'Absolutely not.'

She felt he was owed some kind of explanation. 'I was looking for a cat, you see. I thought if I got a kitten and sort of kept it secretly for a bitGCa you know?'

'I know.' Colm was grave.

'So thanks for all the St Clement's and everything.'

'I'll see you round, Annie.'

Gran was terrific, she had kept sausages for Annie. 'I couldn't find you so I put them in the oven to keep warm.'

'You're great. Where are they all?'

'They're about to have the cake, Lady Ryan arranged sparklers.'

'Mam hates it when you call her that.' Annie giggled and then she winced at the pain in her elbow.

Her grandmother was full of concern. 'Let me wash that for you.'

'It's okay, Gran, it's done, Dettol and all. Look at Aunty Hilary with all those awful boys.'

'She loves them, she's brought a big dartboard where you throw rings on. There's fierce competition.'

'What's the prize?'

'Oh some game, Hilary knows what electronic games children of that age want from being up at the school, you know.'

'Why didn't Aunty Hilary have any children, Gran?'

'The Lord didn't send her any, that's all.'

'The Lord doesn't send children, Gran, you know that.'

'No not directly, but indirectly He does, and in your Aunty Hilary's case He just didn't.'

'Maybe she didn't like mating,' Annie said thoughtfully.

'What?' Nora Johnson was at a loss for words, which was very unlike her.

'Maybe she decided not to go through the whole business of getting them, like cats and rabbits you know. There must be some people who just don't like the thought of it.'

'Not many,' her grandmother said drily.

'I bet that's it, you could ask her.'

'It's not the thing you ask people, Annie, believe me.'

'I do, Gran, I know you couldn't ask her. There are some things you don't talk about at all, you just put away at the back of your mind. Isn't that right?'

'Absolutely right,' her grandmother said with enormous relief.

Later on the parents of Brian's friends came to collect their sons, and they stood in the warm summer evening in the back garden of Tara Road while the boys played and pummelled on, tiring themselves and each other out for bedtime. Annie watched her mother and father stand there in the centre of the group, passing around a tray of wine and little smoked salmon sandwiches. Dad's arm was around Mam's shoulder a lot of the time. Ria knew from the girls at school that parents still want to be with each other and make love and all that, even when they didn't want children. It seemed such an unlikely thing to want to do. Horrible even.

There was much sympathy about the grazed knee, and when she went to bed, Mam came into her room. She sat in Annie's big armchair, moving the furry toy animals out of the way.

'You've been very quiet all afternoon and evening, Annie. Are those knees all right?'

'Fine, Mam, don't fuss.'

'I'm not fussing, I'm just sorry for your poor old knees and your elbow too. Like you would be if I fell.'

'I know, Mam. Sorry. You weren't fussing, but I'm fine.'

'And how did it happen?'

'I was running, I told you.'

'It's not like you to fall, you're such a graceful girl. When Hilary and I were your age we were falling all the time, but you never do. I think it's because your dad calls you a princess you decided to behave like one.'

Her mother's look was so fond and warm that Annie reached out for her hand. 'Thanks, Mam,' she said, eyes full.

'I was so exhausted out there today, Annie, with those tomboys. Honestly they're like young bullocks head-butting each other, not like children at all. When I think what an ease it's always been to have your friends, but that's the difference between the sexes for you. Would you like a hot drink? You've had a bad shock today.'

'What do you mean?' Annie's eyes were wary.

'The fall, it jars the system even at your age.'

'Oh that. No, no I'm fine.'

Ria kissed her daughter's flushed face and closed the door. She had spoken only the truth, it had been a killing day. But then wasn't she so well off compared to everyone else? Her mother going home alone with that absurd little dog. Hilary crossing the city with her dartboard in a big carrier bag to a man who wouldn't hold her in his arms any more because they couldn't make children. Gertie facing who knew what horrors in the flat above the launderette. Rosemary alone in that marble palace of a penthouse.

While she, Ria, had everything she could ever have wanted.

Chapter THREE

Sometimes they saw mothers and daughters together in the shops. Talking normally, holding up a skirt or a dress. Nodding or frowning but concerned. Like friends. One going into a cubicle to try something on, the other holding four more outfits outside. Perhaps they weren't real people, Ria told herself. Maybe they were actresses or from advertising. Judging from the eleven confrontations she had had with her own daughter in an hour and a half it was very hard to believe that any teenager and her mother would go shopping together from choice. These other people were only playing at being Happy Families. Surely?

Annie had this gift token from her grandmother. It was for more money than she had ever spent before on clothes. Up to now Annie had only bought shoes, jeans and T-shirts on her own. But this was different, it was for something to wear for all the parties this summer. It had seemed normal for Ria to go with her and help her choose. It had even seemed like fun. That was some hours ago. Now it seemed like the most foolish thing either of them had ever done in their lives.

When Annie had looked at something with leather and chains, Ria had gasped aloud. 'I knew you were going to be like that, I knew it in my bones,' Annie cried.

'No, I mean, it's justGCa I thoughtGCa' Ria was wordless.

'What did you think? Go on, Mam, say what you thought, don't just stand there gulping.' Annie's face was red and angry.

Ria was not going to say that she thought the outfit was like an illustration in a magazine article called 'Sado-Masochistic Wardrobe Unearthed'. 'Why don't you try it on?' she said weakly.

'If you think I'm going to put it on now that I've seen your face, and let you make fun of meGCa'

'Annie, I'm not making fun of you. We don't know what it looks like until you put it on, maybe it'sGCa'

'Oh Mam, for God's sake.'

'But I mean it, and it's your token.'

'I know it is. Gran gave it to me to buy something I liked, not some awful revolting thing with a butch tartan waistcoat like you want me to wear.'

'No, no. Be reasonable, Annie, I haven't steered you towards anything at all, have I?'

'Well, what are you here for then, Mam? Answer me that. If you have nothing to suggest, what are you doing? What are we doing here?'

'Well, I thought we were lookingGCa'

'But you never look. You never look at anything or anyone, otherwise you wouldn't wear the kind of clothes you do.'

'Look, I know you don't want the same clothes as I do.'

'Nobody wants the same clothes as you do, Mam, honestly. I mean, have you thought about it for one minute?'

Ria looked in one of the many mirrors around. She saw reflected a flushed angry teenager, slim with straight blonde hair, holding what appeared to be a bondage garment. Beside her was a tired-looking woman with a great head of frizzy hair tumbling on to her shoulders, and a black V-neck sweater worn over a flowing black-and-white skirt. She had put on comfortable flat shoes for shopping. This was not a day when Ria had rushed thoughtlessly out of the house, she had remembered the mirrors that came on you suddenly in dress shops. She had combed her hair, put on make-up and even rubbed shoe cream into her shoes and handbag. It had all looked fine in the hall mirror before they had left Tara Road. It didn't look great here.

'I mean, it's not even as if you were really old,' Ria's daughter Annie said. 'Lots of people your age haven't given up.'

With great difficulty Ria forced herself not to take her daughter by the hair and drag her from the shop. Instead she looked thoughtfully back into the mirror. She was thirty-seven. How old did she look? Thirty-five? That's all. Her curly hair made her young, she didn't look forty or anything. But then what did she know?

'Oh Mam, stop sucking in your cheeks and making silly faces, you look ridiculous.' When had it happened, whatever it was that made Annie hate her, scorn her? They used to get on so well.

Ria made one more superhuman effort. 'Listen we mustn't talk about me, it's your treat, your gran wants you to get something nice and suitable.'

'No she doesn't, Mam. Do you never listen? She said I was to get whatever I wanted, she never said one word about it being suitable.'

'I meantGCa'

'You mean anything that would look well on a poodle at a dog show.' Annie turned away with tears in her eyes.

Near by a woman and her daughter were looking through a rail of shirts. 'They must have a pink one,' the girl was saying excitedly. 'Come on, we'll ask the assistant. You look terrific in pink. Then we'll go and have a coffee.'

They seemed an ordinary mother and daughter, not just a couple sent over by central casting to depress real people. Ria turned away so that nobody could see the tears of envy in her eyes.

Danny had organised the people to deliver the sander at eleven o'clock. Ria wanted to be home to greet them. It was such a peculiar idea, to take up their carpets and bring out the beauty of the wooden floors. They didn't look a bit beautiful to her, full of nails and discoloration. But Danny knew about these things, she accepted this. His work and his skill was selling houses to people who knew everything, and these people knew that exposed wooden floors and carefully chosen rugs were good, while wall-to-wall carpeting was bad, and obviously concealed unmerciful horrors beneath. You could rent a sander for a weekend and walk around behind it while it juddered and peeled off the worst bit of your floor. That was what lay ahead today and tomorrow.

Would Annie think she was sulking if she left her now? Would she be relieved? 'Annie, you know your father arranged that this sanding machine come today?' she began tentatively.

'Mam, I'm not spending the weekend doing that, it's not fair.' 'No, no, of course not, I wasn't going to suggest it. I was going to say I should go home and be there when they arrive, but I don't want to abandon you.' Annie stared at her wordlessly. 'Not that I'm much help, really. I'm inclined to get confused when I see a lot of clothes together. GCO Ria said.

Annie's face changed. Suddenly she reached out and gave her mother an unexpected hug. 'You're not the worst, Mam,' she said grudgingly. From Annie this was high, high praise these days.

Ria went home with a lighter heart.

Ria had just got in the door of her house in Tara Road when she heard the gate rattle and the familiar cry: 'Ree-ya, Ree-ya'. A call known all over the area, as regular as the Angelus or the sound of the ice-cream van. It was her mother and the dog, the misshapen and unsettled animal Pliers, a dog never at ease in Ria and Danny's home in Tara Road, but because of circumstances forced to spend a lot of his disturbed life there. Ria's mother was always going somewhere where dogs weren't allowed, and Pliers pined if left at home alone. Pliers yowled in Ria's house, but for some reason this was not regarded as pining and was considered preferable.

Ria's mother never came in unannounced or uninvited. She had made a great production out of this from the time she had moved to the little house near them. Never assume that you are automatically welcome in your children's homes. That was her motto, she always said. It seemed a loveless kind of motto and also totally inappropriate since she called unannounced and uninvited almost every day at Ria and Danny's house. She thought that this shout at the gate was somehow enough warning and preparation. Today reminded Ria of being back at school when her mother would come to the playground or to the park where her pals had gathered, always calling 'Ree-ya'. Her school friends used to take up the cry. And now here she was, a middle-aged woman and nothing had changed, her mother still calling her name as if it were some kind of a war cry.

'Come in, Mam.' She tried to put a welcome in her voice. The dog would worry at the sanding machine when it arrived and bark at it, then he would set up one of his yowls so plaintively that they would assume his paw had been trapped in it. Of all days to have to babysit Pliers this must be one of the worst.

Nora Johnson bustled in, sure as always of her welcome. Hadn't she called out from the gate to say she was on her way? 'There was a young pup on the bus, asked me for my bus pass. I said to him to keep a civil tongue in his head.' Ria wondered why her mother, such a known dog lover, always used the word pup as a term of abuse. There were pups everywhere these days, in shops, driving vans, hanging about.

'What was so bad about him asking you that?'

'How dare he assume that I am at the age to have a bus pass? There's no way that he should think with only half a look out of his slits of eyes that I am a pensioner.' Of course Ria's mother despite her lemon-coloured linen suit and black polka-dot scarf looked exactly the age she was, the young pup on the bus had just been thoughtless. At his age he assumed everyone over forty was geriatric. But there was no point in trying to explain any of this to her mother. Ria busied herself getting out the tray of shortbread she had made the night before. The coffee mugs were ready. Soon the kitchen would be full of people, the men with the sanding machine, Danny wanting to learn how it worked, Brian and some of his school friends; there was always something on offer to eat in the Lynches' kitchen, unlike their own. Annie might be back with some amazing outfit and Kitty Sullivan whom she had met in the shopping mall.

Rosemary always came in on a Saturday, and sometimes Gertie escaped from the flat over the launderette. Gertie came twice a week to do the cleaning, it was a professional arrangement. But she could drop in socially on a Saturday. There would always be an excuse, she had left something behind or she wanted to check the times for next week.

Colm Barry might come in with vegetables. Every Saturday he brought them in armfuls of whatever he had collected. Sometimes he even scrubbed big earth-covered parsnips and carrots, or trimmed spinach for them. Ria made soups and casseroles with the freshest produce possible, all grown with no effort a few feet away from her own kitchen.

Other people came and went. Ria Lynch's kitchen was a place with a welcome. So unlike the way things had been when Ria was young herself and nobody was allowed out to their kitchen, a dark murky place with its torn linoleum on the floor. Visitors weren't really encouraged to come to her mother's house at all. Her mother and, from what she could remember, her father also were restless people, unable to relax themselves and incapable of seeing that others might want to.

Even when her mother visited her here in Tara Road she hardly ever settled, she was constantly rattling keys or struggling out of or into coats, just arriving or about to leave, unable to give in to the magic of this warm, inviting place.

It had been the same in Danny's family. His mother and father had sat in their very functional farmhouse kitchen drinking mug after mug of tea and welcoming no disturbance. Their sons grew up out of doors or in their own rooms, and lived their own lives. To this day Danny's parents lived that kind of life; they didn't mix with neighbours or friends, they held no family gatherings. Ria looked around with pride at her big cheerful kitchen where there was always life and company, and where she presided over everything at its heart.

Danny never noticed Nora Johnson's key rattling, nor was he irritated by the way she called from the gate. He seemed delighted to see his mother-in-law when he came into the kitchen and gave her a big hug. He wore a blue sports shirt that he had bought for himself when he was in London . It was the kind of thing that Ria would never have chosen for him in a million years, yet she had to admit it made him look impossibly young like a handsome schoolboy. Perhaps she was the worst in the world at choosing clothes. She tugged uneasily at the floppy black top that Annie had mocked.

