Pray for Us Sinners (10 page)

“Whenever the missus would give me peace, I done a fair bit of reading myself.” Jimmy cocked his thin head to one side. “Did you ever hear ‘September 1913'?”

Davy never ceased to be amazed that Jimmy, child of the slums like himself, had an abiding passion for the works of William Butler Yeats. Aye, he'd heard the bloody thing a thousand times, but if Jimmy wanted to recite Davy had nothing better to do than listen Jimmy's harsh voice softened.

Davy let his friend carry on until he finished with,

Romantic Ireland's dead and gone,

It's with O'Leary in the grave.

*   *   *

Jimmy seemed to take his pleasure in the cadences, the rhymes. Davy heard the words. He rocked slightly, thinking
, Aye, but you're wrong, Mr. Yeats. Romantic Ireland's not dead and gone. She's still worth fighting for.
As he fought and his dead father had fought.

Davy's Ulster wasn't just the mean streets of the Falls or the grimy Lagan, flowing past the docks and the Queen's Island's shipyards to Belfast Lough. It was the white beaches of Antrim, the bustle of Smithfield Market, the purple, brooding Mourne Mountains, where the silence was only broken by the chuckling of the Shimna River.

By God, he did know what he was fighting for, and for whom. The people: poets and platers, singers and bobbin shifters, drunks and scholars, whores and wives. The Ulster people, humorous, warm—and absolutely, utterly unforgiving of a wrong. He wondered why, for all the injustices, past and present, he could not find it in his heart to hate the English. He simply wanted them gone.

Jimmy was saying something.

“Are you in there, Davy?” He leaned across the table. “That's a powerful poem, so it is.”

“Right enough.” Davy had no desire to tell Jimmy what he had been thinking. “You're a grand man for your Yeats, Jim. But you didn't pop in just to do your party piece.”

Jimmy's jaw twitched. “Not at all. Like, ah, it's been a brave while since we've had a job. Three weeks since that ATO got killed. Do you think they've forgot us?”

“I'd doubt it, Jim. I reckon Sean's keeping the pair of us hid. For a special job, maybe. It's not as if just because we're not working the war's stopped.”

“Aye. There's been plenty of action. Just about every night.”

Davy's lip curled. “Soft targets. Shops. Pubs. It's time we hit the fucking peelers or the army again.”

“They took out a Scottish soldier on Wednesday.” Jimmy looked down at his boots and back to Davy. “Still, it's been nice and quiet for us, like.”

“What are you trying to say, Jim?”

“D'you ever think about getting out, Davy?”

“Not at all. You getting cold feet?” Stupid question. He knew bloody well that Jim was, and in truth so had Davy. She'd come back to him if he did.

“Me? No way. Just wondered. I'd a letter from Siobhan. She says Canada's a great place.” Davy heard the wistfulness in his friend's voice.

“Jimmy, I don't know as much Yeats as you, but you once told me one of your Mr. Yeats's poems, ‘Remorse for Intemperate Speech.'”

Jimmy said, “Aye, he wrote that, in 1931. Twenty-eighth of August.”

“All about great hatreds and fanatic hearts?”

“I know every word.” Jimmy frowned. “But sure, Davy, you don't hate, do you?”

“Not at all. But I want the Brits gone.” Davy knew he could very well need Jimmy's help soon. He wasn't going to get out of it. Davy sought for words of encouragement. “Your Siobhan says Canada's a great place?”

“Aye.”

“So's Ireland. And it's going to be a better place. You and me's going to help see to that. Aren't we, Jim?”

“Oh, aye. Right enough.”

“Good. Sean'll send for us soon. I just know it'll be a big one, but nothing we can't handle.” Before Davy could say anything more, he heard a noise like a miniature cement mixer coming from under the table. “Ah, shit.” He dropped onto his hands and knees. McCusker had sicked up a mess of half-digested cat food. He crouched, staring at Davy. Davy stood. “Bloody cat's been sick. Serve him right. That'll teach him to bite off more than he can chew.”

 

SIXTEEN

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 26

A short, thick-set man sat by himself at a table in a dark corner of the public bar of the Elbow Room on Dublin Road, toying with a glass of sherry. He kept in the shadows, his coat collar turned up and the lower part of his face obscured by a woolen scarf. A bowler hat covered his closely cropped hair. A large Samsonite briefcase lay on the tabletop, hiding him further. Another businessman, dropping in for a quick one on his way home.

