Brenda said.

"If he sees her ..." Derry began.

"He won't."

"No, but if he does, do you think she might go back to him?"

Brenda noticed what she thought was more than a professional interest in the question. His face was very concerned. Wishing she believed what she was saying, she assured Derry that there wasn't a chance in hell that Ella would look at that man again. "Hallo, Don." Ella's voice was flat. "Oh, my darling Ella." "No, Don, none of that." "But nothing's changed. There's been such hell and I know that I

put you through it, but I had to. So that in the end we would be..."

"No, Don, you didn't. You didn't have to do anything."

"It's going to be all right now, Angel. You and I can go away now. We'll get that money your mother and father wouldn't take, that will get us abroad anywhere, then with the computer we can get everything sorted out."

She looked at him in disbelief. He really meant it. He thought it was possible that she would drop everything and run away with him.

What did he think her life had been like for all these months, what kind of grasp on reality did he have?

She looked at his face, wondering how he could be so confident and loving. He really did think she was going with him.

"I can't believe that you're here, Don, walking right back into the lion's den .. ."

"You didn't give it to them, Ella. I know your voice. I know everything about you, honestly I do. I know "what you're like asleep and awake. I think of you all the time. I know every heartbeat. I can tell when you're lying, when you're frightened. I never knew anyone as well as I know you. I know every breath you take." He "was shaking now, trembling, and there "was a heavy sweat on his forehead.

Suddenly she got frightened. She pressed the green button on her phone, which was behind her. She could hear the number being dialled. Please God, may Derry be there. Please may he hear me.

"Don, believe me, I'm not going away with you," she began.

"You are of course, Angel Ella, and we'll be together as we were always meant to be."

She could hear something click on the phone behind her. May it be Derry picking up.

"I didn't come out to meet you in Stephen's Green to talk about this, Don," she said.

"Why did you come then, if you don't love me, want to go away with me to have a life together? Why else did you come?"

"To say goodbye and to say sorry, I suppose."

"Sorry? You're not saying sorry for anything, Angel. You haven't given anything to anyone. It's all somewhere waiting for us to collect."

"No. I gave it in."

"Before or after you talked to me?"

"After," she said, looking at the ground.

He smiled almost dreamily. "I knew, I was right about that, that I could tell when you were lying."

"Well, can you tell now? Can you tell that this much is true .. . that as soon as I put the phone down I rang the Fraud Squad and they came round and took the laptop. And we went and got the bag from the safe deposit. And they took that too." She looked at his face. He did believe it now.

"Why did you do this to me?"

"To have the courage to look you in the face and say it's over and you should give yourself up. Say you're sorry. Put your hands up. There has to be something that can be rescued. Do your time, give the boys some dignity in their father. And your wife, too, for that matter."

His face seemed contorted now. "Will you shut up. Do you hear me? Shut up, mouthing these pious wishes. Are you going to come in and visit me in the gaol for twenty-five years and wait until you are an old woman?"

She was very scared of him now, afraid that he would hit her. "I'm only just up the road from you," she shouted over her shoulder, hoping it would reach the phone behind her.

"What are you talking about?" he cried.

I'm saying where I am to stop myself being frightened of you, Don, and the horrible look in your eyes. I'm in Stephen's Green beside the ducks. That's where I am, and I'm not afraid. It's the middle of Dublin City. You're not going to add to all you've done by hurting me."

"Hurt you, Angel? Are you mad? I love you," he cried.

"No, you never loved me. I know that now."

"I came back for you

"You came back for your computer," she said.

His eyes seemed very mad. Had they ever been like this before?

"Go away, Don," she said in a weary voice. "Please, go away."

"Not without you."

"You don't want me any more. I've given away what you thought I had. You should never have come back."

"You are such a stupid, stupid fool, Angel."

"Oh, yes, Don, I was, I know that now."

He was very near her and he looked totally out of control. "You could have had everything, Angel, anything you wanted." "I want you to go. Maybe you might even get away. Escape before they catch you. You've plenty of friends who'll hide you."

"Not so many nowadays, Angel. Not without the computer."

