Seamus Mallon is looking well. In addition to the other worries for the future of the peace process, there has been a nagging concern about the Deputy First Minister's health. Let it be recorded that the present writer sat across from him yesterday for 45 minutes and he appeared rested, relaxed, at ease with the world - more or less - and ready to go the full 15 rounds.

Concerns about his health arose after he was unable to be present for the final stage of the December 17th-18th negotiations on cross-Border bodies and the restructuring of government departments. He had to leave Stormont to get ready for a gall bladder operation the next day, although he stayed in touch by telephone.

So that's one worry less for the peace process, but it doesn't alleviate the biggest concern of all, which remains the decommissioning of paramilitary weapons. Immediately prior to my interview with Mr Mallon - airy Stormont office, although you have to look sideways to see the Carson statue - he had a lengthy session with Martin McGuinness, Bairbre de Brun and Mitchel McLaughlin. The Sinn Fein group were smiling and good humoured as they left: the meeting had clearly gone quite well.

Mr Mallon has been addressing the decommissioning issue a great deal in recent days. He is the man in the middle, the would-be bridge-builder seeking to span the divide between the unionists' demand for "hardware" and the republicans' refusal to provide it.

Illustrating the two positions, he places an index finger at each end of the coffee-table. The republicans are over here, the unionists are over there and - he draws his two fingers to a point halfway between the two - we have to get to here.

Whatever the technical difficulties, he believes the atmosphere is conducive to a compromise. "There's no evidence that any of the political parties here want this to fall. None: quite the contrary, I think there is a very substantial view that it can't be let fall."

In addition to meeting Sinn Fein, he also had talks with Gen de Chastelain yesterday and of course he meets David Trimble all the time. "I have had almost constant discussion about it (decommissioning) with the various parties and people involved."

All very well but how do we harness that political will in practical terms? Replying, he speaks of "a type of formula which takes it away from the two absolute positions that have been publicly adopted and creates the space between them, or gets the space between them, within which that formula could be decided and developed".

Although unionists say they want deeds rather than words, Mallon still believes words have a vital role. "Words will be crucially important, because words will come from General de Chastelain if and when the time is right." However, he appreciates the head of the decommissioning body has "only one shot at it", so the words will have to generate the right response from all sides.

There was "a lot of work" going on in this regard. "I think General de Chastelain won't say anything, except in consultation with the two governments and the parties." The General would "not do anything that would in any way lessen his capacity to break the deadlock".

Republicans and unionists have taken up what he calls "absolutist" positions but Mallon believes that's not the way to achieve the final goal. "It's getting decommissioning, that's the real issue, not winning the arguments about it, not being the person or party that prevails in terms of this debate."

Despite hardline pronouncements from the IRA on the decommissioning issue, he believes the organisation could and should issue a fresh statement with a view to building trust among unionists and moving the whole process forward.

"The IRA have made three statements which have been, again, very absolutist. I think given what's at stake here, given the whole future of this agreement, the future of the political process, that the IRA should take the opportunity of reformulating their stated position, if only on the basis that there is a need to start moving towards a position of trust in the unionist community, which is going to be needed.

"They should make the type of statement which would allow unionism - and I'm not talking about political unionism, I'm talking about unionism on the ground, the ordinary person - to at least start thinking about trusting the political process - and Sinn Fein of course are part of that. I think that's the first thing and this is where words are going to be crucially important. That could be done, that should be done."

He is acutely conscious that only a limited amount of time remains to save the process. The first anniversary of the Belfast Agreement is looming and ministers have not yet been appointed. It would be a "substantial body blow" if the D'Hondt procedure for establishing the new executive were not activated by the end of March or early April.

Other significant deadlines approach: the European elections, Drumcree Sunday, the Patten Commission report on policing.

"All of those are better faced and dealt with if we have the completion of all of the arrangements here." Although March 10th has been mentioned as a date for convening the Assembly to appoint the a shadow executive, Mallon believes that will be put back to the end of the month, perhaps March 29th.

There has been much publicity about his allegedly tetchy interaction with First Minister David Trimble. Mallon says it is "very much a working relationship". There were meant to be 12 ministers at a very early stage, so Trimble and he have been doing the work of a dozen people. "We've had to cope with enormous difficulties," he says. He is clearly working at the relationship with Trimble: "I understand - I try to understand - the difficulties within his own party, within unionism vis-a-vis decommissioning. I try to understand the unionist reluctance to fully commit themselves to the fact that this is a partnership arrangement and is going to be and will continue to be."

BUT HE insists there is trust between them because they both stuck to agreements once they entered into them. "It's difficult, we're two different types of people. We've come from different backgrounds, we've different ideologies, we approach life in different ways. It hasn't been easy for him, it hasn't been easy for me. But we have been able to do it and I think that when the full executive is set up, devolution takes place, the problems will not be any easier, but will be different!"

Despite the controversy over Bertie Ahern's recent pronouncements on decommissioning, he has kind words for the Taoiseach. "The input by the Taoiseach and the Irish Government, and the British government, on this issue has been huge, absolutely huge. It has never ceased. The Taoiseach is a very clever tactician."

But whatever his regard for Messrs Ahern and Blair, he hopes the current problems can be resolved by the Assembly parties themselves, without what he calls "the helicopters on the lawn syndrome". Why, he muses, do problems have to go into the pressure cooker when they could be solved now in a calm and relaxed atmosphere? Seamus Mallon has spent his political life trying to persuade people to behave in what he regards as a rational manner. Signs are they may be listening to him at last.