'Holly, I know why you're here, you came to help with the sanding,' Danny said. 'Not only do you give our daughter a small fortune for clothes but now you're coming to help us do the floors.'

'I did not, Daniel. I came to leave poor Pliers with you for an hour. They're so intolerant down at St Rita's, they won't allow a dog inside the door, and isn't it just what those old people there need, four-legged company! But those young pups of doctors say it's unhygienic, or that they'd fall over animals. Typical.'

'But it's our gain to have Pliers here. Hallo, fellow.' Could Danny really like the terrible hound, about to open his mouth and drown everything with his wail? Pliers' teeth were stained and yellow, there were flecks of foam around his mouth. Danny looked at him with what definitely seemed like affection. But then so much of Danny's life depended on being polite to those who wanted to buy or sell property, it was hard to know when he was being genuinely enthusiastic or faking it. His was not a world where you said what you thought too positively.

Ria's mother had downed her coffee and was on her way. She had become very involved in the whole life of St Rita's, the retirement home at Number 68. Hilary was convinced that their mother was actually ready to book herself in as a resident. Nora had taught Annie to play bridge and sometimes took her granddaughter along to St Rita's to join in the game. Annie said it was marvellous fun, the old people were as noisy as anyone at school and had just the same kind of feuds and squabbles. Annie reported that everyone in the home held Granny in high regard. Of course, compared to them Granny was very young.

Nora said it was only sensible to examine the options about ageing. She dropped many hints that Ria should do the same; one day she too would be old and on her own, she would be sorry then that she hadn't given more time to the elderly. It wasn't as if she had any real work to go out to like other people, she had plenty of time on her hands.

'You must drive the old fellows mad down in St Rita's, a young spring chicken like yourself in lemon coming in to dazzle them,' Danny said.

'Go on with your flattery, Danny.' But Nora Johnson loved it.

'I mean it, Holly, you'd take the sight out of their eyes,' Danny teased her. Pleased, his mother-in-law patted her hair and bustled out again, smart and trim in her suit. 'Your mother's wearing well,' Danny said. 'We'd be lucky to look as spry at her age.'

'I'm sure we will. And aren't you like a boy rather than a man free-wheeling down to forty,' Ria laughed. But Danny didn't laugh back. That had been the wrong thing to say. He was thirty-seven going on thirty-eight. Foolish Ria, to have made a joke that annoyed him. She pretended not to have noticed her mistake. 'And look at me, you said that when you met me first you took a good look at my mother before you let yourself fancy meGCowomen always turn into their mothers, you said.' Ria was babbling a lot but she wanted to take that strained look off his face.

'Did I say that?' He sounded surprised.

'Yes, you did. You must remember?'

'No.'

Ria wished she hadn't begun this, he seemed confused and not at all flattered by her total recall. 'I must ring Rosemary,' she said suddenly.

'Why?'

The real reason was so that she didn't have to stand alone with him in the kitchen with a feeling of dread that she was boring him, irritating him. 'To see is she coming round,' Ria said brightly.

'She's always coming round,' said Danny. 'Like half the world.' He seemed to say that in mock impatience but Ria knew he loved it all, the busy, warm, laughing life of their kitchen in Tara Road, so different to the loveless house where he had grown up in the country, with the crows cawing to each other in the trees outside.

Danny was as happy here as she was: it was the life of their dreams. It was a pity they were so tired and rushed that they had not been making love as often as they used to, but this was just because there was so much happening at the moment. Things would be back to normal soon enough.

Rosemary wanted to know all about the shopping expedition when she arrived. 'It's wonderful seeing them coming into their own,' she said. 'Knowing what they want, and defining their style.' She didn't sit down, she prowled around the kitchen picking up bits of pottery and looking at the name underneath, fingering the strings of onions on the wall, reading the recipe taped to the fridge, examining everything and vaguely admiring it all.

She clutched her mug of black coffee with such gratitude you would think that nobody had ever handed her one before in her life. Naturally she waved away the shortbread, she had just stood up from a disgustingly huge breakfast she said, even though her slim hips and girlish figure showed anyone that this was unlikely to have been the truth. Rosemary wore smart well-cut jeans and a white silk shirt, what she called weekend clothes. Her hair was freshly done, the salon's first client every Saturday morning week in week out. Rosemary always sighed enviously over those people who could go any day of the week, lucky people like Ria who didn't go out to work.

Rosemary now owned the printing company. She had won a Small Business Award. If she were not her longest-standing best friend Ria could have choked her. She seemed to be the actual proof that a woman could do everything and look terrific as well. But then, she and Rosemary went back a long way. She had been there the very day Ria had met Danny, for heaven's sake. She had listened to all the dramas over the years, as Ria had listened to hers. They had very few secrets.

In fact Gertie was the only subject where they really differed.

'You're only encouraging her to think her lifestyle is normal by giving her tenners for that drunk.'

'She's not going to leave him. You could put all kinds of work her way, I wish you would,' Ria pleaded.

'No, Ria, can't you see you're making the situation worse? If Gertie thinks you go along with this business of her head being like a punchbag and her terrified children living up in her mother's house, then you're just making sure the whole scene goes on and on. Suppose you said one day "Enough is enough", it would bring her to her senses, give her courage.'

'No it wouldn't, it would only make her feel she hadn't one friend left on earth.'

Rosemary would sigh. They agreed on so much, the sheer impossibility of mothers, the problems with sisters, the wisdom of living in the lovely tree-lined Tara Road. And Rosemary had always been incredibly supportive to Ria, about everything. Too many other women told Ria straight out that they would go mad if they didn't have a job to go to and money that they earned themselves. Rosemary never did that, any more than she would ask Ria, like other working wives often did, 'What do you do all day?' especially in front of Danny.

For the last five years of course Annie and Brian didn't need as much minding, but somehow the thought of a job outside the home had not really been a serious one. And anyway, realistically, what job could Ria have done? There was no real training or qualification to fall back on. Better far to keep the show on the road here. Ria rarely felt defensive about being a stay-at-home wife, and she genuinely felt that it must be a good life if Rosemary, who had everything that it was possible to have in life, said she envied her.

'Well go on, Ria, tell me, what did she buy?' Rosemary really thought it had been fun and that Annie and she had agreed and bought something.

'I'm no good at knowing what to look for, where to point her,' Ria said, biting her lip.

She thought she saw a small flash of impatience in Rosemary's face. 'Of course you are. Haven't you all the time in the world to look around shops?'

Then the van containing the sander arrived and the men who delivered it were offered coffee, and ten-year-old Brian, looking as if he had been sent out as child labourer digging in a builder's site instead of having just got out of bed, came in with his two even scruffier friends, scooping up cans of Coke and shortbread to take upstairs. And Gertie, with her big anxious eyes and some rambling explanation about how she hadn't cleaned the copper saucepan yesterday, began to scrub at its base which meant that she needed a loan of at least five pounds.

Pliers whined and there on cue was Ria's mother back unexpectedly from St Rita's. They hadn't told her that there was a funeral there that morning so she wasn't needed after all. And Colm Barry knocked on the window to show Ria that he was leaving her a large basket of vegetables. She waved him in to join the group and felt the customary surge of pride at being the centre of such a happy home. She saw Danny standing at the kitchen door watching everything. He was so boyish and handsome, why had she made that silly remark about him approaching forty?

Still he had got over it, it had passed. His face didn't look troubled now, he just stood there watching almost as if he were an objective observer, as if he were an outsider, someone viewing it all for the first time.

They all took turns at doing the floors, and it wasn't as easy as it looked. Not just a matter of standing behind a machine that knew its own mind, you had to steer it and point it and negotiate corners and heavy objects. Danny supervised it, full of enthusiasm. This was going to change the house, he said. Ria felt an unexpected shiver in her back. The house was wonderful, why did he want to change it?

Ria's mother wouldn't stay for lunch. 'I don't care how many tons of vegetables you say that Colm left out for you, I know what troubles result from people moving in on top of other people. Sit down with your own family, Ria, and look after that husband of yours. It's a miracle that you've held on to him so long. I've always said that you were born lucky to catch a man like Danny Lynch when all was said and done.'

'Now, Holly, stop giving me a swollen head, I'm a very mixed blessing let me tell you. Here, if you really won't stay let me get you some of Colm's tomatoes to take with you. I can just see you serving delicate thin tomato sandwiches and vodka martinis to gentlemen callers all afternoon.'

Nora Johnson pealed with laughter. 'Oh, chance would be a fine thing, but I will take some of those tomatoes to get them out of your way.' Ria's mother could never take anything that was offered to her graciously, she would only accept something if there was an air of doing you a favour about it.

Rosemary was disappointed that there were no clothes to examine. She wondered had they caught sight of the gorgeous scarlet outfit in the corner window just where the two streets joined? No? Absolutely heavenly, no good for people of our age, Rosemary said, patting her own flat stomach, but great for someone like Annie who had a figure like an angel and wasn't getting droppy and droopy like the rest of us. Rosemary must have known that she wasn't getting droppy and droopy. She must have.

Brian and his friends Dekko and Myles had a problem. They had been going to watch a match on cable television up in Dekko's house but there was a new baby and so the television couldn't be put on.

'Can't you watch it here?' Ria had asked.

Brian looked at her, embarrassed. 'No. Do you not understand anything? We can't watch it here.'

'But of course you can. It's your home as much as Dad's and mine, you can take a tray into the sitting room.'

Brian's face was purple trying to explain. 'We don't have it here, Ma, we don't have cable like Dekko's family.'

Ria remembered. There had been a long argument some months ago, she and Danny had said the children already watched too much television.

'Not that it's any good having it now,' Dekko said glumly. 'Not if we can't turn it on because of the awful baby.'

'Come on, Dekko, a little brother can't be awful,' Ria said.

'It is, Mrs Lynch, it's disgusting and embarrassing. What on earth did they have to have one for after all these years? I'm ten, for heaven's sake.' The boys shook their heads and began to debate the possibilities of getting an extension lead to add to the flex. If they moved it twelve feet outside the house and kept the sound down lowish, would that do? Dekko was doubtful. His mother had gone ballistic about this desperate baby.

This was not good news for Ria. She had been thinking long and hard about their having another child. The estate agency was now going from strength to strength. Danny had been made Auctioneer of the Year. They were still young, they had a big house; another baby was just what she had been hoping they might consider.

The copper saucepan was gleaming. Gertie showed it proudly to Ria. 'You could look at your face in it, Ria, and it would be better than a mirror.'

Ria wondered why anyone would want to lift a huge saucepan to look at a reflection but didn't say so. Neither did she say anything about the bruise down the side of Gertie's face, a dark mark that she was trying to hide with her hair. 'My goodness, it's shining like gold. You are so good to come in on a Saturday, Gertie.' The routine was that Ria would now offer the money and Gertie would refuse, but then take it. It was a matter of dignity, and that was the way they played it now.

But not today. 'You know why I did.'

'Well, I mean it's still very good of you.' Ria reached for her handbag, surprised by the directness.

'Ria, we both know I'm desperate. Can I have ten pounds, please? I'll work it all off next week.'

'Don't give it to him, Gertie.'

Gertie held back her hair until Ria could see the long red scab of a cut. 'Please, Ria.'

'He'll only do it again. Leave him, it's the only thing.'

'And go where, tell me that? Where could I go with two kids?'

'Change the locks, get a barring order.'

'Ria, I'm on my knees to you, he's waiting on the road.'

Ria gave her the ten pounds.

From the hall Ria could hear Annie speaking to her friend Kitty. 'No, of course we didn't get anything, what do you think? Just standing there gasping, eyes rolling up to heaven, you're not going to wear this, you're not going to wear thatGCa no, not actually saying it but written all over her faceGCa It was gross I tell you. No, I'm not going to get anything at all, I swear it's the easiest. It's not worth the hassle. I don't know what I'll tell Gran though, she's so generous and she doesn't mind what I wear.'

Ria looked for Danny. Just to be with him for a moment would make her feel better, it might mean a return of some of the strength and confidence that seemed to be seeping out of her. He was bent slightly over the sanding machine, his body juddering with it as it ground through to the good wood he wanted to expose. He was totally involved in it and yet there was something about him that seemed as if he were doing it for somebody else. As if he had been asked by one of his clients to improve a property.

Ria found her hand going to her throat and wondered was she getting flu. This was a marvellous Saturday morning in Tara Road. Why was everything upsetting her? Ria wondered what would happen if she were to write to a problem page? Or talk to a counsellor? Would the advice be that she should go out and get a job? Yes, that would on the face of it be a very reasonable response. Outside people would think that a job took your mind off things, less time to brood, might make you feel a bit more independent, important. It would seem like nit-picking to explain that it wasn't the answer. Ria had a job. There was no sense in going out somewhere every morning just for the sake of it, to make some point. And Danny had often said that a working wife would play hell with his tax situation. And there were ways that the children needed a home presence more than ever at this stage.

And her mother needed her to be there when she came in every day. And Gertie did, not just for the few pounds she earned from cleaning but for the solidarity. And who would do the charity work if Ria were to have a full-time job? It had nothing to do with smart fund-raising lunches like some middle-class women spent their time organising. This was real work, serving in a shop selling things to make money, turning up at the hospital to mind the toddlers whose mothers were being told they had breast cancer. It was collecting old clothes, storing them in the garage then getting them dry-cleaned at a cheap bulk rate, it was finding containers and making chutneys and sauces, it was standing outside the supermarket for four hours with a flag tin.

And the house itself needed her. Danny had said so often that she was a one-person line of defence, rooting out woodworm, fighting damp, dry rot. And suppose, just suppose that getting a job was the answer, what job would she do? The very mention of the Internet sent a chill through Ria. She would have to learn basic keyboard skills and how to work office machinery before she could even ask for a job as some kind of receptionist.

