At last Kyna’s shoulder bumped against the embankment. Immediately the young woman was lifted off her and rose up as if she could levitate, with streams of water running from her red raincoat. Kyna tried to turn herself around, but as she did so she knocked her forehead hard against the wall, just above her left eye. For a split second her world went inky black, and she slipped down underneath the surface. She was semi-concussed and numb with cold, but she still had a tiny speck of consciousness so that she felt that sinking under the water was almost a relief. You’ve done what you set out to do, Kyna, you can rest now.

She didn’t hear the firefighter plunging into the water next to her, or realize that he was heaving her up and fastening a canvas sling around her so that she could be hoisted up the side of the embankment. She wasn’t aware that she was lifted over the railings, wrapped in a crinkly silver blanket and laid gently down on a stretcher. She didn’t feel a woman’s lips pressed against hers, giving her five deep rescue breaths.

She couldn’t feel the first thirty chest compressions, followed by two more rescue breaths, and then thirty more chest compressions. But then she spluttered, and blurted out water, and opened her eyes. Looking down at her she saw Katie, frowning with anxiety.

She opened and closed her mouth, trying to say ‘Katie’, but all she could do was cough.

‘Oh, Kyna, I thought I’d lost you. I really thought I’d lost you.’

Kyna coughed again. She was shivering violently, but she managed to say, ‘That young girl—’

‘Don’t you worry. She’s going to be fine. They’ve just taken her off to the Mercy. You saved her life, Kyna. There’s no doubt at all that she would have drowned if you hadn’t jumped in.’

Kyna tried to sit up but Katie gently pushed her back down. ‘Relax, darling. You’ve got yourself a fierce nasty debt on the forehead there. They’ll be taking you off to emergency, too, just to make sure.’

‘What about D-Doireann Greaney?’

‘Don’t you worry about her, either. She didn’t try to do a legger. I’d guess that she didn’t see the point. Just as soon as Jack had called for the blue lights he lifted her. She’s sitting right across the road there in the back of that squad car.’

‘Oh Jesus, I’m so cold. I feel like my spine’s rattling, top to tail.’

A freckly-faced woman paramedic came bustling up to them.

‘How’re you going on there, girl? We’ll be whizzing you off to the Mercy now. You might need the blood rewarming, or a hot mug of scaldy at the very least.’

Katie leaned over and kissed Kyna on the forehead.

‘There’s photographers over there,’ said Kyna.