by James Deegan
Casey got onto his knees, and started to cry.
‘Please,’ he said. ‘Don’t do it. I’ll do anything. I know a lot of information that the British government would want. Murders, robberies, the Disappeared. I know the lot.’
‘I thought you were a source, Pat?’ said Carr, mockingly. ‘Why haven’t you handed that information over before now?’
‘Oh, shit,’ said Casey. ‘I couldn’t give it all… I needed…’
He tailed off, hopelessly.
Carr laughed. ‘Pat,’ he said, ‘to tell you the truth I couldnae care less whether you’re a tout, or not. This has fuck all to do with politics, or the Troubles. This is personal. You made it personal.’ He levelled the pistol at Casey. ‘This is for Mick and Kevin,’ he said, and shot him once in the chest.
The round ripped through Casey’s right lung and tore a hole out of his back, pushing him back down into the ploughed field, blood frothing from his mouth.
Carr listened to his laboured breathing for a moment, and then realised that he was better than this.
Killing a man was one thing; making him suffer unnecessarily was another.
He put a second round into Casey’s head, and then bent to pick up the body.
Back at the track, Oleg said, ‘John, let’s go. We need to go.’
‘Aye,’ said Carr. ‘I think that would be a good idea. Just give me a couple of minutes.’
122.
CAIRBRE MCKILTY HAD taken a call earlier on with strict instructions not to return to his farm before bedtime, and he knew better than to ask why.
His nephew was a bad, bad man, and those goons he had with him were thick and nasty.
Whatever they had planned, he didn’t want to know.
So he’d gone over Tassagh way to his brother’s farm for tea, and had hung around a while under the pretext of chatting about the state of agriculture.
Eventually, his brother had kicked him out – bedtime for dairy men is around eight o’clock, after all – and Cairbre finally turned into the track to the farm at gone nine.
He’d known, of course – the fire had lit the sky up for miles around, and as he’d got closer he’d realised it had to be his place – but still, the shock of seeing the cottage and the byre still well ablaze, with fire engines spraying water on the house…
It was upsetting, he didn’t mind admitting that.
There were police there, too, peering into the smoking remains of a Volvo, at the body in the driver’s seat.
And when it was safe to get into the ruins, and they found the rest of the bodies, there were questions galore for Cairbre McKilty.
Then he warned them that one of the dead men might well be Pat Casey.
As in, Member of the Legislative Assembly Pat Casey.
As in, speaking softly, Belfast PIRA 2IC Pat Casey.
After that, things had suddenly got a lot hotter.
By then, John Carr and Oleg Kovalev were long gone.
123.
THREE DAYS LATER, two telephone calls were made by an anonymous man with a Northern Irish accent.
He spoke slowly and haltingly, and he did not respond to any questions.
The first call, jotted down in shorthand by the startled reporter on the other end, was to the news desk of the Belfast Evening Telegraph, to inform the newspaper on behalf of the Real IRA that the late Patrick Casey had been a tout for the British, and that he and his associates had been executed for that capital crime by volunteers who had taken their confessions at the farm in Camlough.
The second was to the confidential Crimestoppers hotline.
That call was recorded automatically by the unmanned line.
It began, ‘I have information about the death of Pat Casey and several others at the farm in Camlough, and Casey’s involvement in the death of Michael Parry, the former British soldier who…’
EPILOGUE
CARR WAS GETTING his kit together for a trip to the gym – he’d just got back from a visit to St Helens to see the widow of Mick Parry, to tell her, as far as he could, that justice had been served – when the buzzer went.
He was tempted to ignore it, but it went again, and then again, so he walked through to the kitchen.
The CCTV image was clear enough.
Two men.
Late forties, early fifties, he guessed, and well-dressed.
Then one of them peered up into the lens, and Carr looked closer.
‘What do you want?’ he murmured to himself, with a faint grin. He pressed the button. ‘Come up, boss,’ he said. ‘First floor.’
He opened the door of his flat and went to put his gym bag away.
A moment later there was a tentative knock, and a voice he knew of old said, ‘Hello, John? May we come in?’
‘Well, the door’s open, isn’t it?’ Carr called out. ‘I’ll be through in a sec.’
He stowed the bag in his wardrobe and walked out.
Guy de Vere was standing there – tall and slim as ever, in a grey suit and Para Reg tie.
The guy by his side was wearing a nice, old-fashioned pinstripe.
Expensive shirt.
Pinkie ring.
Discreet silver watch.
Black shoes with a mirror shine.
Looked like a Guards officer, to Carr.
That, or a senior, old school spook.
‘Hello, John,’ said de Vere, holding out a hand. ‘It’s good to see you.’ He grinned. ‘I must say, you’re in a better state than when I last saw you.’
‘I am?’ said Carr, momentarily wrong-footed.
‘At my birthday bash in Fulham,’ said de Vere. ‘You and Evan Forrest were hammered.’
