Rules of the Hunt (25 page)
"If they've got Kathleen," said Fitzduane, "they are going
to make her talk.
That means they'll
know where to hit, location and number of guards, weaponry — basically
everything they need."
"They'll know everything Kathleen has seen," said Kilmara,
"which is not quite the same thing.
There are quite a few other precautions in place a layperson wouldn't
notice."
"They'll know the essentials," said Fitzduane, who was thinking
furiously, "and they'll do it quickly.
And my guess is that they will blast their way in.
This isn't a job for a rocket through the
window.
They will want to make sure, and
heavy firepower is the IRAP style."
Kilmara was somewhat taken aback.
The normal style in the North was to seize a hostage half a day or so
ahead of the operation, and he had been thinking in terms of this pattern.
He now realized that Fitzduane could well be right.
Allowing for time to make Kathleen talk and
to put together a plan based on her information, travel, and reconnaissance,
the hit could happen any minute.
But
they would almost certainly wait until doctors' rounds were over.
On the other hand, if this was going to be an
assault — a quick in-and-out — they wouldn’t want a clutter of visitors getting
in the way, so it would happen before visiting hours.
They probably had an hour to prepare — at the most.
Kilmara picked Fitzduane's brain for a few more minutes and then briefed
his small force.
Certain changes were made.
Fitzduane himself was moved from Room Number
2 on the left-hand side of the corridor to Room Number 4, the corner room on
the right.
Kilmara did not fancy a firefight inside the hospital, but he had nowhere
else to put Fitzduane that was secure, and at least the private wing had no
other patients in it.
He would have
preferred to take any attackers in the parking lot, or otherwise away from the
hospital, but he did not have enough manpower for that option and there was
always enough activity directly outside the hospital to make civilian
casualties likely.
The attackers could pick the time, the strength of their force, and the
weapons, but Kilmara had picked the ground.
It crossed his mind that a famous Irishman, the Duke of Wellington, had
specialized in this tactic.
He never
fought a battle on terrain that he had not scouted in advance, and he never
lost.
However, sometimes he took truly
terrible casualties.
Kilmara was confident his unit could survive an assault, but he was far
from sanguine about the price.
*
*
*
*
*
For forty-five minutes, Sasada, knife in hand, interrogated Kathleen.
Over and over again, he asked the same questions, until the spark of
defiance faded from her eyes and he was satisfied that she had told as much as
she knew.
By the time he had finished, Kathleen's upper body was slippery with
blood and she was deep in shock.
Sasada
had punctuated his questions with small, threatening cuts of his knife.
The blade was so sharp, each cut in itself
did not hurt at first, but the streaming blood and the terror he induced drove
practically all hope from her mind.
McGonigal had watched the questioning with mounting irritation.
He was operating away from his home turf, and
he felt uneasy in strange surroundings.
He was from the North of Ireland and knew the habits and methods of the
British Army and the RUC — the Royal Ulster Constabulary.
The
gardai
,
the police of the
Army were less of a known quantity.
When Sasada was finished, he ordered the two women tied and gagged and
they were dumped unceremoniously on the floor of the front room.
And extending table was pulled out from the
wall, chairs put in place around it, and the detailed assault plan rehearsed.
McGonigal carried out the briefing.
That he had survived on the run as long as he had
was
a tribute to his professionalism.
Every
attack was rehearsed meticulously, but he had trained all his men to improvise
if things went wrong.
He emphasized the
importance of timing and of discipline.
He restated the rules of fire and movement so that no one man advanced
without cover from another.
Ironically,
he had served in the British Army as a young man.
Subsequently, he had received further
training in
"It's a small hospital," he said, indicating the plans Sasada
had brought, "rectangular in shape.
The entrance is in the middle, with the reception desk to the left.
Straight ahead, there is a staircase that
runs up the center of the building.
On
each floor, the wards are to the left and to the right.
The ward we want — what they call the private
wing — is on the third floor on the left.
The third floor is the top floor, although the stairs run up to a
half-landing above it, where there are toilets and storerooms."
McGonigal used a knitting needle as a pointer.
He had been reminded of his mother when he
had found the knitting basket.
She had
loved to knit.
She had been knitting
when she had been killed by a stray bullet fired by British paratroops.
"The nurse says that since our target arrived, there is normally a
uniformed
garda
or sometimes an armed
detective at the foot of the stairs.
He
screens everybody going up and alerts another man on the third floor if anyone
is heading up there.
The uniformed cop
isn't armed, but he does have a radio."
Jim, the black-haired terrorist, interrupted.
"The fellow on the
third floor?"
"The third floor — the private wing on the left — is guarded
entirely by Rangers.
They have installed
what they call a control zone.
There is
a Ranger outside, then two sets of specially installed armored doors.
