In the kitchen her grandmother was sitting by the window looking out, with the two cats on her lap. On seeing Helen, they immediately jumped and sat on the top of the dresser, although Larry had been in the room all the while.

'Some people like cats, and cats like some people, but they're not always the same people,' her grandmother said.

'Did you buy anything in Wexford then?' Helen asked.

'Oh, we've fresh everything, fresh bread, fresh eggs, fresh fish and fresh meat. All from the supermarket. "You'd swear'', I said to Larry on the way home, "that we lived on a farm by the sea."'

Paul came and stood at the door. 'Declan says he wants to go for a short walk at Ballyconnigar. He says he wants to get being sick in the car out of his system. His mother is going to come.'

Larry and Helen agreed that they would also join the walk.

'Tell them I'll stay here,' Mrs Devereux said, 'and ask them if they want salmon or lamb chops for dinner. Explain how fresh everything is.'

Declan said he did not think he would eat much, but he'd try the salmon. The old lady came and watched as Helen, her mother and Declan got into Declan's car and Larry and Paul got into Larry's car. She waved at them as they turned in the yard.

'Helen,' her mother said from the back of the car, 'I wish you'd talk to her about looking after herself. Even getting in a proper telephone, any small thing would be a great improvement.'

'My husband says there's no getting around the women in our family,' Helen said.

'But he doesn't know us,' her mother said.

'I've told him about you,' Helen said.

Suddenly she looked up and saw her mother's face in the rear-view mirror; her eyes seemed magnified and unguarded and vulnerable, nervously watching her. She was tempted for one second to slow down and turn to see if the mirror were making her mother's eyes like that, or if they would appear like that too if she saw them directly. When Helen looked again, her mother's eyes were cast down.

They stopped in Keatings' car park in Ballyconnigar, Larry and Paul parking in the space behind them. They got out of the cars and walked across the small wooden bridge and moved south in the half-fading light. Tuskar lighthouse had started and they stood and watched as a beam circled towards them.

'There used to be two lighthouses here,' her mother said. 'I don't know what they needed the other for, but I suppose the Irish Sea was busy and bits of it were dangerous. It was just out there now \a151 no, a bit further north, towards Cush and your granny's house. Do you remember it, Helen?'

'I do, Mammy, but only when we were children.'

'It was taken out of commission by Irish Lights. I don't know exactly when,' her mother said.

'What was it called?' Paul asked.

'It was called the Blackwater Lightship. It "was weaker than Tuskar. Tuskar was built on a rock to last, I suppose. Still, I loved there being two. I suppose the technology got better, and maybe there's not as much shipping as there was. The Blackwater Lightship. I thought it would always be there.'

Slowly, they walked towards Ballyvaloo. Helen eased close to her mother. The three others moved ahead, Larry and Paul with Declan between them, quietly protecting him. Helen noticed that the beam of the lighthouse did not flash when she calculated it should. Each time she expected it to come too quickly.

'When I was young, lying in bed in your granny's house,' her mother said, 'I used to believe that Tuskar was a man and the Blackwater Lightship was a woman and they were both sending signals to each other and to other lighthouses, like mating calls. He was forceful and strong and she was weaker but more constant, and sometimes she began to shine her light before darkness had really fallen. And I thought they were calling to each other; it was very satisfying, him being strong and her being faithful. Can you imagine, Helen, a little girl lying in bed thinking that? And all that turned out not to be true. You know, I thought your father would live for ever. So I learned things very bitterly.' When Helen looked down, she saw that her mother was clenching her fists. 'If I could meet him here for one minute now, your father, you know, even if he were to be allowed to pass us on the strand here, here now, when it's nearly night. And not speak, just take us in with his eyes. If he was only to know, or see, or acknowledge with a flicker of his eyes what is happening to us. This is just morbid talk, don't mind me, but it's what I think about when I look at Tuskar lighthouse.

'We should go back now,' her mother went on, 'we're all hungry, I'm sure, and we've had a long day, Declan and myself, and I'm sure you've had a long day too.'

The five of them turned and walked back towards the small river which changed its course through the sand each year. There was no one else on the strand now; it was too late for walkers or bathers, and theirs were the only cars in the car park. Helen was surprised when Declan travelled with his friends and left her alone with her mother. He must have been talking to their mother about her, she thought, must have been trying to bring them together. They were together now, Helen thought, and it was awkward. She started the car and then waited for Larry's car to start up. She moved slowly behind it, the lights full on, and they drove back towards Cush as the night settled down.

As soon as she got back, Helen grew restless and wondered if she could find an excuse to drive back to Dublin now. This new softness in her mother was impossible to resist. She felt that her mother was waiting to approach her again with a soothing voice and a tone of easy intimacy. She could not bear it. She took the keys of Declan's car, slipped out of the house and drove into Blackwater.

She dialled Hugh's number from the callbox in the village. When his mother answered the phone, Helen's asking for Hugh was so urgent that she called him immediately and did not make conversation.

'Are things all right?' Hugh asked.

'No, they're not. I'm desperate to get out of here.'

'How's Declan?' he asked.

'There's no change.'

'The boys are fast asleep,' Hugh said.

Tt was mad me not going with you. I'll never do that again. I don't think I can leave them like that again.'

'Helen, it's just a few days.'

'How can you tell whether they're all right or not?'

'Of course I can tell,' Hugh said. 'They're fine. They're on their holidays. They know they'll see you soon.'

'When my father was sick, they all thought it was OK to leave us down here too.'

'There's one big difference,' Hugh said. 'I'm their father, I'm with them. You're talking about them as though I don't exist. I'm looking out for them all day.'

Helen listened and said nothing.

'What you have to do,' Hugh continued, 'is imagine how it would have been all those years ago if your father had been with you. And you mustn't sound worried when you talk to the boys, or they'll get worried too. At the moment they haven't a bother on them. And if there were the slightest problem, I'd tell you.'

'Maybe it's myself I'm worried about. Maybe I'm just afraid to tell you that.'

'I'm here all the time and I'll come down if you want me to, even just for a day.'

'The worst part of it is that my mother is going all soft on me.'

'That sounds like good news.'

'Stop making everything seem good.'

'What are you going to do? Are you going to stay?'

'I'll stay for another day,' she said. 'And I'll call you again in the morning. It's good to talk to you.'