“I had nothing to do with it,” Noreen said, turning from the corner. The words came tripping from her mouth, one stumbling over the next. “I promise, I tried to stop it, I told her not to do it, but she wouldn’t listen to me. I had no—”

“Shut up!” Ivan sprang to his feet and crossed the room to Noreen with a speed that belied his size and age. “Get back in that corner.”

He shoved her into the space where the walls met, put his free hand to the back of her head and pushed her face hard into the gap.

“Don’t you say another word till you’re spoken to.”

Ivan turned back to Joy, walked behind her, trailing the belt buckle across the floor. Joy realised her bladder needed release.

“Please, I want the toilet,” she said.

“You can hold it,” Ivan said. “Look at that boy there.”

George lifted his chin from his chest. He could not hold Joy’s gaze.

“You promised that boy you’d make a home with him, and he believed you. He’s a fool, but I’m not. Now tell him the truth.”

Joy swallowed, kept her eyes on George, and said, “That is the truth. I’m going to make a home with him and be his wife. We’re going to be a family. Him and me and wee Mary.”

A smile broke on George’s face, blood dripping down his chin. “See? I told you.”

“Shut your stupid mouth,” Ivan said.

The smile fell from George’s lips. Ivan stepped up close behind Joy, and she felt his breath on her ear.

“Tell him the truth. Tell him what was going to happen the minute he took you and the child out of here.”

Joy shook her head, felt the sharpening ache of her bladder. “He’s buying that farm in Waringstown. Mary and me are going to live there with him. We’re going to be a family. Please, can I go to the toilet?”

“Tell him the truth.”

“That is the truth. I promise. Can I go to the—”

“Tell him the truth. Tell him you’d leave him before you even set foot in that place, and you’d take the child with you.”

“No,” Joy said, “I wouldn’t, I promise.”

“Tell him!”

“No, I swear to—”

She heard the belt crack the air, felt it wrap around her buttocks, the buckle digging into her thigh. As her knees betrayed her, so did her bladder, and she fell to the floor as urine trickled down her legs.

“Tell him! Tell him!”

He swiped the belt across her back once, twice, three times, and the pain flooded her mind like a red river.

“Tell him the truth!”

Joy turned her face up to look at him. “I swear to God I—”