Perhaps the empty anxious feeling would go. Maybe the solution had nothing to do with looking for a job. The answer could be as old as time. It was simply that she was broody.

She wanted another baby, a little head cradled at her breast, two trusting eyes looking up at her, Danny at her side. It wasn't a ridiculous notion, it was exactly what they needed. Despite the scorn and ridicule from Brian and his friends, it was time to have another baby.

They were having dinner with Rosemary. Tonight it was not a party, there were just the three of them. Ria knew what would be served: a chilled soup, grilled fish and salad. Fruit and cheese afterwards, served by the big picture window that looked out on to the large well-lit roof garden.

Rosemary's apartment, Number 32 Tara Road, was worth a small fortune now, Danny always said, and of course immaculately kept. With the success of Rosemary's company there was no shortage of money and even though she was not a serious cook like Ria, Rosemary could always put an elegant meal on the table without any apparent effort.

Ria would know of course how much had come directly from the delicatessen, but nobody else would. When people praised the delicious brown bread Rosemary would just smile. And it was always arranged so well. Grapes and figs tumbling around on some cool modernistic tray, a huge tall blue glass jug of iced water, white tulips in a black vase. Stylish beyond anyone's dreams. Modern jazz at a low volume on the player, and Rosemary dressed as if she were going out to a premiere. Ria was constantly amazed at her energy and her high standards.

She walked with Danny along Tara Road. Sometimes she wished he didn't speculate so much about what the retail value of each house was. But then that was his business. It was only natural. As they had said to each other so often, this road stood out alone in Dublin . Any other street was either up-market or down-market, this was the exception. There were houses in Tara Road which changed hands for fortunes. There were dilapidated terraces, each house having several bedsitters where the dustbins and the bicycles spelled out shabby rented property. There were red-brick middle-class houses where civil servants and bank officials had lived for generations; there were more and more houses like their own, places that had been splendid once and were gradually coming back to the elegance that they had previously known.

There was a row of shops down by the launderette on the corner where Gertie lived, the shops getting gradually smarter as the years went by. There was Colm Barry's smart restaurant in its own grounds. There were little places like her mother's which defied description and definition.

Every time Ria came in the gate of Number 32 she marvelled at how elegant the whole front looked. Her thought processes went in exactly the same well-travelled channels. She would love their house to have a big expansive welcoming area like this, a place where more than one car could park, where everything seemed to sweep up towards the door, flowers getting taller and turning into bushes as they approached the granite steps. As if the house was some kind of temple. In their own house there was no air of permanency. It was as if the whole place could be dismantled in minutes. True, a few years back Danny had agreed to some small rockeries and a basic tarmacadam on the surface. But compared to Number 32 theirs was absolutely nothing.

Nobody would imagine that anyone in Number 32 would ever build flats or anything in their drive, but that could easily happen in the Lynch establishment the way it looked now. Danny had said several times that this just added to the charm, mystery and value of their property. Ria had said the money value of your property was only important when you came to sell it, otherwise the value was surely only what made you feel good while you lived there. They talked about this from time to time but it was one of the rare subjects where Ria had never been able to communicate how strongly she felt about it all. This business of wanting to make a more definite permanent entrance to the house always sounded superficial. It came out as nagging or envying what someone else had just for the sake of it.

Ria liked to think that she was able to know what was really important and what wasn't. She would use all her powers of persuasion in suggesting that Danny should be a father again. A garden was much lower on the list of priorities and she didn't want to hassle him about everything. He had been looking tired and pale lately. He worked too hard.

Ria looked around her as Rosemary went out to get them their drinks. This was a truly perfect setting for her friend. No sign whatsoever that the owner was a shrewd businesswoman. Rosemary kept all her files and work at the office. Tara Road was for relaxing in. And it looked as pristine as the day she had moved in. The paintwork was not scuffed, the furniture had not known the wear and tear of the young. Ria noticed that there were art books and magazines arranged on a low table. They wouldn't remain there long in her house, they would be covered with someone's homework or jacket or tennis shoes or the evening newspaper. Always Ria felt that Rosemary's house didn't really feel like a home. More like something you would photograph for a magazine.

She was about to say that to Danny as they walked home along Tara Road, peering in at the other houses as they passed by and, as always, congratulating themselves on having been so clever as to buy in this area when they were young and desperate. But Danny spoke first. 'I love going to that house,' he said unexpectedly. 'It's so calm and peaceful, there are no demands on you.'

Ria looked at him walking with his jacket half over his shoulder in the warm spring evening, his hair falling into his eyes as always, no barber had ever been able to deal with it. Why did he like the feel of Rosemary's apartment? It wasn't Danny's taste at all. Much too spare. It was probably just because it was valuable. You couldn't spend all your working day dealing with property prices and not get affected by those kinds of values and standards. Deep down Danny wanted a house with warm colours and full of people.

If they had been having Rosemary to dinner tonight it would have been seven or eight people around the kitchen table. The children would have come in and out with their friends. Gertie might have come to help serve and eventually joined them at the table. There would be music in the background, the telephone ringing, possibly Clement the inquisitive cat would come in and examine the guest-list, people would shout and interrupt each other. There would be large bottles of wine already open at each end of the table, a big fish chowder filled with mussels to start, and large prawns, and thick chunky bread. A roast as main course and at least two desserts. Ria always made a wonderful treacle tart that no one could resist. That was the kind of evening they all enjoyed. Not something that could have been part of a tasteful French movie.

But it was a silly thing to argue about and it might seem as if she were trying to praise herself so Ria, as she did so often, took the point of view she thought would please him. She tucked her arm into Danny's and said he was right. It had been nice to be able to sit and talk in such a relaxed way. Nothing about thinking that Rosemary had dressed and made up as if she were going to a television interview rather than to welcome Danny and Ria, probably the people closest to her.

'We're lucky we have such good friends and neighbours,' she said with a sigh of pleasure. That much she meant. As they turned in to their own garden they saw that the light was on in the sitting room.

'They're still up.' Danny sounded pleased.

'I hope they are nothing of the sort, it's nearly one o'clock.'

'Well, if it's not the children then we have burglars.' Danny sounded not at all worried. Burglars would hardly be watching television and waiting for the occupants to return.

Ria was annoyed. She had hoped that tonight she and Danny could have a drink together in the kitchen and they might talk about the possibility of another baby. She had her arguments ready in case there was resistance. They had been close tonight, physically anyway, even if she would never understand his pleasure in that cool remote home of Rosemary's. Why did the children have to be up tonight of all nights?

It was Annie, of course, and her friend, Kitty. There had been no mention of Kitty coming around, no request that they could take Ria's bottles of nail varnish to paint each other's toenails or borrow her fitness video which was blaring from the machine. They looked up as if mildly annoyed to see the adults returning to their own home.

'Hi, Mr Lynch,' said Kitty, who rarely acknowledged other women but smiled broadly at any man she saw. Kitty looked like something in a documentary television programme about the dangers of life in a big city. She was waif-thin and had dark circles under her eyes. These were a result of late nights at the disco. Ria knew just how many because Annie had railed at the unfairness of not being able to get similar freedom.

Danny thought she was a funny little thing, a real character. 'Hi Kitty, hi Annie, why look you've painted each toenail a different colour. How marvellous!'

The girls smiled at him, pleased. 'Of course there isn't a great range,' Annie said apologetically. 'No blues and black or anything. Just pink and reds.' Kitty's frown of disapproval was terrible to see.

'Oh I am sorry,' Ria said sarcastically, but somehow it came out all sharp and bitter. She had meant it to be exasperated funny but it sounded wrong. The unfairness of this annoyed her. It was her make-up drawer they had ransacked without permission, and she was meant to be flattered but also to feel inadequate at not having a technicolour choice for them. The girls shrugged and looked at Danny for some kind of back-up. 'Brian in bed?' she asked crisply before Danny said anything that would make it all worse.

'No, he's taken the car, and he and Myles and Dekko have gone out to a few clubs,' Annie said.

'Annie, really.'

'Oh Mam, what do you expect? You don't think Kitty or I know where Brian is, or care, do you?'

Kitty decided to rescue it. 'Now, please don't worry about a thing, Mrs Lynch, he went to bed at nine o'clock. He's all tucked up and asleep. Really he is.' She managed to cast Ria in the role of a fussing geriatric mother who wasn't all there in the head.

'Of course that's where he is, Ria.' Danny had joined in patting her down.

'Was it a nice night?' Annie asked her father. Not because she wanted to know but because she wanted to punish her mother.

'Lovely. No fussing, no rushing around.'

'Um.' Even in her present mood of doing anything to annoy her mother Annie couldn't appear to see much to enthuse about there.

Ria decided not to notice the angry resentment that Annie felt about everything these days. Like so many things she let it pass. 'Well, I suppose you'll both want to go to bed now. Is Kitty staying the night?'

'It's Saturday, Mam. You do realise there's no school tomorrow.'

'We still have some sit-ups to do.' Kitty's voice was whining, wheedling as if she feared that Mrs Lynch might strike her a blow.

'You girls don't need sit-ups.' Danny's smile was flattering but yet couldn't be accepted. He was after all a doting and elderly father.

'Oh Dad, but we do.'

'Come here, let's see what does she tell us to do.'

Ria stood with a small hard smile and watched her husband doing a ridiculous exercise to flatten his already flat stomach with two teenagers. They all laughed at each other's attempts as they fell over. She would not join them, nor would she leave them. It was probably only ten minutes yet it felt like two hours. And then there was no warm chat in the kitchen, and no chance of loving when they went upstairs. Danny said he needed a shower. He was so unfit, so out of training these days, a few minutes' mild exercise nearly knocked him out. I'm turning into a real middle-aged tub of lard,' he said.

'No you're not, you're beautiful,' she said to him truthfully, as he took off his clothes and she yearned for him to come straight to bed. But instead he went to shower and came back in pyjamas; there would be no loving tonight. Just before she went to sleep Ria remembered how long it had been since there had been any loving. But she wasn't going to start worrying about that now on top of everything else. It was just that they were busy. Everyone said that's what happened to people for a while, and then it sorted itself out.

On Sunday Danny was gone all day. There were clients looking at the new apartments. They were aiming for a young professional kind of market, Danny had said. The developers had asked why bother having a health club and coffee bar attached unless the young singles could meet similarly-minded people there. He had to go and supervise the whole sales approach. No, he wouldn't be back for lunch.

Brian was going to Dekko's house; there was a christening. Dekko wasn't going to go at all but there would be his grandmother and people from his mum and dad's work there, and apparently it was essential that he be there. For some reason. Anyway it had been agreed that if Myles and Brian and he wore clean shirts and passed round the sandwiches, they would get five pounds each.

'It's a lot of money,' Dekko said solemnly. 'They must be mad investing fifteen pounds in us all being there.'

'I would have thought normal people would have paid us fifteen pounds for us all not to be there,' Brian said.

'Nobody's normal in a house where there's a baby,' Dekko had said sagely and they all sighed.

Annie said that she and Kitty were going to the Career Forum at school and that of course they had told everyone this ages ago, over and over. It was just that nobody ever listened.

'You didn't go to any of the other Career Forums,' her mother protested.

'But those were only about the bank, and insurance and law and awful things.' Annie was amazed that it wasn't clear.

'And what is it this week that you have to go?'

'Well it's real careers, like the music industry and modelling and things.'

'What about your lunch, Annie? I defrosted a whole leg of lamb and now it seems there'll be no one here.'

'Only you, Mam, would think that an old leg of lamb was important compared to someone's whole future.' She banged out of the room in a temper.

Ria rang her mother.

'No, don't be ridiculous, Ria, why would I drop everything and come to eat huge quantities of red meat with you? Why did you defrost it anyway until you knew whether your family was going to be there to eat it? That's you all over, you never think about anything.'

Ria rang Gertie. Jack answered. 'What?'

'OhGCa umGCa Jack, it's Ria Lynch.'

'What do you want? As if I didn't know.'

'Well I wanted to talk to Gertie.'

'Yeah, with a load of feminist advice, I suppose.'

'No, I was going to invite her to lunch, as it happens.'

'Well we can't go.'

'She might be able to go.'

'She's not able to go, Mrs Burn-your-bra.'

'Perhaps she and I could talk about that, Jack.'

'Perhaps you'd like to go and take aGCa' There was the sound of a scuffle.

'Ria, it's GertieGCa sorry I can't go.'

'You can't go to what?'

'To whatever it is you're asking me toGCa thanks but I can't.'

'It was only lunch, Gertie, just a bloody leg of lamb.'

There was a sob at the other end. Then, If that's all it bloody was, Ria, why on earth did you ring me and cause all this trouble?'

'This is Martin and Hilary's answering machine, please leave a message after the bleep.'

'It's nothing, Hilary, it's only Ria. If you're not there on a Sunday at ten o'clock in the morning then it's not likely you'll be there at lunch-timeGCa heigh ho, no message.'

Ria rang Colm Barry at the restaurant. He was often there on a Sunday, he had told her that he took advantage of the peace and quiet to do his accounts and paperwork.

'Hallo.' Colm's sister Caroline always spoke so softly you had to strain to hear what she said. She said that Colm wasn't there, he had gone out to do something, well he wasn't there. Caroline sounded so unsure that Ria began to wonder whether Colm was actually standing beside her mouthing that he wouldn't take the call.

'It doesn't matter, I was just going to ask him if he'd like to come to lunch, that's all.'

'Lunch? Today?' Caroline managed to make both words contain an amazing amount of incredulity.

'Well yes.'

'With your family?'

'Here, yes.'

'And had you asked him? Did he forget?'

'No, it was a spur of the moment thing, you too of course if you were free.'

Caroline seemed totally incapable of taking in such a concept. 'Lunch? Today?'

