Joe slipped into the scullery to wash himself down before going back into his room to dress. He would help Pete fix the fence just as soon as Nola had finished cooking his breakfast. He had deliberately left the family to have a few minutes’ privacy to talk. It was the fact that Nola had cried, although he recognised them to be tears of happiness, and that Seamus had blessed himself and said a little prayer, that confirmed to him that this was good news and news they should be able to appreciate alone.

When he’d finished dressing, he slid the papers that the solicitor had given him the previous evening into his drawer, pushing to the back the sheet of paper upon which was printed the deed of sale. He had bought the manor house there and then and now it was his.

While in Galway, he’d also set another plan in motion, something that had been on his mind for some time. It had not been possible to call his own firm in New York, so he had roped in Mr Keene instead. ‘If you could phone New York at your earliest convenience and tell Mr Browne to make every effort to comply with every detail of the telex I’ve just sent. Ask him to put Miss Carroll onto it. I have no doubt she will have one hundred per cent success. Miss Carroll will never give up and lets nothing defeat her.’

Mr Keene had been amused. ‘You want her to find all of them? They could be all over America.’

Joe had to admit that what he was asking for was very unusual indeed. ‘Yes, everyone. All of them. Leave no one out. I cannot be the only Malone who comes home.’

‘Good luck with your new venture, Mr Malone,’ Mr Keene had said at the conclusion of their meeting. ‘I am sure every single villager in Tarabeg will be delighted with your plans. You will transform the place.’

‘Let’s hope so,’ Joe had replied. ‘It could be that I am run out of the village, and if I am, it will have been a very expensive mistake.’ On his drive back to the village through the dark night, the first niggles of doubt had settled in his belly. Had he gone mad? He didn’t even know how to run a hotel.

With the deeds now safely hidden away, he sat on the edge of his bed, taking in the muffled sound of chatter in the kitchen and the sizzle and aroma of frying rashers seeping under his door. He would invite Mr Browne from Messrs Collins, Browne and Malone out soon enough to see the manor. He heard the laughter in the kitchen and the back door opening and closing. He wanted – no, he needed – a wife, and that was all the fault of the Malones of Tarabeg. He wanted all of this for himself: the family, the comradeship, the laughter and the love; the togetherness and the work. He lived among them, but the sheer closeness of them often made him feel alone. He loved the hand-to-mouth existence and the graft, but he had better for himself whenever he wanted. He had a way out if he chose to leave.