Sleep must have come for I dreamt that helicopter blades were scything through the darkness. I felt the breeze as first they moved towards me and I braced for the agony. As they came close they stopped and veered away, making straight for John Johns. He was smiling, a smile that could light up the hedgerows, when they sliced the top of his head off like an egg. His eyes, his lips, his teeth ran with blood and there was nothing I could do to stem the flow.

We knew that something even more terrible was brewing. We could feel it in the air. The clouds settled once more over Carncloon and over every small and big town in the Province. Protestant neighbours were as shook up as us as we set about getting in the first crop of hay together. It was heartbreaking that the extremists on both sides could cause such damage in our name. We had no control over the mad bombers, the murderers; we knew they would be impossible to stop – if three dead children couldn’t stop them, what would?

The waynes had grumbled a bit about working on the farm; they had wanted to go to the last day of the carnival week in Omagh. It was summer, it would be busy, fun, loads of people would be there, Serena could go shopping! Nora Reilly was allowed to go, why couldn’t Serena go? It was unlike her to keep on long enough to get the boys to join in. All five of them were convinced they were missing out on something special.

–  It’ll be a day to remember, Mammy!

–  Every day you get to live healthy and free is a day to remember, Serena Bridget!

–  Oh Mammy, puh-lease don’t even start up with your fluffy nonsense about us all being together and all being safe and all being grateful that we have eyes to see the grass with!

It made me smile to hear that she had taken in my daily prayer. John smiled too but she carried on with her tutting and pouting a bit too long and he told them all to remember their manners and they knuckled down.

I drove the tractor, pulling the reaper, and the men and Eileen piled the cut grass into windrows. When it looked like rain, we got Daniel to drive instead so we could double up. The children were fine workers; John praised them up the field and back down it again and they worked faster and faster to please him. Bernie and Bridie were in charge of the tea-making down at Arthur Rowley’s place and they brought us a box of flasks around midday. We sat at the foot of an oak and let it burn our thirst away.