And Colette declared that, as God was her judge, she had never seen such an enormous ring. And she wished Birdie luck. And happiness. Wasn’t it a charity, and a sweet reckoning to make Colette spit all that out. Not that there could be the slightest bitterness on a day like that. She even said to Colette to come up later to the party. And Colette said she might put her head in the door for a minute, when she was finished in the shop. It was going to be the mother and father of a party, Birdie promised. And she wasn’t lying.

The music did indeed put a jaunt in the day. Like beetles, one musician attracted another. And it was hardly past noon when the sound of hornpipes and reels in the bar of Hayden’s Hotel attracted Tommy Curtin, the box player from Menagh, and John Joe Curley, the fiddle player from Garvay, who were in on their bikes for the messages, and were sitting not two doors away, in Henderson’s, a little newspaper shop where all the countrymen used to congregate in the old days, sitting on upturned biscuit tins and orange boxes, and smoking their Woodbines, and talking to old stiff Henderson, when they couldn’t afford to go into the pubs.

By five o’clock that evening the session had filled out with musicians from everywhere. Christ, it was turning into a national cultural event, Birdie thought. Musicians from the four provinces, all dropping in one at a time, as if it was all by accident, and not a subtle choreography resulting from the Vet’s connivance with Hughie, and Hughie’s diligent efforts over six months up and down the shores of the Shannon, advising musicians of the spree there would be on the day of Birdie’s wedding in the hotel in Ballinasloe.

By eight o’clock they were all moved into a large function room. A special bar was opened. The musicians struck up a waltz. It filled the smoky room under the low rafters, and the dancing was begun without the slightest deference to the bride, who by tradition ought to have been the first on the floor. But she didn’t seem to mind, for at one stage, when the musicians were having a break, she was seen in earnest conversation with Hughie Donoghue as his flute rested on the table beside his pint and he leaned his head forward, so that she could whisper in his ear.

By midnight hardly anyone present, dancing or drinking or playing music, could quite remember what occasion had triggered such a fantastic session, and Alex Delaney and Birdie Waters were upstairs in the Number One bedroom, sitting on either side of that enormous creaking mattress, declaring their hearts to each other, telling each other the secrets of a lifetime, and promising the rest.

Alex had a lot to tell. And Birdie never repeated what he told her to another living soul. But then Birdie had her own little secrets too. Hadn’t she? And the pale light of dawn was not far away when they both finally collapsed into each other’s arms, and discovered their own unique moment of bliss on the springs of a big fancy bed.