The cloud of confusion begins to lift, and reality intrudes - bringing with it some uncomfortable truths for Dublin and London. First, that Dublin appears simultaneously to have misread the positions of both the British government and the Provisional IRA.
Second, that since last Friday the Taoiseach, his Ministers, and his advisers appear to have been in denial: there was never the ghost of a possibility that yesterday's Downing Street summit would see the suspension of the executive and other institutions of the agreement lifted.
Third, that for all the determined words about the need to have the suspension reversed as soon as possible, we may well be facing into a lengthy interregnum.
And, fourth, that there is no guarantee it will end with the reinstatement of the Belfast Agreement, at any rate in its original form.
For whatever else he may have got wrong, the Taoiseach was absolutely right when he predicted that suspension - from the broad nationalist, republican perspective at least - would be "a disaster". Underlying that assessment was the simple question: if the institutions were to be suspended for want of decommissioning, how would they be reinstated in its continued absence?
The dilemma was underlined dramatically by Tuesday's confirmation that the IRA has withdrawn its representatives - and all previous propositions - to the de Chastelain commission.
Even as Mr Ahern and Mr Blair met to consider how to proceed to the proposed review, Sinn Fein was signalling it would play no part in it. While Mr Trimble's hands weren't quite tied by the Ulster Unionist Council on Saturday, many of his party expect him to use any review to reopen the question of Patten and the RUC's royal title. The risk of the whole thing unravelling is all too plain.
On the upside, it seems there is no immediate risk of the IRA ceasefire breaking down. But those who heard Mr Adams say they had witnessed the failure of politics, and the re-imposition of a unionist veto, will have felt a shiver run down the spine. The Sinn Fein leader may imply no threat, but we are certainly left to ponder the impact of his conclusions on those who have seemingly resisted the demand for early action of disarmament.
And if the political vacuum Mr Adams identified yesterday proves protracted? With the start of the marching season barely a month away few would confidently conclude that "peace" is secure.
Some commentators (this one included) have long wondered whether the Taoiseach and his team ever truly intended the arms issue to provide the ultimate litmus test for the agreement, its viability, and, even, its desirability.
Certainly that was not the sense from Irish sources when the agreement was concluded on Good Friday, 1998. That said, Mr Ahern allowed it to become so. In his famous Sunday Times interview and elsewhere he stated his own requirements on the issue in terms which encouraged the belief that he must have reached some private understanding with the republican movement about its intentions.
Mr Mandelson was by all accounts furious when Irish assurances that the Provos would do something by January 31st proved unfounded. How, indeed, would they have been signalling otherwise when Mr Trimble was encouraged to jump first, in confident expectation that the republicans would quickly follow? There is no imputation by the British of bad faith. Whatever the current tensions, the London/Dublin relationship is said to be too stable for that.
However, it seems clear that the British have been relying heavily on the Irish assessment of the republican disposition. And there is irritation in London that the massive effort made at the last by the Irish side did not come sooner. "We certainly believe things might have been much easier if all this effort had been made much earlier," said one British source.
The criticism would appear to be that if the Irish believed "a new context" had to be created - in which the arms issue could be addressed, for example, in a trade-off for demilitarisation moves by the British - its construction might better have begun last autumn, if not before.
In any event, it didn't happen. And the consequence was Mr Trimble's time-limited offer to enter government with Sinn Fein. From the moment he gave Sir Josias Cunningham his post-dated letter of resignation, the clock was counting down. Incredibly, it has seemed the Irish Government either didn't believe Mr Trimble's bottom line was as stated, or somehow imagined the British could find some way around it.
The suspicion has lingered that Mr Ahern's public and private positions might not have been the same: that he maintained the appearance of pan-nationalist solidarity while resigned to the reality that suspension was Mr Mandelson's only option if he was to avert the uncontrolled collapse of the entire edifice. However, the intensity and consistency of Mr Ahern's attempt to have the suspension rescinded would seem to dispel that suspicion.
If Dublin really did not believe Mr Trimble would resign it would suggest a profound political misjudgment. A miscalculation of such magnitude is highly improbable. More likely the simple truth - that the Government had full grasp of all the conflicting realities, and its confusion reflected a desperate inability to reconcile them.
Last night Mr Ahern and Mr Blair began the effort to restore coherence to the Anglo-Irish position. The public necessity was to affirm their joint determination to work apace to create the conditions in which the political process could be quickly restored. The private preoccupation, almost certainly, will be with how to preserve the peace.
Mr Trimble, meanwhile, heads off to America seemingly content that "the ball is firmly in the republican court". He must know republicans will not contentedly leave it there.