As the recording goes on you can see Bernard’s dawning realisation that his preciousNorthsidecareer, the one he sacrificed his personal life for, is falling apart. And not on his terms. Despite everything he’s done to me, to Art, to Honoria, to all of us, I kind of feel sorry for him.
But notthatsorry.
When the recording ends Triona says, ‘Can you explain this, Bernard?’
Bernard opens his mouth and stares first at Gina, who looks slightly stunned as she puts her phone away, and then at me and Art.
‘You!’ He points at us with a trembling finger. ‘You two musthave put Gina up to this. You’ve been plotting against me from the start.’
Art shakes his head. ‘We really haven’t.’
I look at him, the pathetic little tyrant who almost broke my spirit.
‘I was so happy when you first called me,’ I say. ‘I never wanted things to turn out like this.’
‘No one did,’ says Triona sternly.
Then Bernard says, ‘All you cunts will be hearing from my lawyers,’ and walks off the set, and I stop feeling sorry for him at all.
For a moment we all stare after him and then everyone starts talking at once.
‘Did Gina just save the show?’ I say, and before Art can answer, Triona Clancy appears by our side and says, ‘We need to talk.’
Unsurprisingly, Triona does not approve of the whole guerrilla soap-opera shoot.
‘If you’d presented me with these scenes after the fact, we would have had to think very hard about letting them air,’ she says, after leading us off the hospital set and onto the exterior part of the lot. ‘What you did was completely unacceptable. You do know that, don’t you?’
‘We do, and we’re very sorry,’ says Art, impressively humbly. ‘But we knew Bernard was up to something. And we felt we had to do something to save the show from him.’
‘We believe inNorthside,’ I say. ‘We know how important it is.’
‘We’ll talk more about this later,’ says Triona. ‘But for now … well, I suppose I should let you keep shooting.’
‘Thanks so much,’ says Art. ‘We’ll give you something great. I promise.’
‘I think you’ll make the viewers very happy,’ says Triona. ‘But next time you have any last-minute ideas for an episode, come to me and Susan first.’
And before we can reply, she walks away.
‘Well,’ I say, ‘at least we’re not fired.’
Art grins at me. ‘We’re definitely not fired.’
I smile back at him. ‘So I suppose we’ll be starting on those new scripts next week after all.’
‘Looks like it,’ says Art.
‘Want to weld some of the widgets with me?’ I say.
‘McDermott,’ says Art, slipping his arm around my waist as we walk back to the hospital set, ‘there is nothing I’d like more.’
Chapter Twenty-Eight
ONE MONTH LATER
INT: DONNELLY’S PUB / EXT: CHARLEMONT STREET
I’ll always remember where I was when Ma Cusack made her triumphant return to Charlemont Street.