John Reid is said to be determined to show that he can and will govern, writes Gerry Moriarty, Northern Editor
Mr Gerry Adams is conscious of both the word and the image. As he addressed reporters yesterday he carried strategically in his hands a copy of the Belfast Agreement with that picture of a silhouetted family of four on a hillside facing a brave new dawn.
Perhaps the Sinn Féin president thought that its subliminal effect would be of Sinn Féin standing by the agreement. Of course, the family also could have been facing a setting sun. That's the way it seemed yesterday, although most were attempting to steer away from the politics of despair.
The great hall of Parliament Buildings, Stormont, was teeming with people and activity. A stranger would have thought that here is democracy in all its vibrancy and glory. The opposite, of course, was the case.
At midnight it all came tumbling down. Ministers handed back the keys of their cars, cleared their desks and said goodbye to their drivers and civil service staff. Direct rule from London has returned, this time with a substantial input from Dublin.
Souvenir-hunters bought from the Stormont shop Assembly pens, fudge, mugs, linen and golden humbugs. Security and other staff, busy yesterday, wondered how long they would be employed there.
Today Parliament Buildings will be a hushed place. Assembly members on reduced pay and supports still have their offices for constituency work, but the executive trappings of power have shifted back down the Stormont estate to Castle Buildings, home of the Northern Ireland Office.
The Northern Secretary, Dr John Reid, has added two ministers to create a complement of five, including himself. He is said to be determined to illustrate to the local politicians who couldn't govern that he can and will.
Issues which the politicians feared confronting, such as introducing water rates and tackling sectarianism in north Belfast, are understood to be top of his agenda. A subliminal message here perhaps is that failure to work together will carry a price.
The atmosphere at Stormont was thick with recrimination. Unionists blamed republicans. Sir Reg Empey of the Ulster Unionists wondered if allegations surrounding issues like Colombia, Castlereagh, spy rings at Castle Buildings and Garda uniforms in Wicklow were just a figment of unionists' imaginations. "I don't think so," said the former enterprise minister.
The former SDLP Deputy First Minister, Mr Mark Durkan, blamed both unionists and republicans, but said that unionist concern over the various allegations against the IRA was not just a case of "unionist paranoia".
Sinn Féin rounded on Ulster Unionists, although Mr Adams allowed that republicans were not entirely blameless. Rather than elaborate just how republicans might bear some of the responsibility he went on to say the media were to blame.
Dr Reid said the Assembly election date of May 1st "stands", although what can stand can equally fall by May if there is no resolution, or no sign of a resolution, to this latest crisis.
Mr Adams warned against any tampering with the election date, suggesting that if the British and Irish governments had adopted such a stance "Margaret Thatcher would still be Prime Minister and Charles Haughey would still be Taoiseach".
The real Taoiseach and British Prime Minister were talking tough yesterday and clearly pointing the finger at republicans. "It must be clear that the transition from violence to exclusively peaceful and democratic means, which has been ongoing since the agreement, and indeed before, is being brought to an unambiguous and definitive conclusion," they said in a joint statement.
It was a line similar to the language used in the compromise Jeffrey Donaldson/David Trimble motion agreed at the recent meeting of the Ulster Unionist Council. "The time has come for people to clearly choose one track or the other," said Mr Bertie Ahern and Mr Tony Blair.
Mr Adams said: "Sinn Féin has moved again and again and again. The bar set by the Ulster Unionist Council is too high."
That probably means the IRA is not going to disband in the short term, but everyone, including the Ulster Unionist Council, knows that. Will the IRA carry out some other confidence building measure that could facilitate a return to devolution?
That, as well as delivering other reciprocal confidence-building measures to provide assurance for nationalists and unionists, is what the coming months will be about. The former first minister, Mr David Trimble told UTV - on nothing more than hunch, he said - that he would be very disappointed if the deadlock was not broken by February.
But yesterday wasn't about galvanising politicians for difficult immediate talks. They are too weary for that.