‘No. I haven’t heard from him in a while.’

‘That’s a relief. I kept telling him there was nothing to be gained by what he was doing.’

Not only was it a relief, it was a surprise. Tess knew how tenacious Conor could be. It was unlike him to let something drop. Back in the summer, her mother had phoned to say he’d been nosing around the garda station in Templemorris. In recent months, however, she’d heard nothing.

‘I thought he’d be here today,’ she said. ‘Flan did too. He rang at the last minute to say he was busy. Money-laundering, or something.’

‘Oh. I didn’t know. Like I say, I haven’t really been talking to him.’

‘Here, you didn’t fall out, did you?’

‘No, no, nothing like that,’ said Tom, his voice too brisk.

Once again, Tess sensed there was more going on than she knew. She was about to ask when Haulie arrived.

‘How’s Conor?’ he said. ‘I heard he’s back at work.’

‘Good, as far as I know. They’re allowing him to take it fairly easy.’

‘I hope he hasn’t returned too soon.’

‘He’s well able to look after himself,’ said Tom.

Haulie raised a substantial eyebrow. ‘No offence, Tommo, but that’s not true. If it was, the lad wouldn’t have got himself shot.’

Late in the afternoon, Tess found herself beside Emmet and Helen Minogue. As was her way, she gave Emmet her best supermodel smile. After all these years, she should be indifferent towards the man who’d turned her away from his house. She should be too mature too care. But she wasn’t. She wanted to say, ‘You see this navy blazer, Emmet? It’s Alexander McQueen. Now, that mightn’t mean a lot to you. But it was very, very expensive. I store it in the dressing room of my listed mansion where I live with my multi-millionaire husband and my impeccably mannered daughter.’ Thankfully, she wasn’t quite drunk enough to come out with any of this. She reminded herself that Nina’s mother had been complicit in Emmet’s behaviour, yet for some hard-to-pin-down reason she was easier to forgive.

‘It’s a shame Nina isn’t here,’ said Helen, choosing to forget that a quarter of a century had passed since her daughter and Tess had been friends. ‘She’d love to see you.’