No Sparks Fly at Wapping could have been the heading in the Times of London one day last week. Staff were startled at the sighting of two enemies on separate floors of the building.
One was Sinn Fein's Mitchell McLaughlin, seen emerging from meetings with editorial writers as he continued his sustained briefing campaign against the deficiencies in Patten and the stand-off in the executive. On another floor in discussion with home editor Michael Gove, a well-known Unionist sympathiser and Michael Portillo biographer, was Sean O'Callaghan, the ex-IRA man turned Garda informer, who is now the darling of the Unionist right.
The pair were blissfully unaware of each other's proximity.