Miriam Lordreports on extraordinary scenes at the Mansion House.
Standing amidst the wreckage of a disastrous first week, Bertie Ahern prepared to face the most difficult challenge of his leadership career.
Shell-shocked troops to the left of him. A hostile media to the right. His once-strutting officers arrayed on either side - like they were about to shot at dawn.
The mood in the Mansion House was as upbeat as a dentist's waiting room. Party advisers, battalions of them, tip-toeing around the margins. The room was dark - it suited the tense, subdued atmosphere. Security men patrolled the aisles.
Happy days? Emphatically not.
When Fianna Fáil launched its manifesto in 2002, the happy spirit was summed up in one word by PJ Mara: "Showtime!" Yesterday felt more like a showdown.
As Bertie read his script, Cabinet colleagues looked glum. Nobody noticed when he came to the end.
"I'll now take questions, ladies and gentlemen," said the Taoiseach. It was only then that the huge number of supporters in the Round Room realised he had finished, and clapped.
In the meantime, PJ Mara had shimmered from the shadows and materialised before a microphone at the edge of the stage.
From the off, this was not an easy experience for Bertie. Questions over the party's U-turn on the stamp duty issue were raised. Recent comments by a party backbencher that Fianna Fáil was getting "hammered on the doorsteps" were brought up.
The Taoiseach handled them well. The supporters, outnumbering journalists at what was supposed to be a press launch, perked up.
It didn't last. A reporter questioned his credibility before the electorate in the light of the unanswered questions about his personal finances.
Ministers sank down further in their seats, while the supporters, seated in the main down one half of the room, glared over, shaking their heads at the impertinence.
Clearly uncomfortable, in apologetic tones, the Taoiseach admitted that in Fianna Fáil, "in the past, there were individuals" who might not have operated to the highest ethical standards.
The shade of Charles Haughey loomed large, while his former adviser PJ Mara stood by.
In this highly charged atmosphere, Bertie battled on. "I don't think there's any problems hanging over my head," he declared. "I have to deal with these issues as we go forward, and I will." Another question on stamp duty. It wasn't just his personal finances that were under attack.
Minister for Finance Brian Cowen, who had categorically stated there would be no big announcements from Fianna Fáil, remained expressionless as the Taoiseach tried to extricate his party from this policy promise.
"Can the minister tell us what it tastes like to eat his own words?" asked RTÉ's Bryan Dobson.
He got no answer.
This was damaging for Fianna Fáil. In normal circumstances, the stamp duty U-turn would be hugely embarrassing, but this wasn't normal circumstances. On the scale of calamities, it wasn't the worst.
It was a case of: ask all you want about stamp duty, just don't ask about the "stamp duty issue" that Bertie claimed swallowed up some of the £30,000stg in cash he got in relation to a rented house.
But the money quickly resurfaced. Why should voters wait until after an election to hear an explanation about his personal finances? Had any of his ministers asked him to clarify the situation? Said Ministers were looking like stunned mullets. Even Dick Roche's smirk vanished.
Then Vincent Browne got the microphone. What followed was an absolutely astonishing exchange between the journalist and the Taoiseach. It lasted 12 riveting minutes, punctuated by heckles and applause from the Fianna Fáil claque and a few ineffective bleats from PJ Mara as Browne got stuck in.
Why didn't he tell Bryan Dobson in that clear-the-air interview last year that Michael Wall called to his office in 1994 and gave him a briefcase containing £30,000stg in cash, three days before he expected to become Taoiseach? At the time, Mr Wall was renting a house to Bertie Ahern and his then partner Celia Larkin.
"That money was not money for me. It was money for his affairs, in his house. I hope that answers the questions." A party officer went to take the microphone, but Vincent had no intention of relinquishing it.
"No, it doesn't," replied Vincent. And he took it from there. Bertie repeated that this was Mr Wall's money. "It isn't credible," asserted Vincent, explaining why.
"It was Mr Wall's money administered by Celia Larkin," insisted the Taoiseach. Nothing at all to do with him.
Or as Bill Clinton might have put it: "I did not have financial relations with that woman." Bertie stood his ground. He thrust an arm out to silence the supporters when they started to heckle. Vincent went from the suitcase of cash to the Taoiseach's own money - that £50,000 he managed to save in a 12-month period when he says he was so strapped he had to rely on handouts from friends.
Last November, with stated reluctance, he tearfully said he had to think of his children's education.
Why had he put a portion of that figure into a house he didn't even own, that was only a few years old? "It ain't credible," repeated Browne.
But the Taoiseach stuck to his story. His fighting spirit went down well with the supporters. Brian Cowen shushed them. That money was his own money, bristled Bertie. He was entitled to spend it any way he liked.
When PJ tried to intervene, he was reminded how Charles Haughey had sought to silence the media when his finances were under question.
Finally, as journalists heaved their jaws off the floor, the duel ended. A measure of the disaster that was this manifesto launch was the look of relief on Fianna Fáil faces when talk turned to the nurses' strike.
Whatever the outcome of this election, this public interrogation of a taoiseach over his financial affairs at his own party's manifesto launch will be seen as one of the defining moments of Irish politics.
Amazing stuff.
Bertie hits the country today to repair the damage. He has enough time to do it, if the country is of a mind to listen.