Please let her not be rude to Armand. Please let her not take the good out of Mère Brigid’s party, Keelin prayed silently. Fervently.

Why did Imelda dislike men so much? No man was good enough in her opinion. Not even her loyal and tolerant husband.

‘How can you put up with her meanness, Dad?’ Keelin had asked her father once, furious with Imelda for not allowing her to go to a dance that all her school friends were going to. Larry had tried his best to get his wife to change her mind, but Imelda had snapped, ‘You know as well as I do what goes on at those dances, and I’m not having her coming home thinking she’s falling in love with some Romeo, and mooning over him, and having her school-work suffer.’

‘That’s a bit of an exaggeration now, Imelda,’ Larry protested, winking at Keelin. ‘Sure, it’s the boys who’ll be mooning over our lovely daughter!’

‘She’d be better off keeping away from men,’ Imelda scowled.

‘Why? Weren’t you very lucky to get a kind man like Daddy?’ Keelin had exclaimed hotly, disgusted at her mother’s derisory tone.

‘Lucky! Is that what you call it?’ Imelda retorted, stalking out into the garden to pick some peas and broad beans for dinner.

‘She’s so mean and nasty,’ Keelin raged.

‘Ah, she’s having a hard time starting that old menopause thing. And with her own da being sick, she’s worried and tired. Take no notice, pet, this too will pass,’ Larry uttered one of his favourite sayings and gave her a hug. ‘Put a pillow under your quilt. When it gets dark, I’ll slip out and put the stepladder at your window and leave your bike down at the gate. But don’t be too late home. And be as quiet as a mouse climbing in – although, knowing your mother, she’ll be dead to the world by ten-thirty,’ he added humorously.

‘Oh, Dad, you’re the best in the world. I love you so much.’ Keelin had flung her arms around her father and hugged him with all her might.

Larry had been her champion, and she’d been his, so much so that Imelda had once accused them of ganging up on her.

‘Don’t be like that, Imelda,’ Larry had said sternly. ‘I don’t like that talk and I won’t have it. So we’ll have no more of it.’ It was almost unheard of for him to take that tone with her; shocked, Imelda had muttered an ungracious apology, but an apology nevertheless.

When her father had died, Keelin had wished bitterly that it had been her mother who had been taken first. But Larry was not the parent she’d to learn her life lessons from, she thought ruefully. It was Imelda who was teaching her tolerance, patience and forgiveness, much as she wished it might be otherwise.