Neither would she have been able to keep a secret like Tom. She thought of the days after Father Galvin’s death, when the village had been convulsed by what had happened. She thought of the hullabaloo in the papers and on the TV. Tom’s head must have been in turmoil, yet he hadn’t said a word. And in later years – when Julian Heaney had arrived, when Nina had cheated on him, when the documentary had been shown – he had maintained his silence. How he’d managed it, she would never know.

True, Tess had said little about her mother’s rape, but she’d always felt like it wasn’t her tale to tell.

For a little while, they sat in the gloom, the four of them together again. Tess’s tiredness returned. She longed for her bed, not that she’d be able to sleep. She wanted to be at home in Willowthorpe with Miles. She wanted Daisy in the next room so she could kiss her soft hair and inhale her gorgeous Daisy smell.

Tom sighed. ‘You must be wondering what I’m going to do.’

‘Yes,’ she said. There was nothing to be gained by pretending otherwise. She glanced at Conor and Nina for support. Both were lost in their own worlds.

‘I won’t claim I don’t have a choice,’ he said, ‘because I do. I could brazen it out. I could turn up in the morning and accept the promotion. I could trot up to the Park, shake hands with the president and pose for the photos. I could do the job, working like crazy so that, when the end did arrive, the pundits would say I wasn’t the worst of all time, that I’d done the state some service. Still, they’d insist, I’d committed a grave error and had to go. For a short while, I’d be in disgrace. I’d be on every front page and all over Twitter. But six months later – no, six weeks later – I’d be forgotten. I’d be yesterday’s scandal.’

‘I’m sorry, Tom,’ said Tess, ‘I don’t follow you.’

‘What I’m saying, Tessy, is that I’m going to resign. I’ll call my colleagues first thing in the morning. Then I’ll go and see the taoiseach. There are other considerations, but I won’t worry about them tonight.’

Nina rearranged herself in the leather chair. ‘You don’t have to step down.’

‘I do,’ said Tom. ‘If I don’t, I’ll spend every day waiting for the story to emerge. To use that awful phrase, I used to think I’d “come to terms” with what had happened on the night Father Galvin died … and what I did afterwards. But it’s been in my head for thirty-five years. I don’t know that it will ever go away.’

‘But—’