He seemed not to be paying any attention to his surroundings. He was, in fact, watching a skinny youth sitting at the bar clutching a glass of stout in one hand and a cigarette in the other. The man in the bowler hat recognized the youth as Cathal Fogarty, a volunteer with C Company, 1st Battalion, PIRA.

A packet of twenty Gallagher's Green cigarettes lay on the counter. Cathal dragged on a fag, hacking as the smoke burnt his throat but brought him no comfort from his worries. He glanced at the fingers holding the cigarette, nicotine-yellow from the bitten nails to the second knuckle. His gaze, never still, darted about the room.

It was practically deserted. Not many people came into this bar at six o'clock on a Tuesday night, and a pissing wet one at that. Cathal could just make out the shape of a figure at a table in the corner, head made to look ridiculously large by the outline of his bowler.

Cathal had never been here before. He usually hung about up in Andersonstown—1st Provo Battalion territory. He was here because he had been ordered to be. When he was told to jump, he did.

He'd come early. The man he was to meet wouldn't be here for another ten minutes. Cathal just wished the bugger would get a move on. He wanted to get it over with, collect his money, and get back to the safety of Andersonstown. He was going to piss off tomorrow and go to his sister's in Fivemiletown. Belfast was getting too bloody hot.

The spring that closed the swinging front door twanged, and Cathal turned to watch a man shake himself like a wet spaniel, pull off a sodden cloth cap to reveal a shock of ginger hair, and make his way to the bar. Cathal's hand was clammy on the glass as he stared into his drink, studiously ignoring the newcomer.

Cathal stubbed out his cigarette. A familiar voice—too bloody familiar—ordered a Younger's Tartan. Cathal waited, picking at a tag of skin by his thumbnail, staring at the oaken tuns mounted in the wall behind the bar, reminders of the days when Guinness came in wooden, not aluminium, barrels. He heard the barman say, “Here y'are,” the chink of glass against marble, and the metallic sounds of coins. He felt the pressure at his shoulder.

The bloke with the ginger hair stood there. He gave no sign that he knew Cathal Fogarty as he said, “Have you a match?”

“Aye.” Cathal rummaged in his pocket for the box of Swan Vestas. “Here.”

“Ta.” The stranger pulled out a packet of Greens, removed a cigarette, and set the packet on the counter beside Cathal's. He lit his smoke, returned the matches, picked up a cigarette packet, and returned to his drink.

Cathal waited. His breathing was slower now that the transfer had been made. “Rusty Crust” would have the information he wanted in what had been Cathal's packet of fags and—Cathal pocketed the other smokes—he would be a hundred quid better off with no one any the wiser.

No one except a man in a bowler hat sitting in a dark corner, finishing his sherry.

*   *   *

The ginger-haired man, Detective Sergeant Samuel Dunlop, E Branch RUC, left the Elbow Room, walked up Dublin Road to Amelia Street, and got into a parked Ford Consul. The waiting driver pulled away from the curb.

Not until he was safely back behind the high wire anti-bomb fencing of the Springfield Road police station did Sam Dunlop open the packet of Gallagher's Greens. The note was there, stuffed between four cigarettes. Fogarty had made out well on this transaction—not only had he collected a hundred pounds, but there had been
ten
unsmoked fags in Sergeant Dunlop's packet.

Fogarty'd been brought in by the CID blokes on a breaking-and-entering charge six months earlier. He agreed to pass information in return for having the charges dropped, and he'd been a useful source so far. He was the one who'd given the tip about the van bomb that killed the poor sod of an ATO, Richardson. Dunlop had been sure, though, to make it seem that the arrest of the van's occupants had been the result of a routine stop-and-search mission. Reliable informers were hard to come by.

The sergeant read Fogarty's note by the glare of the arc lights surrounding the barracks. He whistled. The words, written in a jerky hand, said, “Explosives and weapons dump at 12 Slieveban Drive.”

He looked at his watch. Seven. Dunlop went into the building and headed straight for the inspector's office. It would only take an hour to arrange the RUC detail and the protecting troop escort, half an hour to Slieveban Drive in Andersonstown. By 9:30 the PIRA would be short of more supplies and, with a bit of luck, some personnel.

