‘You must be aware of the things people say …’ she all but whispered.

‘I don’t care what people say,’ I answered, at normal volume.

(No. I don’t actually care. Not a jot. And if I keep on saying it – firmly, out loud, quietly, in my head – then maybe I’ll even start to …?)

‘Because as an artist he naturally had carte blanche to travel to and fro across the border without attracting that much attention to himself,’ she reasoned. ‘And he never made any secret of the fact that he was an active supporter of the IRA—’

‘I’m not sure that he was a supporter,’ I interrupted, unable (despite my best efforts) to hold my tongue. ‘He was always very vocal in his opposition to the policy of internment without trial in the North. Perhaps that was a mistake. He attracted a lot of negative attention to himself. But I think he thought all topics were fair game in the realm of art. He just wanted to … to broaden the discussion. He said he always felt like everything was so … so stuck. So formalized. Into sides. Into teams. And art is fluid. It loves to cross boundaries. It can move people – intellectually, emotionally – in unexpected ways. It stands outside. It provokes questions. So it wasn’t really a matter of taking sides – not at all – just another way of expanding the …’ What was the word he’d always used? That favourite word of Bran’s? ‘… discourse,’ I finished off, somewhat clumsily.

Mrs Meadows didn’t respond directly, just lifted Mr Huff’s pyjama bottoms to her nose and inhaled, deeply.

‘And apparently,’ I added (slightly disgusted), ‘he and his wife were constantly being harassed by the army and the police when they crossed the border. Partly because they were a mixed-race couple, which was quite unusual in Ireland at that time.’

‘Surely it can’t have been purely a coincidence, though,’ Mrs Meadows persisted, ‘that the child should suddenly have a spate of strange warning “visions” just prior to a bomb being planted several streets from where her father was at work?’

‘It was placed outside a café where he often ate his lunch.’ I shrugged. ‘Maybe the bomb was about his work?’

‘But he had Republican sympathies.’

‘He was a lapsed Catholic, yes, and a “radical”, but not formally a Republican …’ I paused, glancing over my shoulder, suspecting that I’d just heard the latch clicking shut on the door from the back porch. ‘I found you a pencil and some paper …’ I held them out. ‘Should we …?’

I indicated towards the front room.

Mrs Meadows took the pencil and paper and placed them down on to the counterpane. ‘The child had obviously been party to something,’ she muttered, folding up Mr Huff’s pyjama bottoms, then shoving them under his pillow, ‘and ended up confiding the details to her local priest. Which was the right thing to do, under the circumstances. She saved many lives. But the father was definitely involved.’