She said the words again and Ria wanted to smack her very hard. 'Forget it, Caroline, it was just a passing idea.'

'I'm sure Colm will be very sorry to have missed the invitation. He loves going to your house, it's just that he'sGCa well he isGCa well he's out.'

'Yes I know, doing something, you said.' Ria felt her voice had sounded unduly impatient. 'And you're not free, Caroline, yourself? You and Monto?' She hoped fervently that they were not free. And she was in luck.

'No I'm very sorry, truly I am, Ria, I can't tell you how sorry I am but it's just not possible today. Any other day would have been.'

'That's fine, Caroline. It was short notice, as I said.' Ria hung up.

The phone rang and Ria answered it hopefully. 'Ria? Barney McCarthy.'

'Oh, he's already gone to meet you there, Barney.' 'He has?'

'Yes, up at the new development, the posh flats.' 'Oh, of course, yes.' 'Are you not there?'

'No, I was delayed. If he calls back tell him that. I'll catch him up along the way.'

'Sure.'

'And you're fine, Ria?'

'Fine,' she lied.

Would she cook the lamb anyway, and have it cold with salad when they all came home? Gertie said you could refreeze things if they hadn't thawed completely. But what did Gertie know? Colm would know but he was out somewhere doing something, according to that dithering sister of his. Rosemary would know but Ria hated having to ask her. Was she in fact becoming very boring, as Annie had said? Was she as thoughtless as her mother had suggested? Ria knew now why people who lived on their own found Sunday a long lonely day. It would be different when they had a new babyGCa then there wouldn't be enough hours in the day.

Brian had been sick at the christening. He said it was bad enough to let him off school. He was pretty sure that Myles and Dekko would have kinder, more understanding families who wouldn't force invalids to go out when they were feeling rotten. Annie said that it was just a punishment since they had all been drinking champagne and obviously they were sick. Brian, red-faced with annoyance, said that she had no proof of this at all. That she was only trying to make trouble to take attention away from the fact that she and Kitty had been out so late and caused such alarm.

'I was talking about my career, about the future, jobs and things, something a drunk like you will never have,' Annie said coldly to Brian.

Ria tried to keep the peace, looking in vain for any support from Danny who had his head stuck in brochures and press releases about the new apartment blocks. He had been tired when he came back last night. Too tired to respond when she had reached out for him. It had been a long day, he said. For Ria too it had been a long day, pushing a heavy sanding machine around the floor, but she hadn't complained. Now they were back in familiar territory, a big noisy breakfast, a real family starting the week together in the big bright kitchen.

And everything had simmered down by the time they were ready to leave. Brian said he thought he could face school, possibly the fresh air would do him good and there was no proof that a court of law would accept that any alcohol had been taken. Annie said that possibly, yes, she should have telephoned to say that it was all going on longer, but she hadn't thought that anyone would be waiting. Honestly.

Danny dragged himself out of the world of executive apartments. 'You couldn't give away anything with carpet wall to wall nowadays,' he said. 'Everything has to have sprung oak floors or they won't consider it. Where did all the money come from in this society? Tell me that and I'll die happy.'

'Not for decades yet, I have great plans for you first,' Ria laughed.

'Yes, well none for tonight, I hope,' he said. 'There's a dinner, investors, I have to be there.'

'Oh, not again!'

'Oh yes, again. And many times again before we're through with this. If the estate agents don't go to the promotions then what confidence will they think we have in it all?'

She made a face. 'I know, I know. And after all it won't be for long.'

'What do you mean?'

'Well, eventually they'll all be sold, won't they? Isn't that what it's about?'

'This phaseGCa but this is only phase one, remember we were talking about it on Saturday with Barney?'

'Did Barney get you yesterday?'

'No, why?'

'He got delayed, I told him he'd find you at the development.'

'I was with people all day. I expect someone took a message. I'll get it when I get into the office and ring him then.'

'You work too hard, Danny.'

'So do you.' His smile was sympathetic. 'Look, I brought home that sander and you had to do most of it as it turned out.'

'Still, if you think it looks nice?' Ria was doubtful.

'Sweetheart, no question. It adds thousands to the resale value already and that's only in one weekend. Wait till we get those children of ours working properly, nice bit of slave labour, and do the upstairs as well. This place will be worth a fortune.'

'But we don't want to sell it,' Ria said, alarmed.

'I know, I know. But one day when we're old and grey and we want a nice apartment by the sea or on the planet Mars, or somethingGCa' He ruffled her hair and left.

Ria smiled to herself. Things were normal again.

'Ree-ya?'

'Hallo, Mam. Where's Pliers?'

'I see. You have no interest in seeing your own mother any more, only the dog.'

'No, I just thought he'd be with you, that's all.'

'Well he's not. Your friend Gertie's taken him for a walk, that's where he is. Gone for a nice morning run down by the canal.'

'Gertie?'

'Yes, she said that she heard dogs like Pliers needed a run now and then to shake them up. And of course though I have been able to keep myself reasonably trim, I'm not really able to do anything like that for Pliers any more, so Gertie offered,' Ria was astounded. Gertie didn't run, she barely walked these days, living in such dread of her drunken husband. Ria's mother had lost interest in the conversation. 'Anyway I only came in because I was passing to tell Annie that it's seven o'clock tonight.'

'What is?'

'They're coming down to St Rita's with me this evening, Annie and her friend Kitty. We're teaching Kitty bridge.'

Ria's mind was churning. 'But that will be during supper.'

'I suppose they manage to think that some things are more important because they're nice and normal and they actually like people,' said Ria's mother. She sat at her daughter's table waiting for coffee to be served to her, her face thunderous with the heavy implication that Ria was neither nice nor normal and positively hated meeting people.

The washing machine had just begun to swirl and hum when Rosemary rang. 'Oh Lord, Ria, how I envy you, relaxed in your own home while I'm stuck at work.'

'That's the way things are.' Ria knew there was an edge to her voice. She was becoming sharp with people for no reason. She rushed on to take the harm out of her words. 'We all think the grass is greener in the other place. Often when I'm picking up things from the floor here I envy you being at work and out of the house all day.'

'No, of course you don't.'

'Why do you say that?'

'Because, as I keep telling you, if you did feel like that, cabin fever and everything, then you'd get a job. Listen, what I rang to say is that I saw Jack being taken off in a Garda car this morning, some disturbance outside a pub. I thought you'd want to know. If you have nothing to do you might check whether Gertie's in bits or anything.'

'Gertie's not in bits, she's out walking my mother's dog.' 'You're not serious, aren't people amazing?' Rosemary sounded pleased at this surprise news. 'She didn't ask for a dog-walking fee, did she?'

'No, I don't think so, my mother would have said.' 'Oh well, that's all right then. It's not as if she's doing it to get a couple of quid to buy him more drink when the fuzz lets him go.'

'Mrs Lynch?'

'Yes, that's right.' All day odd things had been happening, 'Mrs Danny Lynch?'

'Yes?'

'Oh, oh I'm sorry. No, I think I may have the wrong number.'

'No, that's who I am, Ria Lynch.' The phone went dead.

Her sister Hilary rang just then. 'You sounded like the Mother of Sorrows on the answering machine,' she said.

'No I didn't. I just spoke and said it didn't matter. We both say that people who don't leave messages should be hanged.'

'I keep saying that the answering machine was a sheer waste of money. Who ever calls? What messages are there that you'd want to hear?'

'Thanks, Hilary.'

Hilary was unaware of any sarcasm. 'What was it you wanted to talk about anyway? Mam, I suppose?'

'No, not at all.'

'She's really going loopy you know, Ria. You don't see that because you don't want to. You always want to believe that everything's fine in the world, there's no famine, no war, politicians are all honest and mean well, and the climate's great.'

'Hilary, did you ring up just to attack me in general or is there anything specific?'

'Very funny. But going back to Mam, I worry about her.'

'But why? We've been over this a dozen times, she's fit and healthy, she's busy and happy.'

'Well, she should feel needed by her own family.'

'Hilary, she is needed by her family. Isn't she in here every single day of her life, sometimes twice a day? I ask her to stay to meals, I ask her to stay the night. She is out with Annie and Brian more than I amGCa'

'I suppose you're saying now that I don't do enough.'

'I'm not saying anything of the sort, and she's never done talking about you and Martin and how good you are to her.'

'Well, that's as may be.'

'So what is it really that's worrying you?'

'She's trying to sell her house.'

There was a silence. 'Of course she's not, Hilary, she'd have talked to Danny about it.'

'Only if she was selling it through him. GCO

'Well, who else would she go to? No, Hilary, you've got this all wrong.'

'We'll see,' said Hilary and hung up.

'Sweetheart?'

'Yes, Danny?'

'Was anyone looking for me at home, any peculiar sort of person?'

'No. Nobody at all, why?'

'Oh, there's some crazy ringing up about the apartments, she says she's being refused as a clientGCa total paranoia. She's ringing everyone at home as well.'

'A woman did ring, but she didn't leave any message. That might have been herGCa'

'What did she say?'

'Nothing, just kept checking who I was.'

'And who did you say you were?'

Suddenly Ria snapped. It had been a stressful weekend, filled with silly unrelated things that just didn't make sense. 'I told her that I was an axe murderer passing through. God, Danny, who do you think I told her I was? She asked was I Mrs Lynch and I said I was. Then she said she had the wrong number and hung up.'

'I'm telling the Guards about it, it's nuisance calls.'

'And did you say that in the officeGCa you know who she is?'

'Listen, honey, I'll be late tonight, you know I told you.'

'A dinner, yes I know.'

'I have to run, sweetheart.'

He called everyone sweetheart. There was nothing particularly special about it. It was ludicrous but she would have to make an appointment with her husband to discuss having a baby, and a further appointment to do something about it if he agreed that it was a good idea.

Ria had a mug of soup and a slice of toast for her supper at seven o'clock. She sat alone in her enormous kitchen. The blustery April wind blew the washing on the line, but she left it there. Brian had gone to Dekko's house to do his homework. Annie was going to have a pizza with her gran after bridge at St Rita's, hugely preferable to spending any time at all with her mother obviously. Even sharing space with an unwelcome baby seemed like a better bet for Brian than his own house. Colm Barry had waved to her from the vegetable garden before he left for his restaurant. Her friend Rosemary was at home no doubt cooking something minimalist. Her other friend, Gertie, had been avoiding a drunken husband by walking that ridiculous dog all day, or so Ria's mother said. How had it happenedGCa the empty nest? Why was there nobody at home any more?

They all came back together when she least expected it. Annie and her grandmother, laughing as if they were the same age. There was over half a century between them and yet they were relaxed and easy together. The ladies had been great fun, Annie said. They were going to lend her some genuine fifties clothes, even one of those fun fake furs. Some of them had come with them to the Pizza House.

'They're allowed out?' Ria said in surprise.

'It's not a prison, Ria, it's a retirement home. And people are very lucky who can get in there.'

'But you're too young to go to a place like that, much too young,' Ria said.

'I was speaking generally.' Her mother looked lofty.

'So you're not planning to go in there yourself?'

Her mother looked astounded. 'Are you interrogating me?' she asked.

'Oh Mam, for heaven's sake don't always cause a row about everything,' Annie groaned.

Brian came in. He seemed pleased but not surprised to see his grandmother. 'I saw Pliers tied to the gate, I knew you were here.'

'Pliers? Tied to the gate?' Ria's mother was out of the house like a shot. 'Poor dog, darling Pliers. Did she abandon you?'

They heard the sound of a car. Danny was home. Early, unexpected.

'Dad, Dad, do you know where we'd find the colours of the flags of Italy and Hungary and India? Dekko's father doesn't know. It would be great if you knew, Dad.'

'That friend of yours is even more scattered than you are, Ria.' Nora Johnson was still smarting over the dog. 'Imagine, Gertie left poor Pliers tied to the gate. He could have been there for hours.'

'He wasn't there when we came in a few minutes ago, Gran,' Annie reassured her.

'No, I saw Gertie running up Tara Road. It could only be a couple of minutes at the most.' Danny was reassuring too. 'Hey, where's supper anyway?'

'No one came home.' Ria's voice sounded small and tired. 'You said you had a business dinner.'

'I cancelled it.' He was eager, like a child.

Ria had an idea. 'Why don't we go to Colm's restaurant, the two of us?'

'Oh well I don't know, anything will doGCa'

'No, I'd love to, I'd simply love to. It would be a treat for me.'

'It would be a treat for anyone to go to Colm's,' Annie sniffed. 'Better than a pizza.'

'Better than sausages in Dekko's,' Brian grumbled.

'Wish I'd been able to go out to four-star restaurants when I didn't feel like cooking,' said her mother.

'I'll phone him and book a table.' Ria was on her feet.

'Honestly, sweetheart, anythingGCa a steak, an omeletteGCa'

'It wouldn't do you at all. No, you deserve a treat too.'

'I eat out too much, being at home's a treat for me,' he begged.

But she had the phone to her ear and made the booking. Then she ran lightly upstairs and changed into her black dress and put on her gold chain. Ria would have loved the time to have a bath and dress properly but she knew she must seize the moment. This was the very best chance she would have to talk to her husband about future plans. Ria moved swiftly before she could be sabotaged by either her mother or daughter putting sausages and tinned beans in front of Danny.

They walked companionably down Tara Road to the corner. The lights of Colm's restaurant were welcoming. Ria admired the way that it was done. You couldn't really see who was inside but you got the impression of people sitting down together. She was glad that Colm seemed to have tables full on a Monday night. It would be so dispiriting to cook for people and have shining glassware and silver out there and then for nobody to turn up. That was one of the reasons she would never like to run a restaurant, you would feel so hurt if people didn't come to it.

'Very few cars outside,' said Danny, cutting across her thoughts. 'I wonder how he makes any kind of living.'

'He loves cooking,' Ria said.

