"Look, I was telling you about my friend Claire Cotter and her place, Lilac Court. The residents there are very happy-"

"You mean they don't know where they are?"

"Not so. It has a lovely garden and very good food. The people who stay there feel safe."

"Even if they do know where they are."

"They do indeed. Have a look at it, Hilary, before you dismiss it completely."

"I'm only dismissing the idea that I'd put my mother anywhere." anywhere."

"This time I'll write down the address," Clara said.

Two days later, Hilary arrived home from the hospital to find her mother behaving very oddly and apparently trying to get Nick out of the room. Nick realized, and left without protest.

"What is he doing here?" Jessica hissed.

"Who? Nick? He was getting your lunch ready while I was at work." Hilary's heart felt heavy.

"But who is is he? What's he doing in this house?" he? What's he doing in this house?"

"He's your grandson, Mother. He's Nick, my son."

"Don't be ridiculous, Hilary. You have no son. But what's that tinker boy doing here?"

"Mother, don't you remember Nick?"

"I'll tell you what I remember, I remember that he slit a hole in my handbag and took out all my money. There's hundreds of pounds gone."

"Mother, we use euros now, and in any case, you don't have hundreds of pounds or or euros," Hilary protested. euros," Hilary protested.

"I don't now," now," agreed her mother. agreed her mother.

So Hilary pulled out the address and phone number of Lilac Court and arranged to go and inspect the place. It looked fresh and clean as she was greeted at the front door by Claire Cotter. She was smartly dressed and full of warm smiles as she took some details; she put Hilary at ease straightaway.

"I want the families to feel every bit as happy and secure as our residents," she said. "Please look around, Mrs. Hickey, and go and see our facilities. We'll show you an empty bedroom, you'll see what we have to offer and then you can come and talk to me."

Hilary pa.s.sed a big, airy dining room where a number of elderly people were already having lunch. The tables had vases of flowers; some of the very elderly or infirm had helpers to a.s.sist them with their food and there was a cheerful atmosphere and a buzz of conversation. She inspected a couple of bedrooms, each with its own bathroom, then toured the bright sitting room, large enough to hold concerts but full of little alcoves where friends and family could sit and chat in privacy. There was even a small gym where they held exercise cla.s.ses.

Hilary went to have a cup of tea with Claire Cotter. Again, she was put at her ease, though she noted that while Lilac Court was comfortable for the residents, Ms. Cotter's own office was very simple. No smart furniture, no luxury carpet, just a practical place with filing cabinets and bookshelves.

Claire Cotter saw that Hilary was taking it all in. "We prefer to spend what we have making our residents comfortable and rea.s.suring their families," she observed.

Hilary allowed her first real smile of the day to escape.

"And we do know that it's never easy, Mrs. Hickey. There's never what seems a right time."

"How do other people know?" Hilary was honest.

"When they realize it's better for the other person," Claire Cotter said gently. "No one else can tell you, and no one else should put any pressure on you."

"You see, most of the time she's perfectly fine."

"And what does her doctor say?"

"I haven't really discussed it with him yet. It's only come on significantly over the last few months," admitted Hilary.

"I see. Why don't you let him talk to her? It might make us clearer about where we are."

"Thank you. I will," Hilary agreed.

This woman had calmed her down. It was possible to deal with this terrible business. She wasn't alone in the world.

The next day, her mother was calm and doing a jigsaw when the doctor arrived. He would see no symptoms and would probably think she was as sound as a bell.

Jessica thought that Dr. Green had come to see Hilary.

"She fusses too much, Doctor," Jessica confided. "Worries about work and about me and about things that will never happen. She was always the same."

Hilary looked up sharply. Something in her mother's voice had changed. She was slipping out of her normal, rational self. Hilary knew the signs now.

She was right.

She sat and listened as her mother told the doctor how sad it was that Hilary had never married. Too choosy, she had been, and too serious.

"And what about young Nick?" Dr. Green asked mildly.

