She was struck by another thought. Her mother had told Hugh that Eliza had been killed in an accident. What would Jeannie have told her on her eighteenth birthday? Would she have given her false information about her father, to stop her from going in search of him? To stop exactly what had just happened with Sheila? Or would Jeannie have told the truth, told her exactly who her father was? That his name was Hugh Foley. That he was her friend Emmet’s father. That she had told him Eliza was dead so she would never have to share her with him.

Eliza had come to Ireland hoping for answers. She now had more questions than ever before.

They were coming closer to the mountains now. The road began to rise ahead of them. They seemed to pass quickly from suburbia, from occasional large houses to this wild scenery. All around them were the Wicklow Mountains, bare at first sighting, but then their colours and textures became obvious. It was wild heather, she realised. In colours that reminded her of tweed, mossy greens, browns, flashes of yellow, even red.

The road was like a mountain track. No lines. No kerbs. It felt like they had it to themselves. They’d passed just one other car. She saw a lake, down deep in a valley, silver-blue in the light. The sky around them was filled with clouds, but patches of blue were appearing. Those shafts of light again. In the distance, darker areas of the deepest green. Forests. Further in the distance, more mountains, including a small triangular one, distinctive among the smoother waves of the others.

She’d never pictured herself in Ireland. Never imagined anything like this happening. She wanted her mother. She wanted Jeannie to explain everything to her. She needed to hear it. All of it.

Her father was a married man. A married Irish man. He had wanted to meet her.

The tears returned suddenly. The tears, the sorrow, the shock and the grief again. That grief that would never ever go away. All of it rose up inside her. She started sobbing, there in the car beside Lawrence. Crying so hard that it felt like she would never be able to stop.

‘Eliza?’

She couldn’t answer him. She didn’t know what to say. She didn’t trust herself to speak.

She felt the car stop. Felt the buffeting wind. She undid her seatbelt. She would get out. Walk. Try to stop these tears, that seemed to be coming from deep inside her —

The cold outside took her by surprise. The wind felt like ice. She leaned against the car, trying to catch her breath now, feeling her chest tighten. Her coat was on the back seat, but she couldn’t reach in and get it. She didn’t know what to do. She had no idea what she should do any more.