'Well, just as well that he does because there can't be much profit in tonight's takings from the look of the place.' She hated it when Danny reduced everything to money. It seemed to be his only way of measuring things nowadays.

Caroline took their coats. She was dressed in a smart black dress with long sleeves and she wore a black turban covering her hair. Only someone with beautiful bone structure could get away with something as severe, Ria thought to herself. 'You look so elegant tonight, the turban's a new touch.' Was she imagining it or did Caroline's hand fly to her face defensively?

'Yes, well I thought that perhapsGCa' She didn't finish her sentence.

She had been so odd on the telephone yesterday Ria had wondered if there was anything seriously wrong. And even tonight, despite the serene way she smiled and seemed to glide across to show them to their table, there was something tense and pent-up there. They were a strange pair, the brother and sister: Caroline with her overweight husband Monto Mackey, always in a smart suit and an even smarter car; Colm with his discreet relationship. He was nowadays involved with the wife of a well-known businessman, but it was something that was never spoken of. Colm and Caroline seemed to look out for each other, as if the world was somehow preparing to do one of them down.

Ria would have liked that kind of loyalty. Hilary was a complicated sister; she blew hot and cold, sometimes envious and carping, sometimes surprisingly understanding. But there was never this united front that Colm and Caroline wore.

'You're miles away,GCO Danny said to her.

She glanced at him, handsome, tired-looking, boyish still, puzzling over the menu. Wondering if he would go for the crispy duck or be sensible about his health and have the grilled sole. She could read the decisions all over his face. 'I was just thinking about Hilary,' she said.

'What has she done now?'

'Nothing, except get the wrong end of the stick about everything as usual. Burbling on about you and about Mam wanting to sell the house.'

'She told you that?'

'You know Hilary, she never listens to anyone.'

'She said I wanted to sell the house?'

'She said Mam wasn't even asking you, that she wanted to sell it herself.'

'I don't understand.'

'Would anyone? The whole thing is nonsense.'

'Your mother's, house! I see.'

'Well you see more than I do, it's totally cracked.'

Colm came to the table to greet them. He made a point of spending only forty seconds and putting a huge amount of warmth and information into that time. 'There's some very nice Wicklow lamb, and I got fish straight off the boat down in the harbour this morning. The vegetables as you know come from the finest garden in the land, and if you're not sick of eating them yourselves, I suggest courgettes. Can I give you a glass of champagne to welcome you? And then I'll get out of your way and let you enjoy your evening.'

Colm had once told Ria that too many restaurant owners made the great mistake of believing that the guests enjoyed the Mine Host figure spending a lot of time at the table. He always felt that if people had come out to dine then that's what they should be allowed to do. Tonight she valued it especially.

She chose the lamb and Danny said that because he really was as fat as a fool these days he must have plain grilled fish with lemon juice and no creamy sauce. 'You're not fat, Danny, you're beautiful. You know you are, I told you the other night.'

He looked embarrassed. 'A man can't be beautiful, sweetheart,' he said awkwardly.

'Yes indeed he can, and you are.' She reached out and touched his hand. Danny looked around. 'It's all right, we're allowed to hold hands, we're married. Now that couple over there, they're the ones who shouldn't be caught.' She laughed over at a couple where the older man was being very playful with his much younger companion.

'Ria?' Danny said.

'Listen, let me speak first. I'm delighted your dinner was cancelled tonight, delighted. I wanted you on your own without half the country being in our kitchen and all joining in.'

'But that's what you like,' he said.

'Yes, it's what I like a lot of the time but not tonight. I wanted to talk to you. We don't have time to talk these days, no time to do anything, not even make love.'

'Ria!'

'I know. I'm not blaming either of us, it just happens, but what I wanted to tell you was thisGCa and I needed time and space to tell youGCa what I wanted to say wasGCa' She stopped suddenly, unsure how to go on. Danny was looking at her, confused. 'You know how I said you look young, I mean it. You are young, you are like a boy, you could pass for someone in his twenties. You're just like you looked when Annie was a baby, with your hair falling into your eyes, unable to believe that you could be a father. You have that look in your eyes.'

'What are you saying? What in God's name are you saying?'

'I'm saying that honestly, Danny, I can see these things. It's time for another baby. Another start of a life. You're more sure and comfortable now, you want to see another son or daughter grow up.' A waiter approached them with plates of figs and Parma ham, but something about the way they sat facing each other made him veer away. These were cold starters, they could wait a little. 'It's time for you to have another child, to be a father again. I'm not thinking of myself only but of you, that's all I'm saying,' Ria said, smiling at the strange shocked look on Danny's face.

'Why are you saying it like this?' His voice was barely above a whisper. His face was snow-white. Surely he couldn't find it such a staggering idea. On and off she had been saying this over the years.

Only this time she had phrased it in terms of fatherhood rather than her own need or their joint life with a new baby.

'Danny, let me explainGCa'

'I don't believe you're saying this. Why? Why this way?'

'But I'm just saying that it's the right time. That's all. I'm thinking of you and your future, your life.'

'But you're so calmGCa this isn't happening.' He shook his head as if to clear it.

'Well of course, I want it too, you know that, but I swear I'm thinking of you. A baby is what you need just now. It will put things into perspective, you won't be rushing and fussing about developments and market share and everything, not with a new baby.'

'How long have you known?' he asked.

It was an odd question. 'Well, I suppose I've always known that with the other two grown-up almost the day would come.'

'They'll always be special, nothing would change that.' His voice was choked.

'Well don't I know that, for heaven's sake, this would be different, not better.' Ria sat back from her position hunched up and leaning over the table. The waiter seized the opportunity and slid in their plates without any comment. Ria picked up her fork but Danny didn't move.

'I can't understand why you're so calm, so bloody calm,' he said. His voice trembled, he could hardly speak.

Ria looked at her husband in astonishment. 'I'm not very calm, Danny my darling, I'm telling you I think it's time we had another baby and you seem to agreeGCa so I'm very excited.'

'You're telling me what?'

'Danny, keep your voice down. We don't want the whole restaurant to know.' She was a little alarmed by his face.

'Oh my God,' he said. 'Oh God, I don't believe it.'

'What is it?' Now her alarm was very real. He had his head in his hands. 'Danny, what is it? Please? Stop making that sound, please.'

'You said you understood. You said you'd been thinking about my future and my life. And now you say that you want another baby! That you do, that's what you were talking about.' He looked anguished.

Ria was going to say that the way it normally happened was that the woman had the baby but something stopped her. In a voice that came from very far away she heard herself ask the question that she knew was going to change her life. 'What exactly were you talking about, Danny?'

'I thought you had found out and for a mad moment I thought you were going along with it.'

'What?' Her voice, impossibly, was steady.

'You know, Ria, you must know that I'm seeing someone, and well, we've just discovered she's pregnant. I am going to be a father again. She's going to have a baby and we are very happy about it. I was going to tell you next weekend. I thought suddenly that you must have known.'

The noise in the restaurant changed. People's cutlery started to clatter more and bang loudly off people's plates. Glasses tinkled and seemed about to smash. Voices came and went in a type of roar. The sound of laughter from the tables was very raucous. She could hear his voice from a long way off. 'Ria. Listen to me, Ree-ah.' She can't have said anything. 'I wouldn't have had this happen for the world, it wasn't part of any plan. I wanted us to beGCa I didn't go looking for something like thisGCa'

He looked boyish all right, helplessly boyish. This was too much to cope with. It wasn't fair that she should have to cope with something like this. 'Tell me it's not true,' she said.

'You know it's true, Ria sweetheart. You know we haven't been getting on, you know there's nothing there any more.'

'I don't believe it. I won't believe it.'

'I didn't think it would happen either, I thought we'd grow old together, like people did.'

'And indeed like people do,' she said.

'Yes, some do. But we're different people, we're not the same people who married all those years ago. We have different needs.'

'How old is she?'

'Ria, this has nothing to do withGCa'

'How old?'

'Twenty-two, not that it mattersGCa or has anything to do with anything.'

'Of course not,' she said dully.

'I was going to tell you, maybe it's better that it's out now.' There was a silence. 'We have to talk about it, Ria.' Still she said nothing. 'Aren't you going to say anything, anything at all?' he begged.

'Seven years older than your daughter.'

'Sweetheart, can I tell you this has nothing to do with age.'

'No?'

'I don't want to hurt you.' Silence. 'Any more than I already have hurt you and honestly I was wondering could we be the only two people in the whole world who'd do it right? Could we manage to be the couple who actually don't tear each other to piecesGCa?'

'What?'

'We love Annie and we love Brian. This is going to be hell for them. We won't make it a worse hell, tell me we won't.'

'Pardon?'

'What?'

'I said, I beg your pardon. What am I to tell you? I didn't understand.'

'Sweetheart.'

Ria stood up. She was trembling and had to hold the table to keep upright. She spoke in a very low carrying voice. 'If you everGCa if ever in your life you call me sweetheart again I will take a fork in my hand, just like this one, and I will stick it into your eye.' She walked unsteadily towards the door of the restaurant while Danny stood helplessly at the table watching her go. But her legs felt weak, and she began to sway. She wasn't going to make the door after all. Colm Barry put down two plates hastily and moved towards her. He caught her just as she fell and moving swiftly he pulled her into the kitchen.

Danny had followed them in and watched, standing uncertainly as Ria's face and wrists were sponged with cold water by Caroline.

'Are you part of the problem, Danny? Is this about you?' Colm asked.

'Yes, in a way.'

'Then perhaps you should leave.' Colm was perfectly courteous but firm.

'What do you meanGCa?'

'I'll take her home. When she's ready and if she wants to go, that is.'

'Where else would she go?'

'Please, Danny.' Colm's voice was firm. This was his kitchen, his territory.

Danny left. He let himself into the house with his front-door key. In the kitchen Danny's mother-in-law, her dog and the two children were watching television. He paused in the hall for a minute considering what explanation to make. But this was Ria's choice, not his, how to tell and what to tell. Quietly he moved up the stairs. He stood in the bedroom, uncertain again. After all, she might not want him here when she returned. But suppose he went elsewhere? Might not this be another blow? He wrote a letter and left it on her pillow.

Ria, I am ready to talk whenever you are. I didn't think you'd want me here so I've taken a duvet to the study. Wake me any time. Believe me I'm more sorry about all this than you'll ever know. You will always be very, very dear to me and I want the best for you.

Danny He reached for the phone and made the first of two calls.

'Hallo Caroline, it's Danny Lynch. Can I speak to Colm?'

'IGCOll see.'

'Well, can you ask him to tell her that I've said nothing to the children and I'm in the study at home. Not the bedroom, the study, if she wants to talk to me. Thank you, Caroline.'

Then he dialled another number. 'Hallo, sweetheart, it's meGCa Yes I told herGCa Not greatGCa Yes, of course about the babyGCa I don't knowGCa No, she's not hereGCa No, I can't come over, I have to wait for her to get backGCa Sweetheart, if you think I'm going to change my mind nowGCa I love you too, honey.'

In the kitchen of Colm's restaurant the business of preparing and serving food went on around them. Colm Barry gave Ria a small brandy. She sipped it slowly, her face blank. He asked her nothing about what had happened.

'I should go,' she said from time to time.

'No hurry,' Colm said.

Eventually she said it with more determination. 'The children will worry,' she said.

'IGCOll get your coat.'

They walked from the restaurant in silence. At the gate of the house she stopped and looked at him. 'It's like as if it's happening to other people,' Ria said. 'Not to me at all.'

'I know.'

'Do you, Colm?'

'Yes, it's to cushion the shock or something. We think first that it's all happening to someone else.'

'And then?'

'I suppose then we realise it's not,' he said.

'That's what I thought,' Ria said.

They could have been talking about the vegetables or when to spray the fruit trees. There was no hug of solidarity or even a word of goodbye. Colm went back to his restaurant, and Ria went into her home.

She sat down in the kitchen. The table had crumbs and some apple cores in a dish. A carton of milk had been left out of the fridge. There were newspapers and magazines on the chairs. Ria saw everything very clearly, but not from where she was sitting. It was as if she were way up in the sky and looking down. She saw herself, a tiny figure sitting down there in this untidy kitchen in the dark house while everyone else slept. She watched as the old clock chimed hour after hour. She didn't think about what to do now. It was as if it hadn't sunk in that it was happening to her.

'Mam, it's the drill display today,' Annie said.

'Is it?'

'Where's breakfast, Mam?'

'I don't know.'

'Oh Mam, not today. I need a white shirt, there isn't one ironed.'

'No?'

'Where were you, were you at the shops?'

'Why?'

'You're in your coat. I could iron it myself, I suppose.'

'Yes.'

'Has Dad gone yet?'

'I don't know, is his car there?'

'Hey Mam, why isn't there any breakfast?' Brian wanted to know.

Annie turned on him. 'Don't be such a pig, Brian. Are you too drunk to get your own breakfast for once?'

'I'm not drunk.'

'You were yesterday, you stank of drink.' They looked at Ria, waiting for her to stop the fight. She said nothing. 'Put on the kettle, Brian, you big useless lump,' Annie said.

'You're just sucking up to Mam because you want her to do something, make you sandwiches, drive you somewhere, iron something. You're never nice to Mam.'

'I am nice to her. Aren't I nice to you, Mam?'

'What?' Ria asked.

'Aw here, where's the iron?' Annie said in desperation.

'Why have you your coat on, Mam?' Brian asked.

'Get the cornflakes and shut up, Brian,' Annie said. Ria didn't have any tea or coffee. 'She had some before she went out,' Annie explained.

'Where did she go?' Brian, struggling with cutting the bread, seemed puzzled.

'She doesn't have to account to you for her movements,' Annie said. Her voice sounded very far away.

"Bye Mam.'

'What?'

'I said, goodbye Mam.' Brian looked at Annie for reassurance.

