‘We need a goodwill gesture,’ Barr said finally. ‘Negotiations with the other side have stalled and this would be a sweetener. It could help move things along.’

Duggan smiled, slyly. ‘That’s not the only reason, is it?’

Barr looked at him blankly.

‘Uncle Sean is going for the leadership of the party, too,’ Duggan said. ‘Some of the moderates have a problem with his past. They want a goodwill gesture.’

‘Is that right?’ Tony asked, looked at Barr.

The youth returned his look, guileless, then nodded.

‘Can we drop this?’ Karen said. She had not spoken in a few minutes so they were all surprised by her intervention now. She looked down at her plate, her voice soft and without emotion.

‘What’s wrong with you?’

‘We were used thirty years ago,’ she said. ‘We’re being used again now.’ She put down her knife and fork and pushed her plate from her. ‘I’m not hungry,’ she said.

Chapter Fifteen

‘I’m not hungry, thanks,’ Karen said.

They were standing in a kitchen near Parkhead. Duggan had made good on his promise to engineer a second meeting between them after Tony had delivered the thermometers to him, as agreed. Tony had tried to restart the acquaintance with the offer of a drink, which she accepted, and some peanuts from a single desultory bowl sitting on the counter, which she’d refused.

‘Besides, do you know how many people have put their dirty paws into the middle of that?’

Tony put the bowl back, took another draught from the can he held.

‘No wine tonight?’ Karen said, nodding at his drink.

‘You were right,’ he said. ‘I felt awful the day after that last night out.’

She sipped her own wine and glanced around the room. ‘I don’t know anyone here,’ she said. ‘Apart from you. And Hugh, wherever he is.’

‘He’s not here,’ Tony said, a little bewildered. Hugh had told him Karen was going to this party and he’d invited Tony along. Now, he suspected that wasn’t entirely true.

‘Did you take the bus?’ Tony asked, immediately regretting the stupidity of it.

Karen nodded. ‘It took for ever. There was a bomb scare in the city centre,’ she said.

‘Here?’ Bomb scares had been a feature of daily life in the North, a vague distraction or a major inconvenience depending on where the bomb was planted. For a while, the favoured target had been the city’s bridge, which meant that traffic from one half of the city could not reach the other, further splitting an already divided city in half.

The sound of cheering from the living area of the flat caused them both to turn to see Hugh Duggan come in, blue bags of beer raised in his two hands. As he made his way through the room towards the kitchen, acknowledging Karen and Tony with a wink, some of the partygoers slapped him on the back.

‘He’s popular,’ Tony said.

‘Glad one of us is,’ Karen said.

‘Are you OK?’

She nodded, leaning towards him, placing her hand on his arm, her little finger electrifying the skin of his wrist where it touched just past the cuff of his shirt. ‘These types of places make me uneasy,’ she said.