Her mother had Declan sit down while her grandmother stood, washing up cups in the sink, although there was a row of clean cups on the dresser. The two cats watched them from their perch.

'Mammy,' their mother said, 'maybe we shouldn't be barging in on you like this.'

'No, Lily, I was worried about you all day.' Her face, Helen could see when she turned, was as unreadable as stone. 'I'll make tea,' she said, 'and I'll make sandwiches if you like, or will you be having a meal when you go home?'

Helen could not tell whether she was pretending not to understand that they wanted to stay here in the house, or whether she genuinely believed that they were on their way to Wexford. She tried to think back to what she had said to her when she got out of the car, but she was too tired to remember.

No one answered her grandmother, who now went outside, leaving the three of them to look at each other.

'Declan,' their mother said, 'we can drive into Wexford and you and Helen can stay in my house.'

He did not reply, but stared straight ahead of him. Helen wondered if he had built up a picture over days in bed of this house and the cliff and the sea and now the sight of it had disappointed and depressed him. He looked miserable.

Her grandmother came in with a bucket and left it down beside the sink. She filled the teapot from the kettle, once more turning her back to them. Declan closed his eyes and sighed. Her mother glanced sharply at Helen.

'Granny,' Declan said, 'they've let me out of hospital for a few days and I thought of coming down here and looking out at the view, and staying for a few days, but maybe it's too much for you.'

His grandmother turned and looked towards the window. 'Declan,' she said, 'you can always come down here. There's always a bed for you. Let us have a cup of tea first, and then we'll make sure you're all fixed up.'

By half-past nine they had been assigned beds. It was arranged that Declan would have the room he and Helen had shared all the years before, which gave on to the front of the house. Helen would have the room behind and her mother would have one of the upstairs rooms.

Some of Declan's medicine had to be put in the fridge; his grandmother made space for it, and they watched, half fascinated, half repelled, as Declan attached a small plastic container to a tube which ran directly into his chest. He went through his pills and took four of them with a glass of water.

'Granny, the doctor says I'm allergic to cats. It's not a problem as long as they don't come near me.'

'Oh, they stay up there if I have visitors, so I don't think they'll be troubling you.'

'I'm sure it's not a problem,' Declan said.

'Look at them, they know we are talking about them,' his grandmother said.

As darkness fell, Helen drove her mother into Wexford.

'She doesn't want us here,' Helen said as they came near Blackwater.

'Oh that's just pretence and nonsense,' her mother said. 'She likes company, you know.'

'She doesn't want us here,' Helen said again.

They remained silent until they reached the other side of Curracloe.

'How long have you known about Declan?' her mother asked.

'Since yesterday. I told you.'

'I mean, how long have you known that he had friends like Paul?'

'Like what?' Helen asked.

'You know like what.' Her mother sounded irritated.

'I've always known.'

'Don't be so stupid, Helen.'

'I've known for ten years, maybe more.'

'And you never told me?'

'I've never told you anything,' Helen said firmly.

'I hope nothing like this ever happens to you.'

'You sound as though you hope it does.'

'If I meant that, I would say it.'

'Oh you would, all right.'

They drove along the quays in Wexford until they came to Helen's mother's car. She did not speak before she got out; she banged the door as she left as though in temper and walked to her car. She drove towards Rosslare, Helen fallowing close behind, and then turned into a maze of side roads for several miles. Even the indicator of her car was in a rage, Helen felt.

Until she turned into her mother's driveway, Helen did not know that the house had a view of the sea, a view even clearer than her grandmother's because the house stood on higher ground. They were closer here to Tuskar; its beam skimmed across the front of the house as Helen stopped the car. Her mother went into the house without paying her any attention, so Helen waited in the car for her to come out again. Declan had told her that the house was grand and had cost a fortune, but it looked to her like an ordinary, detached bungalow with a tiled roof. It was the site, she thought, that must have cost a fortune.

In the dark she could only vaguely make out the line of horizon in the dwindling light. She realised that the house would catch the sun first thing in the morning. She wondered why her mother had not put more glass in the front of the house. The beam of the lighthouse came again and washed over her.

Her mother emerged now with her two arms full of sheets and pillows and put them in the back of her car, still ignoring Helen. Helen wondered if she should drive back to Cush and let her mother follow whenever she wanted, but she realised that a certain curiosity was now tempting her to go into the house. She opened the door of the car and was surprised by the stillness, the pure silence here, not a breath of wind, and the sea too distant, for its roar to be heard. Her mother came out again with duvets; she almost bumped into her at the door.

'I'll need your help with the mattress,' she said brusquely.

The hallway and the bedroom to the right seemed ordinary, like rooms in any new house, but it was the room on the left which caught Helen's attention: it was, she thought, more than thirty feet long, like an art gallery rather than a living-room, with white walls and pale parquet floors and high ceilings with roof windows. In the middle was an enormous fireplace, and the end wall – the gable wall of the house \a151 was all glass. It seemed barely credible that her mother could live alone here.

When her mother came upon Helen looking at the room, she brushed past her.

'What an amazing house!'

'Helen, we have to get the mattress out of the small bedroom.'

Helen ignored her and walked into the room, noting an armchair and a sofa and a television in one corner, but aware more than anything of the emptiness in the room. And then it struck her what the room looked like; it resembled her mother's offices on the top floor of the building in Wexford. It also had a high-beamed ceiling and the same roof-lights, the same cool austerity. It must have been done, she thought, by the same designer. She wondered if there was another smaller, cosier room where her mother could sit in the evenings and at weekends, but she realised as she went back into the hall that there were only two bedrooms, a kitchen and a bathroom. There were no other rooms.

Her mother came into the hallway pulling a mattress. 'Are you going to stay there gawking?' she asked.

'I can't get over your house,' Helen said.

'We can put the mattress on the roof-rack. I have a thing that -will tie it down.'

'It would be nice to bring a lamp that we could put beside the bed for him,' Helen said.

'God, that house in Cush is depressing,' her mother said. She went into her own bedroom and unplugged a bedside lamp. 'Will he need anything else?' she asked. 'He seemed very sick just there when we were going. I can hardly bear to look at him.'

'I think he's happier now that you know the whole story,' Helen said.

'I hope it doesn't rain on the mattress,' her mother interrupted.

They carried the mattress out to the car. In the darkness, they could see the row of lights at Rosslare, and when the lighthouse flashed, it was like a moment from a film as they were caught in its glare. They tied the mattress to the roof-rack and put the lamp in the boot.