Matilda Green, the woman with her heart set on me, is coming at me from all angles. I have successfully avoided her now for more than a week, having taken a few days off from the depot and my usual cycling route; she just couldn’t ‘bump into me on the road’ as she is wont to do.

Every day, on my way to or from the depot – and some days going to and from work – she would appear on her high Nellie out of side-road, boreen or gap .

“Well isn’t this a coincidence?” she’d say, as she came at me broadside. “What a lovely day for a cycle and what a joy to have such good company.”

I’d be ready to turn my bike into the ditch to get away from her, but one look at the briars and nettles waiting to greet me quickly disabused me of that course of action.

However bad Matilda is, being scraped and stung by briars and nettles was even less preferable to putting up with her chirruping.

Todd phoned me to say that she has passed by the depot every morning I’ve been away, standing on the pedals and craning her head to see if there was any sign of me.

I still haven’t told the Mother about her. I know I mentioned last week that I was seriously thinking of pressing the nuclear button and telling her, but I’m keeping that option in reserve until things get completely desperate.

As luck would have it, the day before I was to return to work in the depot the county manager asked me if I’d represent the council at a conference in Killarney on rural depopulation.

Moll Gleeson was supposed to go but pulled out. I was glad to oblige, it would take me completely out of circulation for a few days and give me time to think.

I told the manager I’d be delighted to attend and, in a moment of weakness, I explained how I was trying to avoid this woman and the conference couldn’t have happened at a better time for me.

“Maurice,” says he, “I’m not so sure about this. Are you the right man at all to send to a conference aimed at tackling rural depopulation? A man that’s doing his utmost to avoid the mating game is not going to do much for increasing the population.”

“With all due respects, manager,” says I, “neither my good self nor the woman showing a keen interest in me have much to offer in the field of population expansion. The future in that regard is far behind the pair of us.”

I agreed to go to the conference in Killarney and he agreed to send me – despite my poor form in the fertility stakes.

I enjoyed the two days in the Kingdom. The grub was top-drawer fare, the social interaction was superb, but I slept through most of the proceedings.

There’s nothing like graphs and charts and well-meaning academics talking in circles to send me to slumberland.

From what I could gather (during the bits where I managed to stay awake) there are too many people of my vintage and that of Matilda Green in rural areas all over Europe, with the result that the population is in reverse.

If only Matilda could find a reverse gear for herself I’d be very happy. I’m quite content to leave the expansion of the rural population to people with the energy and inclination for it. I’m gone beyond it.

I took the scenic route home from Kerry in the hope that by the time I got back the heat would be gone out of Matilda and she might even have found another man.

I arrived in Killdicken with a plan in my head to tell the Mother and face Matilda down.

When I got to the house, things had taken a turn for the bad – and they got worse.

There were more flowers in our front porch than you’d find at the Chelsea Flower Show and enough cards to entitle me to shares in the fortune of Helen Steiner Rice.

The Mother greeted me with a smirk: “There’s someone somewhere with a bad dose of it for you. I’m worn from watering flowers for you. It’s a good job the water charges weren’t introduced or I’d be broke.”

“There’s something we must talk about,” says I, “put on the kettle and we’ll have the tay.”

“Oh, there’s fresh tea in the pot,” says she. “The latest member of our book club just dropped in with a copy of our book for next week. She’s in the sitting room. I’ll introduce you. Come in.”

I followed her in. “Maurice, this is Matilda Green. Matilda, this is my son, Maurice.”

Sweet Jesus, ’twould be an ease if God took me. CL