For the next four weeks the peace process will be in limbo - or in purgatory, depending on your point of view. Mr David Trimble bought time with the deal he made to hold back from a full-blooded cross-community vote over government departments and North-South bodies until February 15th.
What reporters could not figure out at Stormont last Friday and what still puzzles many participants in the process is: what is supposed to change between now and February 15th?
Senior unionist sources said last night there was still quite a lot of work to be done to complete the arrangements for the various institutions that are about to be born. "Bugger-all has been done about the civic forum for example."
One senses that, like Mr Micawber, the unionists are waiting for something to turn up on decommissioning.
Once again this reporter steeled himself to put the same question to well-placed republican sources: "Is there any chance . . . ?"
The same answer came forward: There will be no decommissioning to get Sinn Fein into the executive, there will be no decommissioning to ensure a favourable report from the Patten Commission, there will be no gestures, there will be no puffs of smoke in fields, there will be no big bang in the woods, there will only be decommissioning when the IRA decides the causes of the conflict have been removed, and we are an enormous distance from that now.
A Sunday newspaper report that the IRA had extended its ceasefire to 2002 was dismissed out of hand. There was no question of the ceasefire being in any immediate danger but it was not subject to a timetable either. Its duration was always going to be determined by political factors.
Tell that to unionists and they repeat their mantra that, without decommissioning, there will be no seats on the executive for Sinn Fein. Options under consideration include a vote in the Assembly to exclude the "Shinners". That will not get SDLP support.
Another option is to return to the pledges and promises made by the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair, on Good Friday and in the run-up to the referendum. There may be cold comfort there when the small print is analysed.
The course of action most often mentioned in senior unionist circles is the possibility of invoking the review clause in the agreement. This could be their strongest card, especially if there is an outcry among the public over decommissioning, the continuing barbaric practice of paramilitary beatings and mutilations, and perhaps some unforeseen republican "own goal" along the lines of the Donegal Celtic debacle.
The deepest worry for republicans in the event that the unionists make a determined effort to keep Sinn Fein out of the executive is what line will Dublin take? What they see as conflicting signals on decommissioning from that quarter have caused considerable unease. "Dublin is giving way too much succour to the unionist position," sources close to republican thinking say.
The party in the least enviable position in many ways is the SDLP - torn between two intransigents. It is said to have been told in extremely trenchant terms by the unionists that, if Sinn Fein is allowed into an executive, the UUP will walk out. Despite being somewhat shaken by the encounter, senior SDLP people were said to be holding firm to the view that a UUP-SDLP executive with Sinn Fein in opposition is not acceptable.
Relations between Mr Trimble and the Northern Secretary were not exactly rosy last week either. Senior sources said there were "hot words" between them after Dr Mowlam refused to give a guarantee that she would not "trigger" the formation of the executive in the event of a cross-community vote this week to endorse the package of new departments and North-South bodies. Mr Trimble "stormed off" to London to see Mr Blair.
Today's Assembly meeting hung in the balance until an agreement was reached on Friday morning between the First and Deputy First Ministers to "push the blockage further down the pipe".
On paper, it appears the UUP has agreed to endorse the new departments and cross-Border bodies in a cross-community vote on February 15th, thereby triggering the formation of the executive. Observers suspect UUP dissidents might defect to the anti-Agreement camp - it will certainly be a test of their untried mettle.
Despite the dire warnings from the UUP about its intention to have Sinn Fein excluded there are no indications at this stage that the two governments will agree to such a course. But UUP sources insist their party is deadly serious.
On the other side of the fence, the greater the hue and cry over decommissioning the more the IRA's back stiffens. Sympathy for Mr Trimble's internal party difficulties is hard to come by in republican circles. Rather, there is considerable scepticism about the extent to which his leadership is really in danger and republicans point out that he generally wins the key votes in his party by a two-thirds majority or greater. Allied to this there is a strong conviction in republican circles that any move to decommission would make a present of key sections of the grassroots to the "Real IRA".
The key player in the week's events was Dr Mowlam with her insistence that, once the Assembly had endorsed the December 18th package in cross-community terms, she was not going to hold up the executive's formation pen ding decommissioning. If the baton in the relay race was passed to her, she was not going to drop it. The wags might say the prospect of moving to a new job in calmer waters was an added incentive.