Maura sniffed and pulled her handbag closer into her for comfort. ‘I wish he had too. Get our money back, that would be a fine thing. Have you seen how many cottages are standing empty? Everyone is leaving. We’re the only soft buggers that came back – and spent a fortune doing it. And it isn’t just that place; I’ve gone backwards in so many other ways too. I miss the four streets, Liam. The people, the shops, the carrying on.’

Liam crunched the gears and the engine screamed out. Maura wondered would the old van make it. ‘The carrying on?’ Liam glanced at her with a puzzled expression.

‘Yes, the carrying on. There’s always something happening – and the bingo, God, I really miss the bingo. I was good at winning, often had the luck with me but I was never greedy, mind.’ She sighed and, absent-minded, her hands patted the envelopes in her pocket, as if to reassure herself that she was closer to the four streets, just by touching them.

‘The kids are happy though?’ said Liam.

Maura snorted. ‘I don’t know, I daren’t ask,’ she said as her mind scrambled to remember the last time she saw her children laugh.

She was keen to change the subject. She knew she really should have said: no, the kids are as miserable as sin and when Liam probed her feelings, as he was doing now, the fact that Tommy had spent every penny on the rundown inn made her feel sick to the pit of her stomach.

‘Maeve asked me to tell you she’s expecting you and Tommy and the kids over on Sunday after mass and the kids always seem to have a grand time when they come to the farm.’

Maura smiled at the memory of their Sundays, their only day off. As soon as everyone was up, they headed over to Ballynevin for mass, avoiding the church next to the inn, and after, walked back to the farm with Liam and Maeve.

‘That’s it! That’s when the kids laugh,’ she said to Liam. ‘When we come to the farm. It’s the best bit of our week, Liam, and whatever the weather, the kids have a blast. Harry is beside himself that you are taking him out for the salmon again when the summer holidays come.’

Liam laughed. ‘Angela insists she’s coming too. I’ve told them, they can hold the landing net.’

‘I don’t think our Harry will be holding anything for a while; that Mr Cleary, he took the stick to our Harry the other day and you should see the state of his hands. He ripped the skin raw, he did.’