He adjusted the umbrella; she didn’t appear to notice.

‘Batty, of course, but at least he did do something. How awful, how truly awful to think that you might die without doing anything, leaving anything memorable.’ She pulled at his sleeve with her fingers.

‘Yes,’ he answered.

‘That is why I wasn’t contemplating the terminal jump the other day.’

‘I didn’t really think you were.’

‘You gave the impression …’

‘You took the impression …’

She nodded. ‘Maybe. Yes. That’s the sort of thing I do.’

The rain slid from the branches above their heads, bounded from the ground below them, came at them from every direction. The umbrella, he thought, was an irrelevance. If he had been alone he would have run, splashing through the puddles, but he could see that she was moving her fastest and relying more and more on the support of his arm.

As they stood by the edge of the road waiting for a safe moment to cross, the passing cars threw greasy water in their direction. There was no longer blue to be seen anywhere and the clouds seemed to press lower and lower, now almost tangling with the branches of the trees.

She sighed. ‘God, how I long to be away,’ she said aloud but to no one in particular.

‘I’ve never been out of the British Isles,’ he said. They stepped across the water running by the pavement and made their way over the road. Several cars had switched on their sidelights and the reflections flickered on the wet road.

‘Caitlin,’ he said, and then stopped. Clara looked at him. His lips were firmly buttoned. She hustled him down the laneway that he had been unable to find earlier.

All three of them shook themselves once they were in her tiny hall, dog, man and woman. Clara laughed and then took their coats and hung them on hooks behind the door.

‘How silly we look, shaking ourselves like that – not Pansy, of course.’

Pansy wagged her tail on hearing her name.

‘Who is Caitlin? Come into the kitchen. I’ll put the kettle on.’

He wanted to say no one, which was of course true, but thought how unfair that would be and anyway, this woman wouldn’t let him get away with that. She had an Aga. Caitlin had always wanted an Aga. She pushed the large kettle onto the hotplate, then bent down and rubbed at Pansy with a drying-up cloth.

‘Mud,’ she muttered. She stood up, red in the face from stooping and looked at him. ‘Sit down, man. For heaven’s sake sit down and tell me who Caitlin is.’

‘She’s dead.’

He pulled a chair out from the table and sat down. She threw the muddy cloth across the room.

‘Oh. I’m sorry. I—’

‘She always wanted to travel. Circumnavigate the world. We would have one day.’ He laughed harshly. ‘That’s what I always said. “One day. One day. Next year. Leave it a while, love, till we’re on our feet.” This is as far as I’ve got. Dublin’s fair city.’