After a black day for Ulster Unionism, David Trimble still seems set to become First Minister-designate in the proposed Northern Ireland Executive.
But remember these names: Peter Robinson and Jeffrey Donaldson. Remember this word: realignment. We will hear more of these in the coming weeks and months.
Gerry Adams last night hailed the combined triumph of nationalism and republicanism in Thursday's Assembly election, noting the unionist vote had "shredded".
Unionism certainly has fractured over the Belfast Agreement, its divisions laid bare last night in a furious public row between Mr Donaldson and Ken Maginnis, and in the bitter recriminations swirling around unionists wherever they gathered across Northern Ireland.
While the business of transferring preferences continued late into the night, neither side could predict with certainty the final line-up of the parties scheduled to meet for the first time as a putative administration next Wednesday. But after the traumas of the referendum and Assembly campaigns, it seemed clear that nothing could ever be the same within "the unionist family".
Despite falling into second place behind the SDLP, with a fairly disastrous 21.3 per cent of the first-preference votes, weary strategists in the UUP headquarters at Glengall Street in Belfast remained confident the transfer process would leave them with a working majority of unionist seats in the Assembly, so ensuring Mr Trimble's successful nomination for the top post.
There was some satisfaction, too, that declared anti-agreement candidates standing under the party banner had fared less well than those who had opted for outright United Unionist opposition. But there was the grim realisation also that dark and difficult days lay ahead.
One early BBC forecast suggested the Ulster Unionists would wind up with 31 seats. Within the hour this had been revised downward. Key Trimble aides admitted this week that any outcome under 30 would be a severe psychological blow.
And those optimistic forecasts of 30-plus seats had been based on a solid expectation that the party could retain its 27.6 per cent share of the vote in last year's local government elections. After Thursday night's Irish Times/RTE exit poll, they rewrote the script, explaining that the retention of the disappointing 24.2 per cent share of the Forum vote the previous year would represent a triumph here, given the backdrop of fear and anxiety generated by the agreement, fuelled by internal party division and the outright opposition of the Orange Order.
But here they were, forced to rewrite the script again, faced with a still-worse result, the overwhelming confirmation of the effect of those divisions, and of the leadership's collective failure to advance significantly the unionist debate in the afterglow of last month's referendum vote.
Here they were, too, confronted with compelling evidence that, contrary to the immediate and successful "spin" placed on that 71 per cent Yes vote, a decisive majority of unionists had not necessarily embraced the spirit of the agreement.
Mr Bob McCartney, written off politically, was able to declare himself raised Lazarus-like. Mr John Taylor had to summon his formidable skills to dismiss the embarrassment of being topped for poll position by Mrs Iris Robinson in Strangford.
While North Antrim saw not one but two Ian Paisleys elected, the Big Man showed vintage form when he pronounced: "Today the people of Northern Ireland wrote the obituary notice of Trimbleism, and I believe today spelt the end of his leadership of anything."
It didn't, and it isn't. But the so-called "rejectionist front" has served notice on Mr Trimble that they are in business. He may expect their unyielding opposition as he seeks to implement the parts of the agreement to which they are implacably opposed.
Late on Thursday night one senior Ulster Unionist dismissed the exit poll findings, predicting that, with any majority, the agreement would "bed down" over the next four years and transform the North's political landscape. And even as he explained away yesterday's setbacks, Mr Jim Nicholson, the party's MEP and former chairman, declared on RTE that dissident MPs would have to take their share of the blame, and the party would have to review its management and disciplinary arrangements.
Some of us sitting in an adjacent studio thought it more likely that the rebels would claim credit for the leadership's embarrassment. And barely an hour later, sure enough, Mr Donaldson was on the BBC telling Mr Maginnis, who directed the party's campaign, he should hang his head in shame at the result.
Mr Trimble may have thought to effect a reconciliation when he appointed Mr Donaldson his parliamentary spokesman on the Prisoner Release (Sentences) Bill. But Mr Donaldson did not defect on Good Friday intending to secure his banishment to the Westminster wastelands, while bright young rivals won preferment in the new centre of power and influence in Belfast. Nor did he take the rejection of his candidacy for the Assembly election as a call to greater loyalty and deference to his leader.