"Nick? Nick? You mean that young traveler, the tinker? Let me tell you what he stole from me-I don't know why Hilary gives him the run of the house ..."

Dr. Green's report was clear. Hilary's mother had severe dementia and was going to need round-the-clock care.

The following weekend, Hilary took her mother to visit Lilac Court. Claire Cotter was there, as rea.s.suring as ever. She read the doctor's report and then the three of them toured the premises.

Jessica, in a voice as clear as it had ever been, said that she was grateful for the tea and the tour, but could she go home now, please, because she'd seen enough of this place and its strange old people. She wanted to go home now.

From that day onward, Jessica was never in the house alone.

Between them, Hilary and Nick and Ania were on duty at all times. And Gary and Lisa, the nice couple who lived in the house next door, also kept an eye out for her. Nothing could happen to her now.

Hilary began to breathe easily again. She didn't have to do what so many other people did-put a much-loved mother into an inst.i.tution because there was no longer any place for her at home.

Two weeks later, Hilary woke to hear a door banging. She got up to investigate. Her mother's door was closed and the bathroom door was closed also.

It was the hall door, wide open and hitting off the heavy marble doorstop. Her throat narrowed. Mother couldn't have opened the door, surely? They always locked it at night and the key was always kept in a vase on the hall table. With a shaking hand she picked up the vase. The key was gone.

She opened her mother's bedroom and bathroom.

Empty.

"Nick, Nick! Nick! Your gran has got out!" she called. But Nick wasn't home, it was only three a.m. He had a gig in a club and it would be in full swing now. Hilary flung on a pair of warm trousers and her coat. Your gran has got out!" she called. But Nick wasn't home, it was only three a.m. He had a gig in a club and it would be in full swing now. Hilary flung on a pair of warm trousers and her coat. Please G.o.d, Please G.o.d, may her mother not have got too far. may her mother not have got too far.

She was nowhere in the street, so Hilary ran through the freezing night air toward the main road. Who were all these people driving around at this time in the morning? As if it were a normal time to be out. She stood still and watched the traffic. Which way might her mother have gone? Impossible to know. She looked up and down the street, bewildered.

Then she saw it in the distance, the flashing lights and the Guards out on the road waving traffic past. There had been an accident.

She felt dizzy and leaned on a parked car for support. It didn't have to be Mother. There were accidents all over the place.

She began to walk with leaden feet toward the scene. A crowd had gathered and the ambulance was expected. A middle-aged couple were sitting in chairs that had been brought out of someone's house. The man was shaking all over.

"She came from nowhere, just stepped out in front of me in her nightdress. I saw her eyes. They weren't focused. She didn't know where she was. My G.o.d-can someone tell me if she's still breathing?"

The faces of the people around were offering no consolation. Hilary moved silently forward.

There was a rug over her mother's body but she could see the familiar slippers peeking out the end. She held a Guard's arm to steady herself.

"It's my mother," she said. "I know it is. Those are her slippers." Then she felt herself slipping down to the ground.

When Hilary came to, the crowd was still there. The ambulance had arrived and she saw her mother's body being lifted inside. Then a variety of hands helped Hilary in as well. She was to be treated for shock, they said.

Before they drove away Hilary said, "Could someone please tell that poor man it wasn't his fault. My mother has been suffering from dementia. He has nothing to blame himself for ..." Then she took a seat in the ambulance beside the lifeless body of her mother.

They had driven along this road two weeks ago to visit Lilac Court. Why had she not listened to everyone and put her mother in there? Jessica would have been alive and safe and none of this nightmare would be happening. It was all Hilary's fault.

She knew that she would be haunted by the thought for the rest of her days.

Declan's father organized a welcome home party in St. Jarlaths Crescent on the day that his son was eventually allowed home. They had painted the outside of the house in his honor, although Fiona knew that Declan would hardly notice all the hard work that had gone into it. She would be sure to brief him properly; he must admire the window boxes that Muttie Scarlet had planted, the smart new curtains that his mother had been sewing every night for three weeks.