Then she saw people moving towards them. Out of the shadows, behind the trees and bushes of the park. The mother duck had taken the little ducklings away from the scene as if she knew it wasn't the place for them to be. A place where a grown man sobbed like a child to policemen and howled out, "I did it for you, Angel. I did it all for you."

And here Ella Brady trembled and shook in the arms of Derry King, who held her as if he was never going to let her go.

Chapter Sixteen.

The meeting in Quentins that night was cancelled. There had been too much drama. No one could concentrate on a possible film documentary when real life itself had been so full of passion and fear. Over and over, people told each other the events of the evening. Nick and Sandy told Deirdre how they had run out to get a taxi to Stephen's Green when they heard from Derry what was happening. Brenda and Patrick told Tom and Cathy how Blouse had been crossing Stephen's Green on his way back to the restaurant and had seen it all. There was Mr. Richardson crying out and roaring like a child. Barbara Brady told anyone who would listen that she had finally found her courage and her voice possibly when it was too late. But she would remember for ever that she stood up to Don and told him she didn't care what happened to him in the future.

Sasha was told by her uncle Mike Martin that she was to unpack at once and re-establish herself in the Killiney house. Mike Martin himself was going abroad. Mr. Richardson would not be coming back, and the best move was to establish squatter's rights immediately.

Nuala rang Deirdre to say that two of Frank's brothers had been in Stephen's Green also, in case the laptop was being handed over. They had been phoned by Mike Martin as a last-ditch stand. They had been horrified by Don's behaviour, and said that Ella had hired an American lawyer to protect her interests.

Square kind of a fellow called King.

There were photographs in the morning's paper of Don Richardson in custody and some eye-witness accounts of the scene. But there was one picture of Ella captioned "woman being consoled at the scene". Only those who knew her recognised her. Neither the press nor the public made any connection with Love Nest Ella of many months back. Except Harriet, who had met Ella on the plane to New York. She might get a couple of hundred euros if she rang a newspaper and tipped them off. But still, Ella was a nice kid. She deserved a break.

And there were so many other ways of making money. The sharp-eared witnesses who were meant to have heard everything said that Don Richardson had called out over and over: "I did it all for you." This was hard to interpret.

Some of the feature writers said that he may have been calling out to his beloved wife who, it was understood, was still in Spain but expected imminently in Ireland. Some thought to stand at her husband's side. Others thought to answer charges.

Since the long-planned dinner in Quentins was postponed until everyone was calm enough to deal with things, everyone seemed to assume that Ella would go back to the hotel with Derry.

"I don't suppose there's a way you'd like to try the bed tonight?" he said.

"Jesus, no, Derry. I've been through enough today without considering that side of things," she said.

"I didn't mean in bed with me in it, I meant you have the bed with me on the sofa."

"Oh, I see," she said. "Sorry."

And for some reason they found this very funny, and laughed all through the ordering of smoked salmon and scrambled eggs.

They played a game of chess as they had often done. They talked not at all about Don Richardson, where he would be tonight and what would happen to him. They didn't talk about Quentins either. In fact, they hardly talked at all.

And by the time Ella lay down on the sofa, which she insisted felt like home to her now, her eyes looked less frightened and her voice sounded much less shaky.

"I don't want to delay you in Dublin, Derry. We really will get down to work tomorrow."

"I'm in no hurry to leave. There's a great deal to be done here," he said as he kissed her lightly on the forehead and spread a rug over her. But America?" she said drowsily.

"Will survive for a bit without me," Derry King said. What could have happened in that week that made everyone change their minds about the documentary? And where did it start first?

Possibly in the kitchen of Quentins.

Blouse Brennan was going through the boxes of fruit. Expertly he was dividing them into the areas where they would be needed: limes and lemons at the bar, fresh berries over at the pastry table so they could be dusted with icing sugar and added at the last moment to desserts.

"I bet you they'll film you doing that, Blouse. You look very graceful," Brenda said admiringly.

Blouse reddened. "They won't have me in their pictures," he said.

"Of course they will, Blouse, and out in the vegetable garden and with the hens, aren't you the most colourful part of it all?" Patrick reassured his brother.