'Oh goodbye love, 'bye Annie.'

They went round to get their bicycles. Usually they did everything to avoid leaving the house together but today was different.

'What is it, do you think?' Brian asked.

Annie was nonchalant. 'They could be drunk, they went out to Colm's restaurant, maybe the pair of them got pissed. Dad's not up yet, you'll note.'

'That's probably it all right,' said Brian sagely.

Danny came into the kitchen. 'I waited until the children left,' he said.

'What?'

'I didn't know what you'd want to say to them. You know? I thought it was better to talk to you first.' He looked anxious and uneasy. Danny's hair was tousled and his face pale and unshaven. He had slept in his clothes. She still felt the strange sense of not being here, of watching it all happen. That feeling hadn't gone during the long wakeful hours of night. She said nothing but looked at him expectantly.

'Ria, are you all right? Why have you your coat on?'

'I don't think I took it off,' she said.

'What? Not even to go to bed?'

'I didn't go to bed. Did you?'

'Sit down, sweetheartGCa'

'What?'

'I know, I'm sorry, it doesn't mean anything. It's just something I call you. I meant sit down, Ria.'

Suddenly her head began to clear. They were no longer little matchstick figures way down below, people she was watching from far away. She was here in this messy kitchen wearing her coat over her good black party dress. Danny her husband, the only man she had ever loved, had got some twenty-two-year-old pregnant and was going to leave home and set up a new family. He was actually trying to tell her to sit down in her own house. A very great coldness came over her. 'Go now, Danny, please. Leave the house and go to work.'

'You can't order me out, Ria, and take this attitudeGCa we have to talk. We have to plan what to do, what to say.'

'I will take whatever attitude I like to take, and I would like you not to be here any more until I am ready to talk to you.' Her voice sounded very normal from inside. Possibly to him too.

He nodded, relieved. 'When will that be? When will you beGCa ready to talk?'

'I don't know, I'll let you know.'

'Do you mean today? Tonight, orGCa umGCa later?'

'I'm not sure yet.'

'But Ria, listen sweetGCa listen Ria, there are things you have to know. I have to tell you what happened.'

'I think you did.'

'No, no. No, I have to tell you what it was about and discuss what we do.'

'I imagine I know what happened.'

'I want to explainGCa"

'Go now.' He was undecided. 'Now,' she said again.

He went upstairs and she stood listening to the sound of a quick splash wash, and his opening drawers to get clean clothes. He didn't shave, he looked hangdog and at a loss. 'Will you be all right?' he asked. She looked at him witheringly. 'No, I know it sounds a stupid thingGCa but I do care and you won't let me talk. You don't want to know what happened, or anything.'

She spoke slowly. 'Just her name.'

'Bernadette,' he said.

'Bernadette,' she repeated slowly. There was a long silence then Ria looked at the door and Danny walked out, got into his car and drove away.

When he had gone Ria realised that she was very hungry. She had eaten almost nothing since lunch-time yesterday. The figs and Parma ham had not been touched last night. She cleared the table swiftly and got herself a tray ready. She would need all her strength for what lay ahead, this was no time to think about diets and calories. She cut two slices of wholemeal bread and a banana. She made some strong coffee. Whatever happened now she would need some fuel to give her energy.

She had just begun to eat when she heard a tap at the back door. Rosemary came in carrying a yellow dress. It was something they had discussed the other night. Was that only Saturday night? Less than three days ago? Rosemary always dressed for work as if she were going to be on prime-time television, groomed and made up. Her short straight hair with its immaculate cut looked as if she had come from a salon. The dress that she had brought to lend to Ria was one she had bought but hardly ever worn. She didn't have the right colouring, she had said, it needed someone dark.

Rosemary held the dress out as if she were in a dress shop convincing a doubtful buyer. 'It looks nothing in the hand but try it on, it's absolutely right for the opening of the flats.' Ria looked at her wordlessly. 'No, don't give me that look, you think it's too wishy-washy but honestly with your dark hair and say a black scarfGCa' Rosemary stopped suddenly and looked at Ria properly. She was sitting white-faced, wearing a black velvet dress and gold chain, and eating a huge banana sandwich at eight thirty in the morning. 'What is it?' Rosemary's voice was a whisper.

'Nothing, why?'

'Ria, what's happened? What are you doing?'

'I'm having my breakfast, what do you think I'm doing?'

'What is it? Your dressGCa?'

'You're not the only one who can get dressed in the mornings,' Ria said, her lip trembling. Her voice sounded to her a bit like a mutinous five-year-old. She saw Rosemary look at her face, aghast. Then it was all too much. 'Oh God Rosemary, he has a girlfriend, a girlfriend who's pregnant. She's twenty-two, she's going to have his baby.'

'No!' Rosemary had dropped the dress on the floor and come over to embrace her.

'Yes. It's true. She's called Bernadette.' Ria's voice was high now and hysterical. 'Bernadette! Can you imagine it! I didn't know they still called people of twenty-two that. He's left me, he's going to live with her. It's all over. Danny's gone. Oh Jesus, Rosemary, what am I going to do? I love him so much, Rosemary. What am I going to do?'

Rosemary held her friend in her arms and muttered into the dark curly hair, 'Shush, shush, it can't be over, it's all right, it's all right.'

Ria pulled away. 'It's not going to be all right. He's leaving me. For her. For Bernadette.'

'And would you have him back?' Rosemary was always very practical.

'Of course I would. You know that.' Ria wept.

'Then we must get him back,' said Rosemary, picking up a table napkin and wiping Ria's tear-stained face just as you would a baby's.

'Gertie, can I come in?'

'Oh Rosemary, it's not such a good time. I wonder if I could leave it to another timeGCa it's justGCa' Rosemary walked past her. Gertie's home was a mess. That was nothing new but this time there actually seemed to be broken furniture. A lamp was at a rakish angle and a small table now in three pieces stood in the corner. Broken china and glass seemed to have been swept to one side. There was a stain of spilled coffee or something on the carpet.

T'm sorry, you seeGCa' Gertie began.

'Gertie, I haven't come here at nine o'clock in the morning to give your home marks out of ten. I've come for your help.'

'What is it?' Gertie was justifiably alarmed. What kind of help could she possibly give to Rosemary Ryan who ran her life like clockwork, who looked like a fashion model, had a home like something from a magazine and a successful job? Something terrible must have happened if she had come to Gertie for help.

'You're needed up in Ria's house now. You have to come, I'll drive you. Come on, get your coat.'

'I can't, I can't today.'

'You have to, Gertie. It's as simple as this, Ria needs you. Look at all she does for you when you need her.'

'No, not now. You see, there was a bit of trouble here last night.'

'You do surprise me.' Rosemary looked around the room scornfully.

'And we made it all up and I said to Jack I wouldn't go running to the two of you any more. GCO Gertie lowered her voice. 'He said that it was the women friends I had who were coming between usGCa making the problems.'

'Bullshit,' Rosemary said.

'Shush, he's asleep. Don't wake him.'

'I don't care if he wakes or not. Your friend who has never once asked you a favour in her whole life wants you to come round to her house and you're bloody coming.'

'Not today, tell her I'm sorry. She'll understand. Ria knows what the problems are in this house, she'll forgive me for not coming this once.'

'She might, I won't. Ever.'

'But friends forgive and understand. Ria's my friend, you're my friend.'

'And that big ignorant bruiser in a drunken sleep is not a friend, we have to assume? Is that what you're telling me? Get sense, Gertie, what's the worst he can do to you? Another couple of teeth? Maybe you should have them all out next time you go to Jimmy Sullivan. Make it easier. Just whip out your dentures as soon as lover boy starts looking crooked.'

'You're a very hard, cruel woman, Rosemary,' Gertie said.

'Am I? A moment ago I was a sympathetic understanding friend. Well, I'll tell you what you, are, Gertie. You are a weak, selfish, whining victim and you deserve to get beaten up as much as you do, and possibly more because you haven't a shred of kindness or decency in you. If someone told anyone else on God's earth that Ria Lynch needed them they'd be there like a shot. But not you of course, not Gertie.'

Rosemary had never been so angry. She walked to the door without even looking back to see how Gertie was taking it. Before she got to her car she heard steps behind her. Out in the daylight she saw the marks on Gertie's face, bruises that had not been visible indoors because of the dim light in the house. The women looked at each other for a moment.

'He's left her. The bastard.'

'Danny? Never! He wouldn't.'

'He has,' said Rosemary, starting up the car.

Ria was still sitting in her party dress. That, more than anything, underlined the seriousness of it all. 'I haven't told Gertie anything except that Danny says he's moving out. I don't know any more anyway, and we don't want to, or have to. All we want is to help you get through today.' Rosemary was completely in charge.

'You're very good to come, Gertie.' Ria's voice was small.

'Why wouldn't I? Look at all you do for me.' Gertie looked at the floor as she spoke, hating to catch Rosemary's eye. 'So where do we start?'

'I don't know.' The normally confident Ria was at a loss. 'It's just that I couldn't bear to talk to anyone else except you two.'

'Well, who might come in on top of you? Colm?'

'No, he stays in the garden. He knows anyway, I fainted in the restaurant last night.'

Rosemary and Gertie exchanged quick glances. 'So who else is likely to come?' Rosemary asked and then with one voice she and Gertie said, 'Your mother!'

'Oh sweet Jesus, I couldn't face my mother today,' Ria said.

'Right,' Gertie said. 'Do we head her off at the pass? I could do that. I could go and thank her for lending me the dog, tell her I'm sorry I tied him up at the gate.'

'Why did you want him?' Ria asked.

It was no time for disguises. 'For protection. Jack's a bit afraid of dogs. He was very upset yesterday what with being taken in by the Guards.'

'But not kept in, unfortunately,' said Rosemary.

'Yes, but what kind of gaols would they need if you took in every drunk?' Gertie was philosophical. 'I could tell your mother you had flu or something.'

Rosemary shook her head. 'No, that would be worse than ever. She'd come over like Florence Nightingale with potions and try to book you into that geriatric home of hers. We could say you'd gone out shopping, that there'd be no one at home. Or would that be an odd sort of thing to say?'

Ria didn't seem to know. 'She might come round to see what I bought,' she said.

'Could you say you have to go out and meet someone?'

'Who?' Ria asked. There was a silence.

Rosemary spoke. 'We'll say that there's a free voucher in Quentin's, that you and I were meant to be going there today but now we can't. And since it's only valid today your mother and Hilary are to go instead. How about that?' She was crisp and decisive, as she must be at work, looking around to see how the suggestion was received.

'You don't know how slow they are,' Ria said. 'They'd never do anything unexpected like that.'

'Hilary would hate to miss the bargain, she'd go just to get value. Your mother would love to see the style. They'll go. I'll book it.'

Gertie was reassuring. 'Anyone would get dressed up and go to Quentin's. I'd even stir myself for that, and that's saying something.' She managed a watery smile from her poor bruised face.

Ria felt a lump in her throat. 'Sure, sure they'll go,' she said.

'I'll pick up Annie and Brian from school and take them back to my place, to have supper and watch a video.' Rosemary saw the look of doubt on Ria's face about this and said quickly, 'Ill make it such a good video that they won't be able to refuse, oh and I'll invite the awful Kitty as well.' Ria grinned. That would do it. 'And lastly, Ria, I'll also book you a hair appointment in my place, they really are very good.'

'It's too late for hairdos and makeovers, Rosemary. We're way beyond all that. I couldn't do it, it would be meaningless to me.'

'How else are you going to fill in the hours until he comes home?' she asked. There was no answer. Rosemary made two brisk phone calls to busy professionals like herself. No time was wasted in long, detailed explanations. To Brenda at Quentin's who heard that a Mrs Johnson and a Mrs Moran would be going as her guests, and were to be treated royally as winners of a voucher, given everything they asked for. Then to the hairdressing salon, where she booked Mrs Lynch in for a style cut and shampoo and also a manicure.

'I'm not usually so feeble, but I don't think I have the energy to explain all this about Quentin's to my mother and Hilary,' Ria began.

'You don't have to, I will,' Rosemary said.

'The house is a mess.'

'It won't be when you get back,' promised Gertie.

'I don't believe any of this is happening,' Ria said slowly.

'That's what happens, it's nature's way of coping. It's so you can get on with other things,' said Gertie who knew what she was talking about.

'It's like an anaesthetic, you have to go on autopilot for a while,' said Rosemary, who had an explanation for everything but would have had no idea what it felt like to see a huge pit of despair open in front of you.

Ria didn't really remember the visit to the hairdressing salon. She told them she was very tired and hadn't slept all night, they would have to excuse her if she was a little distracted. She tried to show an interest in the hot oil treatment for her thick curly hair, and tried to make a decision about the shape and colour of her nails. But mainly she let them get on with it, and when it came to paying they said that it was on Rosemary Ryan's account.

Ria looked at her watch. It was lunch-time. If everything had gone according to plan her mother and sister would be sitting in one of Dublin's grandest restaurants having a meal they believed to be free. It was yet one more extraordinary aspect to this totally unreal day.

In Quentin's Hilary and her mother were offered an Irish coffee after their lunch. 'Do you think it's included on the voucher?' Mrs Johnson hissed. Emboldened by the excellent Italian wine Hilary decided to be assertive. 'I rather think it is. A place like this wouldn't stint on little extras.' It turned out to be very much included, the elegant lady who ran the place told them, and a second was brought to the table without their having to decide.

While they waited for the taxi, they were asked as a favour to taste a new liqueur that the restaurant was thinking of putting on the menu; they needed some valued customers' views before they made a final decision. The taxi journey back to Nora Johnson's house was something of a blur. She was relieved to have been told by that bossy Rosemary that Ria wouldn't be at home. Otherwise she might have felt she should call around and give a report on how the lunch had gone. She would telephone instead, when she had had a little rest.

