For A man peering into the abyss, Mr David Trimble is surprisingly jocular and self-possessed. Everybody wants a piece of him, and trying to pin him down for an interview is like attempting to talk sports results with a traffic cop during rush hour.
The atmosphere in the Ulster Unionist Party headquarters in Glengall Street is perhaps best described as purposeful chaos. Reporters and camera crews are everywhere, party officials ferry pieces of paper back and forth, rescue missionaries such as the Conservative peer, Viscount Cranborne, and the Antrim-born Labour backbencher, Ms Kate Hoey, hover about, waiting to go to the next stop in their whirlwind Northern Ireland tour.
At last The Irish Times manages to pin the party leader down, not so much far from the madding crowd as right in the middle of them.
First question, the one quietly muttered by his well-wishers and trumpeted by his detractors. They are suggesting he did not prepare unionists sufficiently for the terms of the Belfast Agreement.
He believes this perception is inaccurate. What he calls the "remarkable absence" of argument in the campaign over constitutional matters and the three strands, particularly the "very elaborate" provisions for running the assembly, showed that the party was generally satisfied with the agreement.
"The problem has been prisoners. Prisoners are not our issue, indeed prisoners are something that we feel quite uncomfortable about. It's a government issue and so, if anyone was to prepare the ground for that, it should have been those people who were pressing, or deciding to carry ahead with, prisoner issues.
"It has been government - both in Dublin and at Stormont - that has spectacularly screwed up on this issue by conniving at the Balcombe Street extravaganza in Dublin. Now that is what has caused the problem, and if there are any difficulties in this campaign let's be quite clear where the responsibility lies. It lies there."
So was it fair to say there was a lack of sensitivity and that neither government had a real understanding of the unionist middle ground?
"I can't remember who it was who remarked that in their two years in Belfast the [George] Mitchell team had picked up a better understanding of the situation in Northern Ireland generally and the thinking of unionists than the Irish officials who have been in Maryfield for 13 years have done."
Asked if the same would apply to the mandarins in the Northern Ireland Office, he replied: "The NIO's more of a mixed bag. Not breaching any secrets on this, but when we first heard about the Stone release we made representations - inquiries I should say, because by then the release was decided on - to find out what the heck was going on, and we encountered some ineffable official who assured us: Oh, don't worry, that they had been assured that Mr Stone wouldn't go anywhere near the Ulster Hall. What incredible naivety!"
On the overall result, he had just told a news conference upstairs that below 60 per cent in favour of Yes was bad, over 70 good, and in between a matter of judgement. If it happened to be this last, he told me: "We'll have to look carefully at what we can find out about the voting pattern."
So, would he go the extra mile for The Irish Times and predict a final figure, especially since he boasts a good record as a forecaster? "The outcome is going to be a strong Yes vote," he replied, but refused to settle on a figure.
On a more serious note he added: "There is a very large number of undecideds, and they could obviously affect the outcome, but we're going to see them coming reasonably well."
Monday's news had been dominated by his semi-rapprochement with Mr Jeffrey Donaldson. Was he now going to press for all UUP candidates in the assembly poll to be pro-agreement?
"Well, I think what's important is that candidates be pro the party and committed to the party's policy. And the party will have a policy with regard to the assembly, in terms of making it work for the benefit of the people of Northern Ireland and, of course, of the Ulster Unionist Party, and work in the terms that we expect it to work. I would expect that anyone who seeks the nomination of the party will be prepared to endorse that policy."
So whether they supported a Yes or No vote in the referendum would not be a factor in candidate selection? "Not if they're supporting the party."
It was time to put the question on many people's minds. What was David Trimble's real view of Mr Gerry Adams? Did he regard the Sinn Fein leader as a man of peace or not?
"Well, I noticed the recently-published biography Man of Peace, Man of War?, and when you reached the end of the biography it was leaning more to the man of war than the man of peace conclusion. I don't think it's necessary to add further to that."
The issue of how soon the assembly executive would be set up once the elections had been held on June 25th has become a vexed question. Mr Trimble is clearly in no hurry. "There are too many imponderables here." He brought Viscount Cranborne into the conversation at this point, and the Opposition leader in the Lords made it clear he was in no hurry as regards processing the necessary legislation at Westminster.
We turned to the subject of the No campaign, which has been led by Mr Robert McCartney and the Rev Ian Paisley, but with the latter taking a less prominent role than might have been expected.
"It's perfectly obvious that they are hiding Ian, because they discovered early on that he was an embarrassment to them. I'm now being told they're discovering that Bob's an embarrassment, too." He laughs so much he is barely able to finish the next sentence: "It's a jolly good thing for them that the campaign's coming to an end."
Probably more damaging to Mr Trimble was the defection of Lord Molyneaux to the No camp. Now his predecessor was telling the media he believed Mr Trimble was bullied and blackmailed into deciding the future of Ulster in 15 minutes on Good Friday.
Mr Trimble was blunt: "The only question is who's been telling him this tosh. It didn't happen. Unless he thinks I browbeat the others into it, which I didn't."
Finally, would we ever see him in cabinet with Gerry Adams? He grins: "Will Mr Adams ever reform? That's the question."