THE woman from People Magazine was breathless with excitement. "We know they're there - they're in Kerry," said Ms Biddle, after spelling her name the really irritating way Americans do when they think they are talking to someone for whom English is a foreign language. "That's Biddle, as in B for boy, I for India," etc etc. The "they" in question was John Kennedy Junior and his stunning new wife Carolyn Bessette who were married in a secret ceremony in Georgia last Saturday.
The American magazine had heard "for certain" that the golden couple were honeymooning in the Park Hotel in Ken mare. Did I know anything about it, she said with the air of a woman desperate for a story, "you must be out looking for them".
Having gently explained the near impossibility of hiding in Kerry this week - given that there was a huge press corps camped out there covering Ivan Yates and the European farm ministers' activities, not to mention thousands of protesting farmers the intrepid reporter went away saying that she'd phone around other hotels and maybe even other Irish newspapers to see if she could track them down. Ever wondered how rumours start?