They bounced into Derry station late in the evening to the area marked out for the Lough Swilly buses, and while the driver sat separating sterling from punts, the few passengers alighted. Jack rang the Guild Hall to hear that the play Catherine had been appearing in had in fact finished the night before. By some freak of fate he had missed her. No message had been left. He sat in the station wondering what to do.

He moved to the nearest pub, and rang Catherine’s number in Belfast.

“Where are you?” she asked in an excited voice.

“I’m in Derry.”

“What happened?”

“I don’t know. I must have got the dates mixed up.”

“Well look – book yourself in somewhere – then come up on the first train, and I’ll meet you. And Jack?”

“Yes.”

“Watch yourself.”

“I will.”

“I don’t want to lose you just yet.”

He returned to his drink.

“Is there a hotel round here?”

“Not here, fellow,” said the barman.

“Could you give me the name of any place I could book into?”

“There’s boarding houses. And there’s the Blue Tit.”

“You see I have a gig in town tonight,” Jack explained unnecessarily.

“What are you – some class of a chanter?”

“That’s right. A classical musician.”

“Classical.” He spun a glass in his hand. “Do you play cricket?”

“No.”

“I never met a classical musician who didn’t play cricket. Cricket is big in Derry.”

“Oh.”

“We get all kinds of serious clients in here.”

“Well look, I’ll be seeing you.”

“Look after yourself.”

By the time he was happily drunk, Jack had risen in rank to be a researcher with the BBC. As a musician again, he lay down to sleep in a lodging house, not far from the station, where all night he heard voices from downstairs that he imagined were discussing him.

I wish, Jack Ferris thought, I was with someone. He moved towards the railway station. Everybody around him looked bitterly sane. The hangover had left a dark gap in his mind. The human spirit was flush against its walls. A distant cramp attacked the calf of his right leg. I could take a drink, he thought. He hurried across a bridge over the Foyle. Rats scurried through the mud below. A shaven-headed chap approached from Waterside like an old man. A policeman looking down at the River Foyle below, dabbed his forehead and sighed. An over-sized gull landed on a rail and turned one bad eye to look at Jack.

Cold sweat dribbled down his forearms.

I feel awful, he said to himself.