There were two more hours before Danny came home. Ria had never known time pass so slowly. She walked aimlessly around the house touching things, the table in the hall where Danny left his keys. She ran her hand over the back of the chair where he sat at night and often fell asleep with papers from work on his lap. She picked up the glass jug he had given her for her birthday. It had the word Ria engraved on it. He had loved her enough last November to have her name put on a jug and yet in April another woman was pregnant with his child. It was too much to take in.

Ria looked at the cushion she had embroidered for him. The two words 'Danny Boy'. It had taken her weeks of unpicking the stitches to finish it. She could remember his face when she gave it to him. 'You must love me nearly as much as I love you to do something like that for me,' he had said. Nearly as much!

She looked at their new music centre. Only last Christmas, less than six months ago, he had spent hour after hour testing where the speakers would be best. He had bought her so many compact discs, all the Ella Fitzgeralds she had loved, and she had got him the big band sound he liked, the Dorsey brothers, Glenn Miller. The children had groaned at their taste. Perhaps the youthful Bernadette played the strange music that Annie and Kitty liked. Perhaps Danny Lynch pretended he liked it too. Soon he would be home to tell her things like this.

Ria saw Colm Barry in the garden. He was turning the soil but in a desultory way, as if he weren't really there to dig vegetables but to look after her in case she needed it.

Gertie phoned Rosemary at seven o'clock. 'I just rang to sayGCa well, I don't know why I rang,' she said.

'You know why you rang, you rang because it's seven o'clock and we're both mad with worry.'

'Are the children there?'

'Yes, that bit worked anyway. I nearly had to give my body to get that video but I got it.'

'That'll keep them entertained. Do you think they'll patch it up?'

'They'll have to,' said Rosemary. 'They've too much to lose, both of them.'

'But what about the baby? The girl who's pregnant?'

'That's probably what they're talking about this minute.'

'Do you say prayers at all, Rosemary?'

'No, not these days. Do you?'

'No, I do deals, I suppose. I promise God to do things if Jack stops, whatever.'

Rosemary bit her lip. It must have cost Gertie a lot to admit this. 'Do they work, these deals?'

'What do you think?'

'No, I suppose not all the time.' Rosemary was being diplomatic.

'I've done a deal today. I've told God that if he gets Danny back for Ria, I'll wellGCa I'll do something I've been promising to do for a long time.'

'I hope it's not to turn the other cheek again or anything,' Rosemary said before she could stop herself.

'No, quite the contrary as it happens,' Gertie said and hung up.

At seven o'clock Ria turned down the volume control on the answering machine. She didn't want to be disturbed by any more drunken messages from her mother and sister who appeared to have become legless at the restaurant where they had lunch. There were also messages from other people. A query from her brother-in-law Martin to know where Hilary was. Dekko's mother to say that there would be a babysitting opportunity for Brian at the weekend. The hire shop confirming the rental of the sanding machine for next weekend. A woman organising a class reunion lunch who wanted addresses of others who had been at school with them.

Ria would not have been able to talk to any one of them today. What did people do without answering machines? She remembered the day they had installed it and how they had laughed at Danny's attempts to record a convincing message. 'We have to face it, I'm just not an actor,' he had said. But he had been an actor, a very successful one for months. Years maybe.

She sat down and waited for Danny Lynch to come back to Tara Road.

He didn't call out as he usually did. There was no, 'Yoo hoo, sweetheart, I'm back.' He didn't leave his keys on the hall table. He looked pale and anxious. If things were normal she would have worried, wondered if he was getting flu, begged him to take more time off from the office, to relax more. But things were not normal so she just looked at him and waited for him to speak.

'It's very quiet here,' he said eventually.

'Yes, isn't it?'

They could have been strangers who had just met. He sat down and put his head in his hands. Ria said nothing. 'How do you want to do this?' he said.

'You said we must talk, Danny, so talk.'

'You're making it very hard for me.'

'I'm sorry, did you say that I am making it hard? Is that what you said?'

'Please, I'm going to try to be as honest as I can, there will be no more lies or hiding things. I'm not proud of any of this but don't try and trip me up with words and phrases. It's only going to make it worse.' She looked at him and said nothing. 'Ria, I beg you. We know each other too well, we know what every word means, every silence even.'

She spoke slowly and carefully. 'No, I don't know you at all. You say there'll be no more lies, no more hiding things. You see, I didn't know there had been any lies or any hiding things, I thought we were fine.'

'No, you didn't. You can't have. Be honest.'

'I am, Danny. I'm being as honest as I ever have been. If you know me as you claim you do, then you must see that.'

'You thought that this was all there was?'

'Yes.'

'And you didn't think it had all changed. You thought we were just the same as when we got married?' He seemed astounded.

'Yes, the same. Older, busier. More tired, but mainly the same.'

'ButGCa' he couldn't go on.

'But what?'

'But we have nothing to say to each other any more, Ria. We make household arrangements, we rent a sander, we get things out of the freezer, we make lists. That's not living. That's not a real life.'

'You rented the sander,' she said. 'I never wanted it.'

'That's about the level of our conversation nowadays, sweetheart. You know this, you're just not admitting it.'

'You're going to leave, leave this house and me and Annie and BrianGCa is that what's happening?'

'You know it's not the same any more, like it was.'

'I don't, I don't know that.'

'You can't tell me that for you everything's perfect?'

'It's not totally perfect, you work too hard. Well, you're out too much, maybe it's not work after all. I thought it was.'

'A lot of it is,' he said ruefully.

'But apart from that I thought everything was fine, and I had no idea that you weren't happy here with us all.'

'It's not that.'

She leaned over and looked him right in the eyes. 'But what is it, Danny? Please? Look, you wanted to talk, we're talking. You wanted me to be calm, I'm being calm. I'm being as honest as you are. What is it? If you say you weren't unhappy then why are you going? Tell me so that I'll understand. Tell me.'

'There's nothing left, Ria. It's nobody's fault, it happens all the time to people.'

'It hasn't happened to me,' she said simply.

'Yes it has but you won't face it. You just want to go on acting.'

'I was never acting, not for one minute.'

'I don't mean in a bad sense, I mean playing Happy Families.'

'But we are a happy family, Danny.'

'No, sweetheart, there's more, for both of us. We're not old people, we don't have to ruin ourselves and put up with the way it all turned out.'

'It turned out fine. Don't we have the most marvellous children and a lovely home? Tell me, what more do you want?'

'Oh Ria, Ria. I want to be somebody, to have a future and a dream and to start over and get things right.'

'And a new baby?'

'That's part of it, yes, a new beginning.'

'Will you tell me about her, about Bernadette? About what you and she have that we don't have, I don't mean glorious sex of course. Calm I may be but not quite calm enough to hear about that.'

'I beg you, don't bring bitter accusing words into it.'

'I beg you to think about what you say. Is there anything bitter and accusing about asking you in a totally non-hysterical way why you are suddenly ending a life that I thought was perfectly satisfactory? I just asked you to tell me what you are going to that's so much better. I'm sorry I mentioned sex but you did tell me that you and Bernadette are going to have a child and so forgive me but there must have been some sex involved.'

'I hate you to be sarcastic like this. I know you so well and you know me, we shouldn't be talking like this. We shouldn't truly.'

'Danny, is this just something that's happened to us, something that we might sort of get through like people do? I know it's serious and there's a child involved, but people have survived such things.'

'No, it's not like that.'

'You can't feel that it's all over. You got involved with somebody much younger, you were flattered. Of course I'm furious and upset but I can get over it, we all get over things. It doesn't have to be the end.'

'All day I said to myselfGCa please may Ria be calm. I don't expect her to forgive me but may she be calm enough for us to discuss this and see what's best for the children. You are calm, I don't deserve this but it's the wrong kind of calm. You think it's just a fling.'

'A fling?' she said.

'Yes, remember we used to go through all the degrees of relationships, a whirl, a fling, a romance, a relationship, and then the real thing.' He smiled as he said this. He was looking at his wife very affectionately.

Ria was bewildered. 'So?'

'So this is not a fling, it's the real thing. I love Bernadette, I want to spend the rest of my life with her, and she with me.'

Ria nodded as if this was a reasonable thing for the man she loved to be saying about somebody else. She spoke carefully. 'During the day when you were thinking please let her be calm, what else did you think? What did you think would be the best end to this discussion?'

'Oh, Ria, please. Don't play games.'

'I have never felt less like playing games in my life. I mean this utterly seriously, how do you want it to end?'

'With dignity I suppose. With respect for each other.'

'What?'

'No, you asked me, you asked what did I hope for. I suppose I hoped you'd agree that what we had was very good at the time but it was over and thatGCa we could talk about what to do that would hurt Annie and Brian least.'

'I've done nothing at all to hurt them.'

'I know.'

'And you didn't think there was anything that you and I could talk about which would get us back together the way it used to beGCowell, used to be for you.'

'No, love, that's over, that's gone.'

'So when you said talk, it wasn't talk about us, it was talk about what I am to do when you go, is that it?'

'About what we both do. It's not their fault, Annie and Brian don't deserve any hardship.'

'No they don't. Do I, though?'

'That's different, Ria. You and I fell out of love.'

'I didn't.'

'You did, you just won't admit it.'

'That's not true. And I won't say I did to make you feel better.'

'Please.'

'No, I love you. I love the way you look and the way you smile, I love your face and I want to have your arms around me and hear you telling me that this is all a nightmare.'

'This isn't the way it is, Ria, it's the way it was.'

'You don't love me any more?'

'I'll always admire you.'

'I don't want your admiration, I want you to love me.'

'You only think you doGCa deep down you don't.'

'Don't give me this, Danny, trying to make me say that I'm tired of it all too.'

'We can't have everything we want,' he began.

'You're having a pretty good stab at it though.'

'I want us to be civilised, decide what we'll do about where we all liveGCa'

'What do you mean?'

'Before we tell the children we should be able to give them an idea what the future is going to be like.'

'I'm not telling the children anything, I have nothing to tell them. You tell them what you want to.'

'But the whole point is not to upset themGCa'

'Then stay at home and live with them and give up this other thingGCa that's the way not to upset them.'

'I can't do that, Ria,' Danny said. 'My mind's made up.'

That was the moment she believed that all this was actually happening. Up to then it had all been words, and nightmares. Now she knew and she felt very, very weary. 'Right,' she said. 'Your mind's made up.'

He seemed relieved at the change in her. He was right, they did know each other very well, he could see that somehow she had accepted it was going to happen. Their conversation would now be on a different level, the level he had wanted, discussion of details, who would live where. 'There wouldn't be any hurry to move and change everything immediately, disrupting their school term, but maybe by the end of the summer?'

'Maybe what by the end of the summer?' Ria asked.

'We should have thought of what will happen, where we'll all live.'

'IGCOll be living here, won't I?' Ria said, surprised.

'Well, sweetheart, we'll have to sell the place. I mean it would be much too big forGCa'

'Sell Tara Road?' She was astounded.

'Eventually, of course, becauseGCa'

'But Danny, this is our home. This is where we live, we can't sell it.'

'We're going to have to. How else canGCa wellGCa everybody be provided for?'

'I'm not moving from here so that you can provide for a twenty-two-year-old.'

'Please Ria, we must think what we tell Annie and Brian.'

'No, you must think. I've told you I'm telling them nothing, and I am not moving out of my home.'

There was a silence.

'Is this how you're going to play it?' he said eventually. 'Daddy, wicked monster Daddy, is going away and abandoning you, and good saintly poor Mummy is stayingGCa'

'Well that's more or less the way it is, Danny.'

He was angry now. 'No, it's not. We're meant to be trying to be constructive and make things more bearable for them.'

'Okay, let's wait here until they come home and let's watch you making it bearable for them.'

'Where are they?'

'At Rosemary's, watching a video.'

'Does Rosemary know?'

'Yes.'

'And what time will they be back?'

Ria shrugged. 'Nine or ten, I imagine.'

'Can you ring and get them back sooner?'

'You mean you can't even wait a couple of hours in your own home for them.'

'I don't mean that, it's just if you're going to be so hostileGCa I suppose I'm afraid it will make things worse.'

'I won't be hostile. I'll sit and read or something.'

He looked around wonderingly. 'You know I've never known this house so peaceful, I've never known you sit and read. The place is always like a shopping centre in the city with doors opening and closing, people coming in and out and food and cups of coffee. It's always like a beer garden here, with your mother and the dog and Gertie and Rosemary and all the children's friends. This of all times must be the very first time in this house that you can hear yourself think.'

'I thought you liked the place being full of people.'

'There was never any calm here, Ria, too much rushing round playing house.'

'I don't believe this, you're just rewriting history.' She got up from the table and went over to the big armchair. She still felt this huge tiredness. She closed her eyes and knew that she could sleep there and then in the middle of this conversation that was about to end her marriage and the life she had lived up to now. Her eyelids were very heavy.

'I'm so sorry, Ria,' he said. She said nothing. 'Will I go and pack some things, do you think?'

'I don't know, Danny. Do whatever you think.'

'I'm happy to sit and talk to you.'

Her eyes were still closed. 'Well do then.'

'But there's nothing more to say,' he said sadly. 'I can't keep on saying that I'm sorry things turned out like this, I can't keep saying that over and over.'

'No, no you can't,' she agreed.

'So maybe it would be better if I were to go up and pack a few things.'

'Maybe it would.'

'Ria?'

'Yes?'

'Nothing.'

For a while she could hear him upstairs moving from his study to the bedroom. And then she fell asleep in the chair.

She woke to the sound of voices in the kitchen.

'Usually it's Dad fast asleep,' said Brian.

'Did you have a nice time?' Ria asked.

'It's not even in the cinemas for another three weeks.' Brian's eyes were shining.

'And you, Annie?'

'It was okay. Can Kitty stay the night?' Annie asked.

