Jim handed her a glass of wine and asked what else they had done in Dublin. Victor let out a disparaging chortle, his eyes smirking at Jim over the lip of his glass. Cushla’s face felt hot as she told them about the play and the walk around Trinity and the dinner. She didn’t tell them the hotel was like a seminary and that she heard what saudade sounded like in the back room of a bar. She excused herself and went to the downstairs loo. The toilet bowl was ornate, the original mahogany seat corroded by decades of piss. Shelves that ran the length of the opposite wall were stacked with literary magazines and books on gardening and DIY. A box of lily bulbs had begun to sprout, green shoots protruding through the seams of the cardboard, giving off a funereal scent. She washed her hands and saw in the mirror what they saw. A dalliance, someone not to be taken seriously.

Cushla heard her name as she put her hand on the kitchen door. Victor was sitting with his arms folded, looking chastened. She couldn’t bear to imagine what he had said. She lifted her wine, but an undulating dread was washing through her. Where the hell was Michael? She put the glass back down.

It was almost ten when he arrived, apologising to Penny, asking how the evening had been. He sat heavily and found Cushla’s hand under the table. Sorry, he mouthed at her.

Hard day at the office, darling? said Jim, as he filled Michael’s glass. It sounded jovial but he looked concerned.

You could say that, he said, lowering the wine as if it was water.

Penny took a shepherd’s pie from the warming oven and placed a bottle of HP sauce beside it. Michael lit a cigarette, drawing hard on it while she loaded food on to plates and passed them around.

Jim said a poet friend of theirs had sent a draft of his new collection to his publisher. His editor said they were war poems.

Do you think this is a war? Victor said.

If it’s not, I’d love someone to tell me what it is, said Michael. His hand was still on Cushla’s. With his free one he refilled his glass.

The government is talking about it as a law and order issue, said Victor.