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and exited.
    Amiss looked at the baroness, who was in a reverie. ‘Do you get the feeling that we’ve a lot to learn?’
    She shook her head. ‘Not fundamentally, I think. Just the small print. The fact is that Paddies are always up to sharp practices.’ She smacked her lips. ‘Enough of that. If my sources are accurate we’re about to have the best wild duck in these two islands.’ She raised her glass of Sancerre. ‘I’ve feeling that our Irish trip will continue to be memorable.’

Chapter Four
    Cullally Hall was a Georgian gem.
    ‘Satisfactory?’ asked the baroness as the porter carried their bags up the staircase.
    ‘Wonderful.’
    ‘I felt I owed you something good after last night. Now, sort yourself out and we’ll meet in the bar in an hour. You’ll have time for a bath.’
    The porter delivered Amiss to a room full of rugs and prints and comfortable chairs. ‘You can plug your modem in there, sir.’
    Amiss tipped him, disinterred his laptop, plugged it in, dialled up his e-mail connection and waited in trepidation.
    ***
    ‘One hundred and twenty-nine bloody messages! One hundred and fucking twenty-nine!’
    ‘I’m not surprised you’re late. You should have just ignored them. Have a drink.’ She summoned the bartender. ‘He needs champagne.’
    ‘Do I?’
    ‘Judging by your face you do. What’s up?’
    ‘I won’t weary you with all the cancellations and changes except to tell you that this conference seems doomed to complete pointlessness. The southern Irish are melting away like flies on the dimmest excuses, the English are sending ever fewer and more junior representatives and all the big political names are sending substitutes. I knew I should have stayed in London.’
    ‘What could you have done?’
    He shrugged. ‘Nothing, I suppose. But I could have tried.’
    ‘Here’s the champagne. Drown your sorrows.’
    Amiss took a grateful sip. ‘But there’s worse.’
    ‘More MOPEery?’
    ‘Yup.’
    ‘What do they want this time?’
    ‘It’s not so much what they want. It’s what they’ve got.’
    ‘From your obliging friends Crispin and Roddy, no doubt?’
    ‘From everyone, really. Judging by the correspondence I’ve been copied, at every stage there was a little token resistance and then the British and Irish officials took it in turns to cave in first.’
    She drained her glass, grabbed the bottle from the ice-bucket and refilled both of their glasses. ‘So what have they got?’
    ‘A wheelchair.’
    ‘Are they bringing a cripple? And if so, why doesn’t he bring his own wheelchair?’
    ‘They said one of their number might need one. Hence the ramps, which the hotel is hastily installing even as we speak.’
    She shrugged. ‘Is that it?’
    ‘No. There’s been a big problem in finding someone to do sign language.’
    ‘They’re bringing someone deaf?’
    ‘They might. The problem arises because the signer has to be bilingual.’
    The baroness emptied her glass in one draught. ‘Fuck them. Let’s get pissed.’
    ***
    ‘Well, despite one spartan night, the abortive picnic and all that rain yesterday, Ireland has done us proud,’ said the baroness the next afternoon, as she drove towards a glorious sunset.
    ‘Mmmmm,’ said Amiss contentedly. ‘That was a wonderful hotel. Breakfast was even better than dinner. And lunch surpassed the two. The deprivations chez Lavinia and Grace are but a sweet, sad memory. Thank you. You’ve made amends for some of your misdeeds. And it’s a pleasure to be driven by you when you’re constrained by potholes.’
    She wasn’t listening. ‘I’m looking forward to Moycoole Castle, anyway. Haven’t seen it for thirty years, but still remember it vividly as a…’ She interrupted herself. ‘Ha! We must have crossed another boundary into the constituency of a cabinet minister.’ She put her foot down hard and the car tore along the winding road. The sickening lurch that brought Amiss to near panic was caused by her slamming