‘Oh, I’ll always come home to Belmullet,’ said Dana. ‘It’s easy enough on the boat, and besides, it’s a holiday for me, but I will never leave Liverpool now. I love nursing, I can’t imagine ever giving it up.’

The road was straight and the night clear. Dana had stayed to eat with the Malones, at Rosie’s insistence, and not another word had been mentioned about her faux pas in the post office. It was clear to Dana, however, that Michael had not been informed that Mary Kate’s secret was out of the bag.

‘You’ll be wanting to come home at some point though, to marry a good Irish boy. That’s a big farm your daddy has and he’s not getting any younger.’

Dana averted her gaze and looked out of the window as she replied, keeping her tone even. ‘Ah well, that won’t be for me, I’m afraid, Mr Malone. If I marry at all, I will definitely settle in England.’ And then she bit the bullet. ‘Mary Kate would make a grand nurse, you know. Matron and Dr Gaskell, from the hospital, they were both impressed with her, and Dr Gaskell said that they would be very lucky indeed to have someone like Mary Kate training as a nurse at St Angelus.’

Michael laughed out loud. ‘Mary Kate? She came home, Dana. In another week or so she will probably be wanting to help out in the store, and I’d be grateful for that. Like your daddy, I’m not getting any younger.’

*

She could hear his voice in her sleep, see his face, and his smile reached her heart. They were walking along the Cornish beach where they’d spent their idyllic holiday, she carrying her sandals as the wash of the waves lapped over her toes. He was calling her name, ‘Mary Kate! Mary Kate!’, but as she looked at his face it was full of horror and now he was shouting her name, running across the sand towards her, his arms outstretched. But he couldn’t reach her and she couldn’t move.

She sat bolt upright in bed, awoken from her dream, the nape of her neck damp, her heart beating rapidly. She shouted out his name, ‘Nicholas! Nicholas!’, but as she opened her eyes in the darkness it wasn’t Nicholas in front of her and there was no time to scream for help. A hand was clamped over her mouth and the smell was unbearable, the panic wild as she fought and pushed and tried with all her might to yell out, but it was no use, the adrenaline coursing through her veins and the fight that had come from nowhere had now left her. Her last memories were of a gagging in her throat, an inability to breathe, a blackness descending, and her mother’s face appearing over her, with tears running down her cheeks.

Chapter 18

Dr Gaskell and Matron were seated across the desk from the solicitor in Galway. Mr Keene had very quickly been made aware that, in Matron, he had met his match.