But Blouse didn't respond to the flattery. "I didn't think it would be nice to be in it as, well, I don't want people looking at me."

"They'll be nice people, you know most of them, Nick and Sandy and Ella," Brenda pleaded.

"No, I don't mean them."

"Well, Mr. King was in here, and he was the nicest man you could ever meet."

"No, I mean real people, outside people looking at it. People like Horse and Shay back home. The Brothers who taught me, fellows who work on the allotments. I don't want them seeing me and knowing my business," Blouse said, flushed and upset.

They knew not to let him get more distressed.

"Well, there's no question of you being in it if you don't want to, Blouse," Patrick said.

It would be a great loss, but it's your choice, no question of that," Brenda agreed.

"Thanks, Brenda, Patrick ... I don't want to let you down or anything."

"No way, Blouse," Patrick said through gritted teeth. Or it could have been in Firefly Films. They got the offer they had

dreamed of from the day they started: to film one of Ireland's greatest rock bands all the way through from composing and rehearsing the songs up to a huge rock festival. They would be made if they could do it, but they would need to start almost immediately.

Nick was about to refuse. They were committed to Quentins.

Sandy said they should stall them for a week, a lot could happen in a few days and Derry King could easily change his mind.

Or it could have been Buzzo. He said he couldn't be seen in the film because nobody at school knew he worked here, and that his brothers would take any money off him if they knew he had it.

And Monica said that her husband, Clive, though the greatest darling who ever walked the earth, had been having second thoughts about their telling their love story. People were odd in the bank, no sense of humour. They might think less of Mr. Clive Harris if they knew he had read books covered in brown paper about how to be attractive to the opposite sex. Regretfully, they would have to pull their story out.

Someone had told Yan the Breton waiter that if this film was successful, it would be shown everywhere, even in his homeland. Then his father would hear him saying for all the world to hear that they had not got on well as father and son. It was a very enclosed community. In his part of Brittany, people didn't air their problems in public. A million pardons, but he wouldn't be able to contribute.

And then Patrick Brennan finally had his annual checkup. He did all the stress tests on the treadmill and the exercise bikes. Then he sat down, still sweating mildly, to talk to the counsellor as part of the checkup.

"It's a stressful job, running a restaurant, of course, but once we get this documentary out of the way, we should be fine. We"ve promised to take time off together, delegate more."

"When will that be?"

"Oh, a few weeks" time, I gather. It will be hell keeping the show on the road until then, but we have to do it."

"Why, exactly?" asked the counsellor. Brenda's friend Nora O'Donoghue was in the kitchen chopping vegetables. Brenda looked at her affectionately. She was such a handsome woman, with her piebald hair and her long, flowing clothes. She had no idea that she was striking and wonderful. Even there, as she washed the vegetables in a sink, laid them out on cloths to chop and dice, she looked like some happy goddess from a classical painting.

"I wish you'd stop that and come and talk to me, Nora."

"Listen, I'm doing three hours" work for your husband, if not for you. Come and talk to me here while I work."

Brenda pulled up a chair. "Do you mind them filming you doing this?" she asked.

"They wouldn't want me, for God's sake, a mad old woman."

"Oh, they would, Nora. You look lovely. I was just thinking it. Would you mind?"

"Not at all, if it's any help to you and Patrick. I'd be honoured."

Brenda looked at her with a lump in her throat. What a generous-spirited person she was. She didn't care if her mother and awful sisters, if the students in the Italian class she taught, if Aidan's colleagues, saw her scrubbing vegetables in a kitchen. What a wonderful way to be.

"You're tired, Brenda."

"Which means, You're ugly, Brenda."

"No, it means, You're worried, Brenda."

"All right, I am worried. Worried sick about this documentary and that we get it right."

"You don't need to do it," Nora said.

"If we are to amount to anything, then let us leave some kind of legacy after us."

Nora carefully put down her short, squat, but very sharp knife and laid her hand on Brenda's. "You? Amount to anything? Legendary, that's what they call you two already. How much more do you want to amount to? You've been giving legacies into people's lives and will continue to do so for ever."

