‘Aye, they are running riot at the manor. The Carter family have all left, there’s no one there. The housekeeper and the ghillie were already as drunk as lords when I came away, and everyone was having the dance of their lives. They’ve taken the captain’s body back to England on a jet plane, and while he climbs high in the sky, everyone else is pissing his wine cellar into the Taramore.’ She laughed.

‘Captain Bob, he came up from the coast with me and has gone into Paddy’s to set up a few extra barrels for when they get back. There will be no sleep in this village tonight and no work done tomorrow, I’ll bet.’

Mary Kate smiled again. That was twice in as many minutes. She remembered enough wakes and enough harvest parties to know exactly what Bee meant, and as Bee spoke, she felt a further lightening of the weight. She took a deep breath and sighed. ‘Nothing has changed then, since I left?’

‘Mother of God, no. I was gone for ten years and ’twas just the same when I got back. You would think I’d been up to Galway for a bit of fancy shopping for all the fuss anyone made.’

‘That’s good to hear. Do you think it will be the same for me?’

Bee looked Mary Kate in the eyes and held her gaze for a moment. ‘No, Mary Kate, not at all. For one thing, you left a girl and you have returned a woman.’

Mary Kate blushed. They both knew exactly what Bee meant.

‘And another is that you are Mary Kate Malone and no matter how much you try and slip back into the ways of Tarabeg, you won’t be able to. Jesus wept in heaven, Mary Kate, would you just look at you. Those boots you are wearing, they will attract more admirers than Father Jerry can get through the door into Mass on a Palm Sunday. There’s no heather in your hair or holes in your frock. You won’t be running up the boreens with your shoe leather falling off and your knickers tied up with string and bits of wool you’ve cut out of your cardie. You are nothing like the people you left behind. I understand it, I lived in Liverpool, although I was glad to get back with all that was going on there, what with the modern ways and the boots like yours. I was a fish out of water – I was too old to be changing anything. But you, you are young, it’s different for you. I’m not going to lie to you, Mary Kate, your return will be the talk of the west, from here to Clew Bay.’

This was not what Mary Kate wanted to hear.

Bee pulled out a chair, sat down at the table next to her and slipped her hand over Mary Kate’s. ‘Look, no harm will come of it. You know what the place is like. You will settle back in just fine. It might take a bit of time, that’s all.’ She glanced up. ‘Have you eaten?’ she asked – the second question to fall from the lips of every woman in Tarabeg, after the first, which was always the offer of a cup of tea.