Mr David Trimble has never looked more relaxed. Launching the power-sharing Executive's Programme for Government on Tuesday, he was asked about tensions that were rumoured to exist between himself and Mr Seamus Mallon - Stormont's odd couple, as the BBC's Mark Grimason described them.
The First Minister laughed, with every appearance of finding the question uproariously funny, and replied "Anyone who wants to write about an equivalent of the Blair - Brown - Mandelson rows will be disappointed. They don't exist here."
Ho! Hum! the cynical reader may be tempted to respond. It was clear, though, that on this occasion the two men shared a genuine pride in the Executive's proposals for the future government of Northern Ireland, the first produced by a devolved administration since 1974. Mr Trimble insisted that "the toytown parliament at Stormont", as it was recently described by the Rev Martin Smyth, will survive.
We will have to wait until Saturday's vote at the Waterfront Hall to see whether his colleagues in the Ulster Unionist Party allow the First Minister to implement the 230 proposals on health, education, human rights and other areas contained in the 87 page document. But the launch of the programme does mark a moment of real hope in Northern Ireland.
The timing of the launch was, at the very least, a happy coincidence. It would be reassuring to think that it might have been deliberately planned to demonstrate the real potential of a devolved administration in advance of Saturday's meeting of the Ulster Unionist Council.
There is evidence that some strategic planning, involving the kind of PR skills one usually associates with Mr Peter Mandelson, went into the presentation of the Programme for Government. Yesterday both the Belfast morning newspapers carried an open letter from the odd couple, urging the public at large to read the proposals and to send their comments to the Economic Policy Unit at Stormont. It was a salutary reminder that there is a world beyond decommissioning and the RUC.
This is not in any way to dismiss the difficulties which Mr Trimble faces on Saturday. The dissidents are gearing up for a bruising confrontation around the arms issue. The emerging view is that this will fall short of a challenge to Mr Trimble's leadership, but could leave him shackled by a motion demanding a phased withdrawal from the institutions set up under the Belfast Agreement, starting with the North-South bodies.
There are, however, tensions within the No camp which should help the Ulster Unionist leader. Mr Smyth's sneering dismissal of the Stormont assembly as a toytown parliament has alarmed many unionists who are angry about decommissioning and the RUC, but still want to keep a devolved administration.
On the leadership issue, even those who see Mr Jeffrey Donaldson as a future leader concede that his time has not yet come. He is inexperienced and lacks the political clout to present the unionist case on the national or international stage in the way that Mr Trimble has learnt to do.
What Mr Donaldson does do, very effectively, is articulate the gut anger which many unionists feel on such issues as the release of prisoners and, crucially, decommissioning. He argues that a final resolution of the arms issue should not be left until next June, the deadline favoured by the two governments.
Mr Trimble's rejoinder is that there will be no decommissioning if the Belfast Agreement is seen to fail. The slogan "No guns, no government" is double-edged. If devolved government collapses, there will be no guns put verifiably beyond use.
The situation is complicated by the fallout from the South Antrim by-election. Unionist politicians are fearful of possible meltdown at the polls if the party continues to share power with Sinn Fein in the absence of any movement by the IRA.
Perhaps the most powerful symbol of the potential for change which exists in a devolved administration came this week in the launch of an economic task force for West Belfast, announced after discussions between Enterprise Minister Sir Reg Empey and Mr Gerry Adams.
The economic and social problems of West Belfast have long been regarded as almost wholly intractable. The male unemployment rate is still 24 per cent, the highest in Northern Ireland. Now, at last, a serious effort is to be made to achieve an economic regeneration which will embrace the Shankill and the Falls.
This has happened because of the remarkable consensus on a whole range of issues that already exists within the power-sharing Executive.
On Saturday the No camp within the UUP will dismiss yesterday's statement by the IRA that it is to allow another inspection of its arms dumps as too little and too late. But there are many others, who want the devolved administration to succeed, who desperately need a signal that the IRA remains committed to the peace process. They will examine yesterday's statement with great care.
Sinn Fein leaders sometimes talk as though the political survival of Mr Trimble is nothing to do with them. But Mr Adams, at least, knows better. It is in the interests of the people he represents that the devolved administration should not only survive but flourish.
That is more likely to happen if David Trimble can emerge from Saturday's meeting of the Ulster Unionist Council with his position secured in a way that will enable him and Mr Mallon to implement the Programme for Government which they announced this week. Let us hope that the IRA's statement gives him the votes he needs.