The outside man checks you through one
door.
In the middle is a metal
detector.
If you are clear, then you go
through the second set of doors, where there is the second Ranger.
The doors are never opened together.
Indeed, I gather they can't be.
They have some kind of integrated electronic
locks."
"Is there video surveillance?" said another terrorist.
McGonigal nodded.
"There is a
camera on the wall overlooking the outside of the two doors.
It can see the length of the corridor to the
top of the stairs.
There were fire doors
there, but they were removed by the Rangers.
Anyone coming up the stairs or leaving the elevator, which is beside the
stairs, is on camera from the moment he hits the third floor."
There was silence in the room, as each man evaluated what he had heard so
far.
Taking care of the policeman at
reception would be no problem, but getting up three flights of stairs without
alerting the armed Ranger at the top would not be so easy.
Still, McGonigal normally had an idea.
He was good at this kind of thing.
"Fire escapes?" said Jim.
He found the building plans hard to read and would have preferred a
recent photograph and a hand drawn sketch.
He also had a suspicion of old plans.
It was not the Irish way to be meticulous in record-keeping.
Whatever the regulations, buildings were
modified and amended without up-to-date plans necessarily being filed.
He looked at the date on the drawing.
These were not the originals but they were
still forty years old.
He wondered just
how reliable they were.
McGonigal nodded.
"There is
one at either end of the corridor, and they both go right up to the flat
roof.
However, I think it is safe to
assume that the Rangers will have done something with the one at their
end."
The planning continued.
Lying
bound and temporarily ignored in the corner, Kathleen listened to an assault
scenario being outlined which seemed impossible to stop.
She despaired when weapons were pulled out of
canvas bags and she saw what the terrorists had assembled.
There were not just automatic rifles.
These people had rocket launchers and
grenades — overwhelming firepower.
She clung to one thought.
She had
told the terrorists everything except the correct number of Fitzduane's
room.
It was one lie she had stuck to
despite everything, one lie that she had now convinced herself was the truth,
so these bastards would not see through her.
Fitzduane was in Room Number 2.
She had persuaded them that he was really in Room Number 4.
It was all she could do.
It was pathetically little.
Shortly afterward, the terrorists, five in number including Sasada,
departed, leaving behind just one man to guard them in case hostages were
needed.
If the attack went off as
planned, there would be a phone call and, lying there helpless, Kathleen and
her mother would be killed.
They would
no longer by
needed
and they could identify their
attackers.
Sasada had wanted to kill
them earlier, but McGonigal had persuaded him to wait an extra hour or so.
It was not much time to live.
Silently, Kathleen sobbed.
Their
guard, Eamon, he of the bald head, listened to the radio and occasionally
glanced in their direction.
An AK-47
rested on his knees, but he was planning to kill them with his knife.
He had killed before, but never in that
particular way.
He had thought of fucking the nurse, but, banged about and drenched in
blood as she was, she was not an attractive sight.
Still, this waiting was boring.
He was supposed to remain in the front room
with the blinds down, but that was ridiculous.
What difference would it make if someone saw him — just a shape — from
outside?
And who would, in this remote
bloody spot?
He stood up, stretched, and went into the kitchen to make himself some
tea.
*
*
*
*
*
They used the Bear's car.
It would
be less likely to attract attention than the unmarked, but still well-known,
police vehicles.
The Bear's car had an
Avis sticker, the badge of a tourist in that part of the world.
The series of little roads were narrow and winding, and the Bear was
still adjusting to driving on the left-hand side of the road.
The stone bridges were narrower still.
He thought it quite likely that he would be
having some paintwork on the local stonework before the day was out.
As they drove around one bend, about a mile from Kathleen's home, two
cars came toward them from the opposite direction.
The Bear saw the lead car only at the last
minute and swerved desperately to avoid a collision.
His tires locked, and he skidded off the road and slid inexorably into a
patch of boggy ground.
When the car came
to a rest, using the clutch and gears with care, he tried to drive out but in
vain.
Next he tried to get out, but his
door was stuck.
The Bear felt very foolish and not a little angry with himself.
He should have let one of the policemen
drive.
He was a good driver in
to get used to and the roads in the West were worse than most.
His front passenger had slid out, and he
followed by sliding across with some difficulty.
The Bear was not built for confined spaces.
The four men tried for fifteen minutes to push the car back on the road,
but their efforts were fruitless.
The
Bear fell in the mud several times as he pushed.
None of their personal radios could pick up
anything in the valley.
Finally, the four men set off for the Fleming house on foot.
The Bear was not overly fond of walking, but
could manage a brisk enough pace if it was absolutely essential.
The armed detective brought up the rear of
the little party.
He had taken his Uzi
out of the briefcase it was normally carried in and slung it over his shoulder.