"You're very good to go round there so often." He held her hand as they walked the hospital corridor together. He was off his crutches now and only needed a stick.

"But don't I love it, Declan? Your ma and I are the best of friends. I mean it-we are."

"She fusses so much, I was afraid she'd drive you crazy."

"No, how could she drive me mad? Haven't we one thing in common? We're both mad about you!" Fiona laughed.

"She means so well, but I go crazy when she tells people how important I am." Declan was struggling to be fair.

"Oh, I put her wise on that ages ago, I told her you were a great useless waste of s.p.a.ce at the center."

"You didn't?"

"Of course I didn't, you eejit. I told her the truth, which is that you are a great doctor and they are all aching for you to get back."

"My successor hasn't stolen your hearts away, then?" Declan asked, knowing well that this was not the case. The loc.u.m had been a smart aleck of a fellow whom none of them liked much.

"Stop fishing and walk straighter. You'll have to make an entrance tomorrow. Oh, and don't forget to notice that your mother has a new outfit in honor of the occasion."

"She actually spent something on herself herself ?" Declan was astounded. ?" Declan was astounded.

"Well, I got it for her, actually, in a thrift shop. She gave me the money."

"You didn't go to a thrift shop?"

"I did too!" But Fiona wasn't a good liar. "Oh, all right, I went to a shop, but there was a sale on. It looks terrific on her. She wouldn't take it unless I said it was from the Vincent de Paul."

"Who else is coming?"

"People from the clinic, some of your mates, your father's friend Muttie, his wife and those children or grandchildren who speak like aliens."

Declan laughed. "Oh, Maud and Simon. The Mitch.e.l.l twins. They were always great kids. They must be about sixteen now."

"They're seventeen. They are saving up to go abroad during the spring break; they offered to be waiters and Muttie nearly beat the heads off them for asking your ma and da for money. So they're going to help for free now."

"We can't have them doing that. I'll slip them something. They're a great pair, those two. They're no relation of Muttie and Lizzie's at all, you know."

"I didn't know. What are they doing there, then?"

"G.o.d knows-lost in the mists of time. Somebody couldn't keep them and they were cousins of Cathy's first husband ... I think."

"Cathy?"

"Now, she is is Muttie and Lizzie's daughter, I know that much. Is she coming to the party?" Muttie and Lizzie's daughter, I know that much. Is she coming to the party?"

"No, she's doing a big catering job for some boy band somewhere. Let no one say that St. Jarlaths Crescent isn't the heart of the universe!"

"I'm exhausted already and I'm not even home yet," Declan said.

"Then let's get you back to bed," Fiona said.

"I wish ..."

"Not at all-you're as frail as a day-old chick. You'd be no use to me," she said. But she said it affectionately and as if she thought the days of total recovery were not far away.

Ania had made a great banner with WELCOME HOME, DECLAN WELCOME HOME, DECLAN on it and it was strung between the two bedroom windows. The neighbors were all at their gates looking on and Paddy waved them in. on it and it was strung between the two bedroom windows. The neighbors were all at their gates looking on and Paddy waved them in.

"The lad would love to see you," he called.

Declan's mother was resplendent in a dark purple dress with a lace collar. Her hair looked different, and for once she didn't seem to be fussing. Declan could hardly take it in. There was no racing around asking people to sit here or there-she was relaxing with a gla.s.s of wine. He shook his head in disbelief.

Maud and Simon were like a courteous committee, almost as if they were representatives of another civilization. Fiona was spot-on to say they spoke like aliens: that was exactly what they did, with one starting and the other finishing every sentence.

"Everyone in St. Jarlaths Crescent wants you to feel very welcome ..." Maud beamed.

"Back to your home after your great ordeal," Simon continued.

"And to say how much the accident was regretted ..." Maud added.