"You're kind to think we amount to a lot, Nora, but I don't see it that way. I thought this would sort of define us in a way."

"Brenda, you have each other and all this marvellous place. In the name of God, woman, don't you have enough?" Ella ran into Mrs. Ennis, the school principal, in Haywards Cafe.

"I can't tell you how pleased I am to see you," Mrs. Ennis said.

Ella was surprised. She had left Mrs. Ennis slightly in the lurch by leaving the school so quickly. Then Mrs. Ennis, too, might have regretted her indiscretions about her own private life which she told to cheer Ella up.

"I was going to ask you, did you want any part-time work? I did try to call you, but none of your phone numbers worked."

"Oh, I went into hiding for a while," Ella admitted.

"But I gather from what I read in the papers that you're out now," Mrs. Ennis was matter-of-fact.

"Yes, that's right, I am."

"Does teaching still interest you? You were good. The girls liked you."

"I did like it, very much. It was more solid than anything else, in a way."

"But maybe solidity isn't enough."

"I think it is now. But I have to make a film documentary first."

"How long would that take?"

"A few weeks, Mrs. Ennis. I won't be part of the editing."

"What's it about?"

"It's about a day in the life of a restaurant."

"Why?" Mrs. Ennis asked baldly.

Ella looked at her for a moment. "Do you know, I'm not quite sure why. A dozen reasons along the line, partly as therapy for me at the start, I know that. Then a lot of other people got drawn in." She seemed confused, thinking about why they were doing it.

Mrs. Ennis was brisk. "You know where we are, Ella. Ring us within a week if you'd like to come back to us. We need you."

"You're very kind."

"And the other business? All right about that?"

"Oh, yes. It's as if it all happened to someone else, not me."

"Good, then you're getting better," Mrs. Ennis said. Ella hadn't talked to Derry properly for three days. He was with his cousins morning, noon and night.

"You haven't had a fight with him?" Barbara Brady asked.

"You couldn't fight with Derry," Ella said. She remembered his ex-wife Kimberly saying something similar.

When he rang later that day, he asked to see her. "We have to talk, Ella. Can we have dinner at Quentins?"

"Will I get Nick and Sandy to come?"

"No, just you."

It turned out that he had been eating there every evening with his cousins. Scan and Michael knew the place already and had come for special treats.

"I'm sorry you're going to turn all this into a sort of circus," Scan had said bluntly as he looked around him.

"What do you mean?" Derry wondered.

"Well, when you have all these people appearing on television, they'll become celebrities and folks will come in to gawp at them. They won't be able to get on with their job like they did before. Before they became actors, I mean."

"Ah, now, Scan, don't go discouraging Derry. This is his work, his business. You wouldn't like it if he were to go telling you how to paint a house," Michael said.

"I wouldn't mind if he had anything interesting to say." Sean was honest.

And that night, Derry told Ella all this. How the brothers had opened up his eyes about so many things. Filming wasn't his business, he assured them, selling was his business, creating needs for people, then filling them. That's what he was good at. He had spent time in their business and told them about ways they could expand. Sell paint as well as doing the job. Set up an advisory service after hours, in the evenings or Saturday mornings. Draw in the young couples, give them colour charts, do and don't lists. Make them your friends. You weren't doing yourself out of a market. There were two different worlds, those who painted and those who didn't.

And then, he said to Ella, he had listened to them as well. And understood what they were saying. He had grown to love Quentins, there was a possibility that a fly-on-the-wall would destroy it and the hard-working people there. He felt clear in his head about it. Now the only problem was to explain all this to Ella and to everyone else. He was amazed at how easy that turned out to be.;. The only person who was confused and annoyed in the end was Deirdre. "For week after bloody week I've been talking, sleeping, dreaming, breathing this documentary. It was going to be the making of everybody. And now suddenly, out of a clear blue sky, I'm meant to be overjoyed that it is not happening. No, Ella, give me some sense of being something rather than a nodding dog."

"You, a nodding dog, Dee! Please!"

"No, I'm serious. It's all ludicrous. What happens when you go back to teaching, your man goes back to America, your other man goes to gaol, Firefly Films become rock groupies, Quentins misses it out on immortality? Where's all the joy in that?" Deirdre was great when she grumbled. Which was never for long.

