The dog rubbed his back against the underneath of the chair. Jack’s touch set Daisy’s right rear leg into a state of uncontrollable pleasure. It slapped the cement floor like a drumstick. The dog could not stop himself, went to dart out, withdrew and collapsed.

“Poor Daisy. Daisy,” lilted Catherine, “what an unfortunate name for a dog.” She returned her gaze to him. “Where do you come from?”

“To my great grief,” replied Jack, “I come from Kilty in the County Leitrim.”

“The dogs in Roscommon,” commenced Jack Ferris as he considered Daisy, “have different-coloured eyes. One brown, one blue. It’s hard to credit it. How do you think that happened?”

“I couldn’t say,” answered Catherine.

“In Leitrim there’s a fair few have a twist in the eye, and there’s another few albino.”

“Is that so?”

“Of course,” surmised Jack Ferris, “the shepherd dog as we know him is not the shepherd dog.”

“No?”

“Indeed, he’s not the collie at all.”

“Really?” She felt her cheek. “How interesting.”

“I always had a knack with animals,” Jack continued, bracing himself, “but never dogs. I always had a fancy towards horses and cattle, right enough,” he agreed. “And sheep, maybe. You don’t find many instances of the disturbed pupil there.” He tapped a fag into the palm of his hand. “The same horse is very scarce where I come from. Do you read the books?”

“No. All I do is look at the pictures.”

“Somebody’s codding somebody,” said Jack, emptying the ash into the fire, “I suppose you were all contrary children.”

“I suppose we were.”

“And Sara is off to the Abbey Theatre to act, I believe.”

“That’s right.”

“It’s all go.” He heard her mother cough as she crossed the landing upstairs. “What ails your ma?”

“She has congestion of the lungs. She says it’s like someone sitting on her chest.”

“Give her goat’s milk,” he said.

“Goat’s milk,” repeated Catherine, and immediately she remembered Matti Bonner. “Have you had plays put on?”

“A few,” he said.

Silence fell on them. Daisy made his way out, looked around the room, licked the floor with a very tentative, wet tongue and then tried to bury his head in Catherine’s groin. “Get down, you cur,” said Jack. “He is always saddle-sniffing.” The dog climbed back in underneath Jack’s chair, then, much to Catherine’s distraction, licked at its private parts and, finished with that, began instantly dreaming.