Waiting on seismic shift to begin long journey into political unknown

Bairbre de Brun effectively was telling the world in English, Irish and French-language interviews that Sinn Fein had jumped, but that David Trimble had remained on the edge of the precipice waving, "Bye bye, Gerry."

There was a lot of talk of shifting positions yesterday. Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern were on a mission to shift David off the cliff and down with Gerry Adams into the great political unknown of trust and political co-operation.

Jeffrey Donaldson and Willie McCrea stood together chatting amiably beside the tented media village outside Castle Buildings, Stormont, near where Bairbre was talking to the planet.

Here was a sense of kindred spirits, from opposite unionist parties - Ulster Unionist and DUP - but anti-Belfast Agreement in the soul.

Day Four and journalists were wondering would we again see night softening into dawn. "Are you here for the duration, Jeffrey?" asked one hack.

"Depends what comes after the duration," said Jeffrey. Which was a good answer.

That's what everybody wanted to know: would the end bring a deal or a disaster? At the time of writing it was another day older, a lot more weary, but not much wiser.

Journalists were talking to politicians, and politicians were talking to journalists. And as Tony Blair's chief-of-spin Alistair Campbell said, "Very few wandering around here know what is going on." He may have been including Jeffrey and Willie in that observation. Certainly Jeffrey wasn't giving much away, but at least we knew he wasn't going to provide a launching pad for David Trimble if he wanted to jump with Gerry Adams.

Inside Castle Buildings we were told the squeeze was on David Trimble. Tony Blair was talking of "seismic shifts" in political thinking, particularly from republicans. How about a little earthquake from the UUP? But it was obvious that Jeffrey didn't want David to make much of an impression on the Richter Scale of compromise.

And that was where the deadlock was last night. Close to a deal - so close, said Alistair Campbell, that the public when they learned the detail would not be able to understand why the two sides couldn't crack it - but equally close to a collapse.

Listening to Sinn Fein politicians argue the toss with their UUP counterparts at press interviews and on TV and radio was listening to an old record stuck in a groove. You know our proposals, said Sinn Fein. Yes, but they're not on paper, said the UUP. You know our proposals. Yes, but they're not on paper . . .

The hope was that some time in the dark night or early hours of the morning there would be a real shift. Ian Paisley the previous day had expressed confidence that God would answer his prayers that the agreement would fold. Yesterday he wasn't so sure. Even John Taylor was a little more optimistic. Chances of a deal? "Ten per cent," said Mr Taylor, up 13 points from Wednesday night's position of minus 3 per cent.