From time to time Mrs Vi McDowell's friend Ruth Heard reminds her in a ladylike tone that a woman should not reveal her age.
But Vi, owner of Gray's Guesthouse on Achill Island, Co Mayo, has let the cat out of the bag, and the great lady of Dugort confirms that next Wednesday, February 27th she will, in fact, turn 98.
Born in 1910 at the foot of Slievemore mountain to Rebecca McNally and William Robert Gray, an engineer who worked with T.E. Lawrence of Arabia and who is mentioned in Seven Pillars of Wisdom, Violet McDowell, or Auntie Vi as she is known to many, is an iconic figure in Mayo and beyond, celebrated in poetry, guidebook and song for her hospitality as well as for her longevity.
"She is clearly a very remarkable lady indeed, knowledgeable of all sorts and conditions of people, and most wonderfully hospitable," says the Church of Ireland Bishop of Tuam, Killala and Achonry, the Rt Rev Dr Richard Henderson. "She invariably asks me in for a 'cup of tea' and equally invariably serves the most magnificent spread, of which a cup of tea is but a very modest part."
Mary Fanning, who interviewed her for an RTÉ Nationwide programme last summer, says: "She was splendid in powder blue, regal, gracious and very lovable, and she gave me a sense of security I felt when I was in boarding school and knew I was safe."
Vi still lives in Achill all year round, in all weathers, overseeing the daily operation of her guesthouse with her long-time companion and friend Margaret McLoughlin, niece Dorrie Darlington and staff by her side. When asked the secret of a long life, she cites "being happy", adding that she had a wonderful husband and has always been interested in people.
In 2006 she was named Host of the Year by travel writer Georgina Campbell, author of Georgina Campbell's Ireland, who described her as "an extraordinarily interested and hospitable hostess". Campbell says: "Nobody understands better the qualities of peace, quiet and gentle hospitality that have been bringing guests - especially artists and writers - here for the last hundred years."
Vi retired to Achill with her late husband Arthur, former Ulster Bank manager in Tuam and Ballina, in 1970 and she has been running Gray's ever since with what Campbell calls a "quiet and gentle style of hospitality that has all but disappeared in 'Tiger' Ireland". Regulars will be familiar with the bountiful meals, the flaming desserts, the roaring fires, the freshly baked cakes, the plush green leather chairs and the powerful social energy which the hostess focuses on her guests until Cuddles the dog makes his after-dinner appearance, bounding into the sitting-room, looking for a place to land.
When Vi inherited a series of houses from her parents, she also inherited a formidable sense of responsibility for the properties and the land. There is much to do to maintain her world: there are sitting-rooms to be painted, gardens to be tended and land to be cleared. Accounts must be monitored, blankets folded, holiday houses cleaned, patios built, fireplaces installed and - if Vi takes a notion - carpets torn up and floorboards put down, not to mention the shopping expeditions to Sweeney's, Achill Sound; O'Donnell's, Westport; and McDermott's, Castlebar, in her red Ford Fiesta with Margaret at the wheel.
And always, always there are people to entertain. There are summer rituals, such as tea in the sun lounge and visits from old friends. The painter Desmond Turner, who has run the Achill Island School of Painting for more than 40 years, and his wife Doreen stay at Vi's for several weeks and host an exhibition of his works in the Cyril Gray Memorial Hall. Writers and poets staying at the nearby Heinrich Böll Cottage frequently stop by too, bearing a signed copy of their latest published work.
There are Christmas traditions, among them sending salmon through the post and the signing of 100 cards or more. On New Year's Day she watches the annual swim on Dugort beach by volunteers collecting for the lifeboat, then drops into the Strand hotel or has an all-day breakfast at Alan Gielty's bar and restaurant in Dooagh. There are services to attend at nearby St Thomas's Church - the 19th-century chapel built by the Rev Nangle in the days of the Achill Mission - in which she played the organ as a girl.
"She is very proud of her church and tradition (her husband was a Reader)," says Dr Henderson, "but is very much also integrated into a vast network of people, from the very local to across the country, and the world, probably."
Dr Henderson would know. His wife Anita made headlines last October when she converted from Anglicanism to Roman Catholicism, and at the time the bishop invited members of his flock to talk to him personally about the matter if they wished. But the issue did not perturb Vi in the slightest and when the bishop came to Gray's for tea, she recalls quietly, "We didn't bring it up." Vi, who has many friends
from both churches and traditions, is marching into the 21st century with an ecumenical view.
"There isn't much between us," she observes. "We are all one, really."