"Listen, cheer up. You're invited to a big party to celebrate."

"God, what a mad crowd you are. Celebrating! Anyone else would be in mourning."

"No, Dee, you eejit, it's for lots of things . .. the new company, Kennedy and King. Berry's going in with his cousins. It's for Aidan and Nora's wedding party. It's for Nick and Sandy's new contract. It's for my getting exactly the job I want, part-time teaching, and I'm going back to university to do a doctorate as well, and it's for my father going to have a job as a financial adviser in Kennedy and King. And for so many other things ... if you can't celebrate all that, then you're only a miserable old curmudgeon."

Deirdre threw her arms around Ella. "I never saw you so happy. So that maybe is a reason to get a new party frock. Will there be anything there that I could get my nails and teeth into?"

"Lord knows, there might be," said Ella. "It's shaping up as a very unusual party." "Yes, Mrs. Mitchell. I know it's inconvenient. Perhaps you could choose another night."

"But my daughter-in-law ... well, my ex-daughter-in-law, tells me she's going to Quentins on Saturday night . .. tomorrow."

"But as I'm sure she told you, it's a private function, Mrs. Mitchell."

"Well, I had thought there might be exceptions for regular clients."

"No, we have had this notice on the tables for three weeks, Mrs. Mitchell, and in the newspaper."

Brenda came off the phone and rolled her eyes up to heaven. "Amazing how Cathy didn't kill that one dead. She's the most trying woman in Dublin."

The next call was from Nora's mother. "I don't know what you're thinking of to imagine that I and my family are going to a surprise party for Nora. I never heard such nonsense, and at her age. And at such short notice."

"We had to keep it at short notice in case they heard about it." Brenda's eyes rolled further around in her head.

"But I thought that this ceremony was going to be in a bookshop. That's what Nora said, and we wouldn't have gone to that either," Mrs. O'Donoghue sniffed.

"We so much hope you'll be here tomorrow. It will be a great feast and every woman wants her mother there at a wedding party."

"Huh, as if it were a proper wedding."

"It will be a marvellous wedding. I'm one of the witnesses. So can I hope you all will come, or is this a definite no?"

Nora's appalling mother didn't want to rule herself out of what was being described as a feast. "I can't say yes or no."

"Well, we hope that's a yes. Meanwhile, not a word of any of this to Nora and Aidan."

Brenda knew that the old bat would try to ring them and spoil it, but it was impossible now; Nora was staying in Quentins for the night and Aidan was at his son-in-law's house. Mrs. O'Donoghue would not be able to find them now, no matter how hard she tried. Maud and Simon were told that Hooves, their dog, could not come to the party no matter how rejected it made him feel. He had a collar the same as Derry King's dog had in America, but even that didn't get him in. They were warned by Cathy that two songs was the maximum, and could they be love songs?

Simon thought of "Please, Release Me, Let Me Go". But that was not suitable for a wedding, apparently.

Neither was "Young Love, First Love, is Filled With Deep Emotion", which they knew, because the couple were not in the first flush of youth.

"Love," Cathy said. "You must know some song about love?"

They said they would do some research.

"Nothing to be sung without consulting me," Cathy said. "That's an order." Scan and Michael Kennedy were the first arrivals. They were trying out the canapes and looking at the banners on the wall. The menu was engraved for Aidan and Nora as it should be with wedding bells attached, but there was a banner for Kennedy and King too, and one for Firefly Films, and one for Ella's degree.

The sign writer had been busy tonight.

At the piano, two earnest-looking blond children sat beside an

old man as he picked out the notes of a song and tried to teach it to them.

"We'd better write it down, Muttie," the boy said.

"Everyone knows the words," the old man protested. "They"re not words you'd be able to write down like, they're not in English."

"Then why are we singing it?" the girl asked.

"Because Cathy says they must love it. She said it was a pity you didn't know it but you will if you concentrate."

They concentrated heavily. Derry came in a car to collect the Brady family.

