‘Were you really going to try and set on me with a replica sword?’ the man with the club asked Bimbo.

‘I can’t be sanctioning you boys coming in here leathering the shite out of this young fella and dragging him around the place like a bit of lawn furniture, no matter what he done,’ Bimbo said.

The man with the club sighed.

‘Setting on your own brother,’ he said. ‘I know it’s not right. I know there’s nothing in it that’s a credit to me. But what that fella sees fit to put her through.’

‘We don’t deserve them, do we?’ Bimbo said. ‘Our mothers.’

‘We don’t,’ said the man with the club. He tucked the driver under his arm, took out his wallet, flicked through it.

‘Here,’ he said to the first man, ‘have you a twenty?’

‘What?’ said the first man.

‘Have you a twenty? Give it here.’

The first man made a face, but complied. The man with the club took the twenty, added a twenty of his own and handed the money over to Mikey.

‘The next round,’ the man with the club said. ‘Derek, I’m sorry I took Daddy’s club to you.’

‘I’m sore all over,’ Derek said.

‘I’m afraid that can’t be helped now.’

The two men left.

‘Well, now,’ Bimbo said.

‘Wasn’t that very good of them,’ Moira said, nodding at the money in Mikey’s hand.

‘Come up here, young fella,’ Rory said, extending a hand to the young man still on his back on the floor. Derek accepted and Rory hauled him up on to his feet.

‘You look as shook,’ Moira said to Derek.

‘Mikey, will you run this man a big glass of water,’ Rory said. ‘When you’re shook you need to hydrate.’

‘If you are peckish, I’ve a heap more toasties in the fridge,’ Mikey said.

‘I have no appetite on me,’ Derek said.

‘Well done, the Alps boys,’ Peader Ginty said.

‘Aye, well done on not getting your heads cracked open, much as you were trying,’ Softly said.

‘Softly,’ Denise said, ‘shut up.’

‘What?’ Softly said.

‘The Alps boys put themselves on the line for that oddball of a young fella,’ Denise said. ‘He was getting a beating and they saved him from much worse. And what did you do? Pegged the keys to your Mondeo into the night like a child. That goon was right about you.’

‘I didn’t heed a thing that goon was saying about me.’