*   *   *

Brendan McGuinness's face was puce as he slammed the telephone receiver down. “Fuck it! Fuck it! Fuck … it!”

Sean Conlon sat watching the information officer's rage. Turlough was in bed, and Sean saw no reason to disturb the man. It was after midnight. He and Brendan had been putting the finishing touches on the plan for the attack that was to be launched the next night.

“I don't fucking well believe it.” Brendan's fist pounded on the shining tabletop.

Sean said nothing.

“The Brits took out Slieveban Drive about three hours ago.”

“So you've lost First Battalion's ammo dump?”

“Five hundred pounds of explosives, detonators, Cordtex, sixteen ArmaLites, two RPG-7s, five thousand rounds of 7.62-millimeter ball cartridge”—he paused—“and three explosives men. The buggers were building the mine for tomorrow night.”

“Pity about your men.”

“Never mind the fucking men.” Brendan paced away from Sean, swung back, and snarled, “There's no way now we can set up the attack for tomorrow night.”

“So? There'll be other chances.”

“You think I don't know that? For God's sake, it was the first time we could give the surveillance equipment a decent field trial.”

“I thought you had it working.”

“Christ, Sean. Routine stuff. Routine stuff's coming in loud and clear, but it's not the same as when the buggers are after a real target. They could use some kind of code. I have to know.”

“There'll be a way to set up the kind of mission you need.”

“How? Your quartermaster's out of explosives. That was our last lot until the next shipment comes in from Dublin, and I've no more munitions men.”

“We've stockpiled weapons here.”

“Jesus. Guns and a few grenades? Do you fancy taking on armoured Land Rovers with nothing else?”

Sean shook his head. “No. But it's a start.”

“Shit. I've got to get hold of my action squad and my inside man. Tell them the whole thing's off.”

“Can you?”

“The lads is easy, but I can't talk to him. I'm not due to see him for a few days, but I can get him a message.”

“Do it.”

Brendan strode to the phone and dialed. “Hello, Billy? Tell the boys to tuck their heads in. Aye, it's off. And leave a note in the usual place. Say, ‘No party tonight.' Aye. ‘No party tonight.'” He hung up. “He'll get that when he checks the dead-letter drop.”

“Good, because it's still a good plan, and we don't want your source to get a reputation for giving false alarms.”

“True.”

“Can we hold off for a week or two?”

“Have we a choice?”

“No. It'll take a wee while to organize, but I've a man who could make a land mine out of his granny's knickers and a piece of string.”

Brendan nodded. “Go on.”

“Let me get hold of him, get him on the job, and that'll give you time to get in touch with your fellow.”

“If your bloke can do what you say, it could work.”

“Aye. You can test your fancy gear, see if you can hear the Brits in action, and we'll take out a few more of their troops.”

McGuinness thought for a moment. The British General Election was in two days, on the twenty-eighth. Another week or two wasn't so important. The British PM would be unlikely to visit Ulster for at least a month, probably longer. Sean was right. “Sounds good. We'll talk to Turlough about it in the morning. Who is your man, by the way?”

“Davy. Davy McCutcheon.”

 

SEVENTEEN

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 6

Captain Warnock had left ten days ago. Warnock and his “Let's just say if you blow your cover, you'll never have to worry about passing the examinations for promotion to captain.” Today was to be a different kind of examination—the finals the major had mentioned at the start of Marcus's training. Marcus rose early, impatient, wanting to get on with it.

He finished shaving, running the razor over the strip of skin that stretched from his lower lip, round the centre of his chin, and down over his throat. He looked in the mirror. The split in his lip had healed, leaving a pale, thin scar. The bruises had turned from black to a yellowy greenish-purple, like the skin round the vent of a pheasant hung for too long. His new moustache was an expanded Pancho Villa—full over the upper lip, narrower at the corners of the mouth, and widening again as it ran down his chin and in underneath. He frowned when he discovered some grey hairs among the black.

The acne was an irritant. He lifted the dark, oily fringe from his forehead and peered at the angry red pustules. A military haircut would stick out like a sore thumb, but after four weeks—and he had been ready for a trim before all of this—he was starting to look like John Lennon in his Maharishi phase.