"We're not really much for parties," Tim protested, but Ella noticed he had dressed up smartly all the same.

"Can't have a party without my financial adviser there. I might revert to my father and get drunk and silly," Derry said.

Ella smiled at him. He was able to make a remark about it, a joke even. At last.

"We wouldn't miss it for the world, Derry," Ella's mother said.

Ella looked at the streets around her as they drove to Quentins. This was her world. There was no other and there never would be again. Patrick made an appearance at the party in full chefs gear. "Brenda is with them. She's taking the little party, just Aidan, his daughters and the son-in-law, down to Holly's for afternoon tea and they think they're going to the bookshop afterwards."

"Wouldn't they be afraid Nora would get a heart attack when she finds the place closed?"

"No, don't worry." The Registrar was a kind man. He knew when he saw a party of only six people, a bride and groom tending towards middle age rather than extreme youth, that a ceremony of great dignity was called for. He looked from one to the other and stressed the importance of the day and the decision they were making in front of all present.

They thanked him profusely and asked him to join them for afternoon tea in Holly's. He was often invited to join the festivities, but never accepted. Today for the first time he was tempted. They were so touchingly happy, it made him blow his nose quite a lot. They had obviously travelled a long road to get to this day.

They drove to Holly's and got a great welcome. Photographs were taken in the garden under the huge trees. Tiny sandwiches and little cream cakes were served. Everyone was very relaxed. But the bride had her eye on her watch.

"We must be in time for the bookshop," Nora said.

Brenda was delaying them. "Ah, don't worry. It will start without us ... they'll know we're on the way."

"How many will there be altogether?" Aidan's daughter Brigid asked. She was in on the whole thing and thought it was so cool. In fact, totally cool.

"There will be fourteen altogether. I'd have loved to have asked more, but you know ..." Nora said.

"It's the fourteen important ones anyway, and the others will understand. Don't start fussing, Mrs. Dunne." Aidan looked at her with great affection.

"Oh, God, you put the heart across me, Aidan. I thought your first wife had materialised down here in Wicklow." Nick, Sandy and Deirdre arrived together. They had been firmly instructed by Brenda to move among the guests talking and introducing. There were people from a lot of different worlds here tonight, and they needed someone to keep them together. Brenda would have done it effortlessly, but she was needed elsewhere.

Nick, Sandy and Deirdre got their first drink and began doing their duty, moving around and bringing the little groups together. Getting names and giving them.

"Aren't you a very lovely person? Are you an actress or a film star?" a man asked Deirdre.

"No, I'm not. I work in a lab and I'm as cross as a bag of weasels," Deirdre said.

"And what has a gorgeous girl like you cross?"

The man was well-dressed, with bristly hair like Derry King's. Of course, it must be one of the painter cousins.

"Are you Scan or Michael?" she asked.

I'm Scan. Imagine you having heard of us."

"Everyone's heard of you. I'm Deirdre."

"And what's upset you, Deirdre?"

"I paid four hundred euros for this dress and I look like the wrath of God in it."

"You do not, you look lovely."

Deirdre moved and examined herself in the mirror. With a very disappointed face.

A woman with the most amazingly brassy hair came over and watched her. "It needs a scarf draped over it, something that picks up the colour," she said.

"A lot of use that is to me to know that now. It looked fine in the shop."

"Bet they draped a scarf over it for you?"

"They did, as it happens. I'm Dee, by the way, Ella's friend."

"I'm Harriet, Nora's friend, and Ella's too. We met when she was going to America."

"Oh, yes, she told me about you. You sold her a dog collar."

"I can sell you a scarf now, if you want one. Just wait and I'll get you a selection. I checked my bag in to the cloakroom."

In minutes Deirdre was transformed.

Til leave you now. He's one of the best catches in Dublin," Harriet whispered.

"Who?" Deirdre felt disconnected from everything.

"Sean Kennedy, rolling in money and he's drooling over you."

"I'm really meant to be mingling," Deirdre said.

"I'd say you've mingled enough," advised Harriet. When they saw the notice on the door, Nora felt the tears coming down her face. "Oh, Aidan, isn't that desperate? What could they mean, unforeseen circumstances?"