'No, not tonight.'

'But Mam, why"? Why do you always make life hell for everyone? We told Kitty's mother that she'd be staying.'

'Not tonight. Your father and I want to talk to you and Brian about something.'

'Kitty can talk too.'

'You heard me, Annie.' There was something about her voice. Something different. Grudgingly Annie escorted her friend to the door. Ria could hear muttered remarks about people who spoiled everything.

Danny had come downstairs. He looked pale and anxious. 'We want to talk to you, your mother and I,' he began. 'But I'll do most of the talking because this is aboutGCa well, it's up to me to explain it all really.' He looked from one to the other as they stood alarmed by the table. Ria still sat in her armchair. 'It's very hard to know where to start, so if you don't think it's very sentimental and slushy I'll start by saying that we love you very, very much, you're a smashing daughter and sonGCa'

'You're not sick or anything, Daddy?' Annie interrupted.

'No, no, nothing like that.'

'Or going to gaol? You have that kind of voice.'

'No, sweetheart. But there are going to be some changes, and I wanted to tellGCa'

'I know what it is.' Brian's face was contorted with horror. 'I know. It was just the same in Dekko's house when they told him, they told him they loved him. Are we going to have a baby? Is that it?'

Annie looked revolted. 'Don't be disgusting, Brian.'

But they both looked at Ria for confirmation that this wasn't the problem. She gave a funny little laugh. 'We're not, but Daddy is,' she said.

'Ria!' He looked as if she had hit him. His face was ashen. 'Ria, how could you?'

'I answered a question. You said we should answer their questions.'

'What is it, Daddy? What are you saying?' Annie looked from one to the other.

'I'm saying that for some of the time I won't be living here any more, well, for most of the time really. And that in the future, well, we'll all probably move house, but you will have a place with me and also with Mummy for as long as you like, always, for ever and ever. So nothing about us will change as far as you're concerned.'

'Are you getting divorced?' Brian asked.

'Eventually yes. But that's a long way down the line. The main thing to establish is that everyone knows everything and there are no secrets, nobody getting hurt.'

'That's what your father wants to establish,' Ria said.

'Ria, pleaseGCa" He looked hurt and annoyed.

'And is Mam making it up about you having a baby? That's not true, is it, Dad?'

Danny looked at Ria in exasperation. 'That's not the point at the moment. The point is that you are my children and nothing can change that, nothing at all. You are my daughter and my son.'

'So it is true!' Annie said in horror.

'Not a baby!' Brian said.

'Shut up, Brian, the baby's not coming here. Dad's going away to it. Isn't that what's happening?' Danny said nothing, just looked miserably at the two stricken young faces. 'Well, is it, Dad? Are you going to leave us for someone else?'

'I can never leave you, Annie. You're my daughter, we'll never leave each other.'

'But you're leaving home and going to live with someone who's pregnant?'

'Your mother and I have agreed that we are not the same people we once wereGCa we have different needsGCa'

Ria gave a little strangled laugh from the armchair.

'Who is she, Daddy? Do we know her?'

'No, Annie, not yet.'

'Don't you care, Mam? Won't you stop him? Won't you tell him you don't want him to go?' Annie was blazing with rage.

Ria wanted to leap up and hold her hurt angry daughter to her and tell her just how bad it all was, how unreal. 'No, Annie. Your father knows that already, but he has made up his mind.'

'Ah, Ria, we agreed, you promised that this shouldn't be a slanging match between us.'

'We agreed nothing, I promised nothing. I am not telling my children that I have different "needs". It's just not true. I need you and want you at home.'

'Oh Mam, everything's ending, Mam.' Brian's face was white. He had never heard his capable mother admitting that she was adrift.

'Brian, it's all right, that's what I'm trying to say to you. Nothing's changing. I'm still Dad, still the same Dad I was all the time.'

'You can't leave Mam, Dad. You can't go off with some other one, and leave Mam and us here.' Brian was very near tears.

Annie spoke. 'She doesn't care, Mam doesn't give a damn. She's just letting him go, she's letting him walk out. She's not even trying to stop him.'

'Thank you very much, Ria, that was terrific.' Danny was near to tears.

She found her voice. 'I will not tell the children that I don't mind and that it's all fine. It is not all fine, Danny.'

'You promisedGCa' he began.

'I promised nothing.'

'We said we didn't want to hurt the children.'

I'm not walking out on them, I'm not talking about selling this house over their heads. Where am I hurting them? I only heard about your plans last night and suddenly I'm meant to be all sweetness and light. Saying this is all for the best; we're different people with different needs. I'm the same person, I have the same needs. I need you to stay here with us.'

'Ria, have some dignity please,' he shouted at her.

They seemed to realise that the children hadn't spoken. They looked at the faces of their son and daughter, white and disbelieving and both of them with tears falling unchecked. They were beginning to realise that their life in Tara Road was over. Nothing would ever be the same. An eerie stillness settled on the kitchen. They watched each other fearfully. It was always Ria who broke a silence, who made the first move, who jollied people along. But not tonight. It was as if she were more shocked than any of them.

Danny spoke eventually. 'I don't know what to do for the best,' he said helplessly. 'I wanted it told differently but maybe there's no good way of telling it.' They said nothing. 'What would you like me to do? Will I stay here in the study tonight so things will be sort of normal, or will I leave and come back tomorrow? You tell me and I'll do what you say.'

It was obvious that Ria was going to say nothing.

He looked at the children. 'Go,' said Brian. 'Stay,' said Annie.

'Not if you're going to leave anyway, go now,' Brian said. They all looked at Annie. She shrugged. 'Why not?' she said in a small hurt voice. 'If you're going to leave tomorrow, what's the point of hanging about?'

'It's not goodbye, sweetheartGCa' Danny began. 'Can you understand that?'

'No, I can't, Daddy, to be honest,' she said, and she picked up her school bag and without a backward glance went out the kitchen door and up the stairs.

Brian watched her go. 'What's going to happen to us all?' he asked.

'We'll all survive,' Danny said. 'People do.'

'Mam?' Her son looked at her.

'As your dad saysGCa people do, we will too.' The look that Danny gave her was grateful. She didn't want his gratitude. 'The children have said they'd like you to go, Danny. Will you, please?'

He went quietly and the three of them heard him starting his car and driving down Tara Road.

Ria had a little speech ready for them at breakfast.

'I wasn't much help last night,' she said.

'Is it all really going to happen, Mam? Isn't there anything we can do to stop it?' Brian's face was hopeful.

'Apparently it is going to happen, but I wanted to tell you it's not quite as sad and awful as it seemed last night.'

'What do you mean?' Annie was scornful.

'I mean that what your father said was quite true. We both do love you very much and we'll be here, or around if not here, whenever you need us until you get bored with us and want lives of your own. But until then I'm not going to shout at your father like I did and he's not going to sneer at me. And if you want to be with him, at a weekend say, then that's where you'll be and if you want to be with me, then I'll be here or wherever and delighted for you to be with me. That's a promise.' They didn't rate it much. 'And what I suggest is that you ring your dad at the office today and ask him where he'd like to meet you tonight and talk to you and tell you about everything.'

'Can't you tell us, Mam?' Brian begged.

'I can't really, Brian. I don't know it all and I'd tell it wrong. Let him tell you then you won't feel worried and there won't be any grey areas.'

'But if he tells us one thing and you tell us another?' Annie wanted to know.

'We'll try not to do that any more.'

'And does everyone know about it?'

'No, I donGCOt think many people do.'

'Well, do they or don't they?' Annie was abrupt and rude. 'I mean does Gran know, Aunty Hilary, Mr McCarthyGCopeople like that?'

'Gran and Hilary don't know, but I expect Mr McCarthy does. I didn't think of it before but I imagine he knows all about it.' Her face was like's^one.

'And are we to tell anyone? Do I tell Kitty what's happened or is it all a terrible secret?'

'Kitty's your friend. You must tell her whatever you want to, Annie.'

'I don't want to tell Dekko and Myles, they'd tell the whole class,' Brian said.

'Well don't tell them then, for goodness' sake.' Annie was impatient.

'Do you get custody of us, Mam, or does Dad?'

'I've told you we won't fight over you, you'll be welcome with both of us always. But I would think you would probably live with me during the week in term-time.'

'Because she wouldn't want us, is that it?' Annie was instantly suspicious.

'No, no. She knows your father has two children, she must want to welcome them.'

'But she's having her own,' Brian grumbled.

'What's her name?' Annie wanted to know.

'I don't know,' Ria lied.

'You must know, of course you know,' Annie persisted.

'I don't. Ask your father.'

'Why won't you tell us?' Annie wouldn't let go.

'Leave Mam alone. Why do you think she knows?'

'Because it's the first thing I'd have asked, that anyone would ask,' said Annie.

Danny used to laugh at the way Ria made a list of things to do. She always headed it List. Old habits die hard. She headed it List and sat at the table when the children had gone. Their hugs had been awkward but some pretence at normality had been restored. The tears and silences of last night were over. The list covered many phone calls.

She must ring her mother first and prevent her coming anywhere near the house, then ring Hilary, then at ten o'clock when the charity shop where she was meant to be working opened she would ring and cancel her shift. She would ring Rosemary at the printing company and Gertie at the launderette, and Colm to thank him for minding her.

And lastly she would ring Danny. Beside Danny's name she wrote firmly: Do not apologise.

Nora Johnson started to explain about the lunch. 'There may be a question on the bill at the restaurant. They said we could have three Irish coffees. In fact, Ria, they more or less insisted. But if there's any disputeGCa'

'Mam, could you stop talking please?'

'That's an extraordinary tone to take with your own mother.'

'Listen to me please, Mam. This is not a good day for me. Danny and I are going to have a trial separation. We told the children last night. It didn't go well.'

'And has he moved out?' Her mother sounded very calm.

'Yes. We haven't decided what to do about the house yet but he has moved out for the moment.'

'Keep the house,' her mother said, in a voice like a trap closing.

'Well, all that has to be discussed. If you don't mind I don't feel much like talking about it now.'

'No, but talk to a lawyer and keep that property.'

'Ah, Mam, that's not the point. The point is that Danny's leaving. Aren't you sorry? Aren't you upset for me?'

'I suppose I saw it coming.'

'No, you couldn't have seen it coming.'

'He has very small eyes,' said Ria's mother.

'Can I speak to Mrs Hilary Moran?'

'Jesus, Ria, think yourself lucky you didn't use that voucher, I have such a hangover.'

'Listen, can you talk?'

'Of course I can't talk. I can't think and I certainly can't be in a school with all these screeching voices but this is where I am, and where I have to stay until four thirty. God, you don't know how lucky you are having nothing to do all day but sit in a big houseGCa'

'Hilary, shut up and listen to meGCa'

'What?'

'Danny has another woman, a girl he got pregnant.'

'I don't believe it.'

'It's true. I wanted to tell you before Mam did, she's possibly trying to ring you at this minute.' Ria felt her voice tremble a little.

'I'm very sorry, Ria, more sorry than I can say.'

'I know you are.'

'And what happens now?'

'We sell the house, I suppose. He goes his way, I go mine. I don't know what happens now.'

'And the children?'

'Like weasels of course. In total shock, as am I.'

'You didn't know or suspect anything?'

'No, and if you tell me he has small eyes like Mam did I'll go round and kill you.'

They giggled. In the middle of it all they were able to laugh at their mother.

'I could tell them I'm sick and come round to you?' Hilary was doubtful.

'No, honestly, I have a million things to do.'

'I hope one of them's getting your hands on the deeds of that house,' Hilary said before they hung up.

Frances Sullivan, who was married to their dentist Jimmy, ran the charity shop. 'RiaGCa of courseGCa we'll find someone else for this morning, don't give it a thought. Going anywhere nice?'

'No, bit of a family crisis, something I want to work out.'

'You do that. Is it Annie and my Kitty?'

'No, why do you say that?' Alarm bells sounded in Ria's head.

'Nothing.' Frances was backing off.

'Go on, Frances. I'd tell you it if I knew.'

'It's probably nothing, it's just that Kitty let out that she and Annie were going off on a motor-bike rally on Saturday next. I wondered had you found out.'

'Not next Saturday surely? They have another Careers Forum.'

'I think not,' said Frances Sullivan. 'But you didn't hear it from me.'

Rosemary's secretary put her through at once. 'Is it a good time, Rosemary?'

'Is he giving her up?' Rosemary said.

'No, not a chance.'

'And the children?'

'Took it very badly, of course. Danny and I made a real mess of it.'

'Are you all right, Ria?'

'I am at the moment, I'm on autopilot. And thank you so much for all the things, I forgot to thank you for anything.'

'Like what?'

'The hairdo, the lunch for Mam and HilaryGCothey got pissed there by the way, the bill might be a bit more than we thought.'

'Oh, for heaven's sake, Ria.'

'And for coming around, and all the encouragement. That's the best bit, I'm sorry for not making a better go of it.'

'You and he'll be back together.'

'No, it's not likely.'

'You're still in Tara Road, aren't you?'

'Yes, for the moment.'

'Stay there, Ria. He's not going to leave that house.'

'Gertie, I truly appreciated your coming round, I knew it wasn't such a good day for you.'

'And you sorted it all out, didn't you?'

'No, I'm afraid not.'

'Listen, there's nothing I don't know about family rows, he'll be as sorry as anything, he'll put it right. He'll let your one, whoever she is, have her baby or an abortion or whatever. You and he areGCa well, I know you don't like the example but, you're like Jack and myself. Some people are meant for each other.'

'I know you think this is helping, Gertie, butGCa'

'Listen, can you ever imagine either of you living anywhere on earth but Tara Road? You're made for that house, that's a sure guarantee it will work out all right.'

'Colm? It's Ria Lynch.'

'Ah yes, Ria.'

'You were very kind to me. I realised I never thanked you.'