He had a point. I’m not sure I’d ever give up sitting in front of the fire with the waynes toasting their bread on the ends of forks to have with their cocoa. It gave us all a minute to look at each other in a timeless light.

I phoned Marius and Eugene first thing – John was resting – and spent the rest of the morning analysing what I’d been told. There was still no news about his back or his spine. So it was no surprise that he was a bit gloomy, a bit odd. He had asked them if I’d made it to the hospital yet, so they reported the fainting, the crying, the standing by the bed like a gom, the having to be fed chocolate. The fact that I hadn’t hesitated for a second when a decision had to be made about who would stay with him, who would go back to Johns Farm.

It sounded even worse when I heard my fantastic attempt at being a good wife summarised. I had abandoned him. He had nodded and said something peculiar. She never was one for grasping the nettle. The boys didn’t really understand what he meant so they didn’t have the sense to keep it from me.

The problem was that John had been right: I wouldn’t go, I couldn’t go, he knew me so well. I was weak material and getting weaker. That he was not here was about as much as I could bear – what would I do if he could never come home? What if he couldn’t walk? What if I reached out to him at last to keep him from falling and he was still determined to push me away?

The wool in my head was getting wetter, heavier, it was pushing at the back of my throat threatening to choke me. I kept swallowing and swallowing but something was bubbling up inside me, something desperate to break free. Eileen was feeling my forehead again – it’s as well if we won’t have both of them in the hospital at this rate, she tutted to Bernie. I was saved by the sound of a tractor on the lane.

My father was rounding the bend when I got to the half-door. He’d come to see if I needed anything, he wanted to help. He’d already done a few novenas, he says, embarrassed because he knew I’d given up on God. A few auld grey hairs poked out of his work shirt and the bristles on his face shone silver and there was only one thing that could be done for me.

–  Give me a hug, Daddy, before my actual heart breaks?

–  Come here, Mary girl, I’ve got you.