"They were so sure." Aidan's face was bleak. "And what did they do with the wine and the canapes?"

"Does it say anything else?" Nora wept.

Then they found a second note.

It says the Dunne reception has been transferred eight doors down the street."

"Which direction?" she sniffed.

It says to Quentins," Aidan said.

They looked at the others, who were beaming with delight.

"But we can't go to Quentins, not on a Saturday night. No, Carissima Brenda, even for a wedding. We can't do that on you."

Now Brenda had tears in her eyes.

I've a feeling it's going to be perfectly fine," she said, and led the newlyweds eight doors down the road to Quentins. Brigid Dunne had run ahead and when they came in the door, a man at the piano struck up with "Here Comes the Bride", and after that everyone they could ever have wanted to see at their wedding appeared, to hug them.

Nora's hair was a triumph and her lilac-coloured dress with the dark royal purple chiffon sleeveless coat looked astounding. Harriet had got an immense bargain for her somewhere. No one would ever know how immense, not even the man whose lorry it was meant to have fallen off.

The twins approached. "We are only allowed to sing two songs. Will we sing them now?"

"Of course," Nora could hardly speak. Simon and Maud liked things announced.

"The bride and groom have connections with Italy, what with the bride having lived out there for a long time and her teaching Italian here, so we thought they'd like "Volare"." Everyone in the room seemed to know it and joined in the chorus.

Maud announced the next song. "It doesn't matter what age you are when you get married, your wedding day is meant to be your best day, so for this couple we are going to sing "True Love"."

The twins knew all the words, even the bit about the Guardian Angel on High with Nothing to Do. They looked round proudly as they sang. They were making a fine job of this, unlike "Volare", which wasn't even English and everyone had drowned them out. So when they were doing it so well why was everyone weeping unashamedly? Simon and Maud found life more impossible to understand every day. "Those two are extraordinary, they break people up all over the place," Cathy said to Tom in the kitchen.

She had come in to sit down. Three times in the last two weeks she had gone to the hospital, certain that the baby's birth was imminent. Three times they had sent her home saying that there was absolutely no sign of anything. So she hadn't taken much notice of the pains earlier on today. She was so anxious to be at the reception. And she knew the hospital would only send her away again, but there was this pain, well, it wasn't a pain, more a downward dragging feeling. It had come on quite suddenly.

"Cathy, are you all right?" Tom asked suddenly.

I must be, I have to be, but .. ." "But what?" He was ashen.

"But I think the baby's coming, Tom," she said. Blouse and Mary saw first what was happening. And knew there was no time to get an ambulance or to move them upstairs.

They moved instead to the storeroom and sat her down in a big armchair. Mary ran to her own quarters for sheets and towels. Blouse ran into the dining room to get Brenda and Patrick.

Ella came into the kitchen that moment and took everything in. "Well done, Cathy," she said. "We'll be absolutely fine." Her voice calmed the two, who were holding hands so tightly it looked as if they would never be prised apart.

"Couldn't be a better place, plenty of boiling water," she soothed. "Tom, get Derry to point out a Brian Kennedy to you. He's actually a doctor. You couldn't be in better hands. Quick now, but don't alarm them."

Cathy's face was terrified. Mary and Ella calmed her. "You couldn't be safer, Cathy," they begged her.

Brenda was with them and then they began to believe it might be true. They leaned over her.

"Push, Cathy," they all said. The baby's head was there.

Dr. Brian Kennedy said by the time he came in, it was all over. The baby was born. Tom and Cathy had a son.

That was when Derry had come into the kitchen to find Ella. And the moment was frozen for ever in everyone's lives.

There should have been the noise of the kitchen, the ovens, the humming of the various appliances. There should have been the sounds of the party in the next room. They definitely should have been heard.

But they all remembered a moment of total silence before the little lungs of the boy who was going to be called James Muttance Feather gave a cry to say he was safely in the kitchen of Quentins and the world.

I love you," Cathy said to Tom.

And Mary said it to Blouse.

And Patrick Brennan said it to Brenda.

And Derry and Ella said it to each other at exactly the same time.