‘Ah, right,’ said Carr. ‘Got you. I’d had a few…’
He felt himself flushing slightly, as an image of a naked Antonia de Vere jiggling and squealing in his shower forced its way into his head.
Mercifully, it dissolved as quickly as it had arrived.
Guy de Vere turned to the man next to him. ‘John held my hand when I first joined the Parachute Regiment,’ he said. ‘And then we worked together at 22. He was one of my best guys there.’ He chuckled. ‘Mad John. The stories I could tell you.’
‘Aye, well, never let the truth get in the way of a good story, Guy,’ said Carr, with a smile.
‘Terrible what happened to Mick Parry,’ said de Vere. ‘His wife and daughters... He was a good man.’
‘He was,’ said Carr. ‘Top guy, Mick. You’ll be at the funeral next week, I assume?’
‘Of course,’ said de Vere. ‘I’ll never forget that day in Belfast.’
‘Me neither,’ said Carr. ‘Been on my mind a bit lately.’ He looked at the other man. ‘And you are?’
De Vere’s eyes twinkled in amusement. ‘John,’ he said, ‘can I introduce you to Justin Nicholls? Justin’s a very good friend of mine, and a senior chap at MI6.’
‘I’d never have guessed,’ said Carr. ‘Good to meet you, Justin.’
The two shook hands.
‘Take a seat, gents. What are you drinking?’
‘I don’t think we should,’ said Nicholls. ‘We’re expected at a JTAC meeting in about an hour.’
Carr ignored him. ‘The Macallan do you, Guy?’
‘Sounds good to me.’
Carr poured three large measures, passed them around, and then sat down opposite de Vere and Nicholls.
‘I dinnae trust a man who won’t have a drink with me, Justin,’ he said.
‘Fair enough,’ said the MI6 man, taking a decent swig.
‘So I assume this isn’t a social visit?’ said Carr.
Putting the glass down, Nicholls opened his briefcase with a solid click, pulled out a sheaf of papers, and put them on the coffee table in front of him.
He selected a photograph, put it on the table, and turned it to face Carr.
‘Do you recognise this?’ he said.
Carr looked at it.
It was a CCTV still showing him walking along the deck of the St
ena Superfast VIII, on his way to Belfast.
Head down.
It wasn’t clear.
But it was clear enough.
Carr swallowed a mouthful of Scotch and looked directly at Nicholls.
‘Looks a wee bit like me,’ he said. ‘I can’t remember being on any boats recently. Then again, I might have been. Busy life, I lead.’
He switched his gaze to de Vere, who merely smiled.
‘How about these?’ said Nicholls.
Several ANPR images of a black Audi.
Carr was visible – just about – behind the wheel in some of them.
‘All taken from the roads around Patrick Casey’s house or Brian Keogh’s house,’ said Nicholls. He pointed to one. ‘Actually, this one is on the road to Camlough.’
Carr started to laugh. ‘I haven’t the faintest fucking idea what this is about, guys,’ he said, ‘but I do know that if you wanted to pin anything on me you wouldnae do it like this. So what d’you want?’
‘I’d say you were about as good as it’s possible to be for one man acting alone, John,’ said Nicholls. ‘Exceptional. Everything Guy said about you, I believe.’
Carr drank more scotch. ‘Is that so?’ he said. ‘And?’
‘You can probably imagine the shit that’s been going down in Northern Ireland since your visit,’ said Nicholls. ‘The police aren’t the brightest, but they’re putting a lot of manpower into it. For the time being, they’re buying the line that the whole thing was an internecine affair caused either by Casey taking it upon himself to kill Michael Parry, or by Casey’s being a tout, or both.’ He paused. ‘He was a tout, by the way. Very strictly between us – you know I shouldn’t be telling you. Been a valuable source for over twenty years.’
Carr shrugged. ‘You’ve got others. And you’ll not have to pay his pension.’
‘The Chancellor of the Exchequer will be most grateful,’ said Nicholls, drily. ‘Anyway, a nice lot of confusion and misinformation sown there by someone. Give it another fortnight, though, and images like these, and who knows what will happen?’ He paused. ‘But don’t worry,’ he said. ‘It’s not going to court. We’ll make sure of that.’
Carr nodded.
Knocked back his whisky.
Got up, replenished his glass, and came back.
Sat down and looked flatly at Justin Nicholls.
‘Don’t worry?’ he said. ‘Listen, pal, I lived with death for years. Many’s the times I’ve got up in the morning and not known if I was going to see the sun go down. I’ve been in spots where my life expectancy was measured in seconds. I’ve had friends – good friends, close friends – shot dead next to me. I took a round in the chest in Baghdad myself. Body armour saved me, and I got up and carried on. I’m okay with all of that shite. I love it, truth be told. So I’m not worried, believe me. But I dinnae like being threatened. You know what happened to the last people who tried it. So you tell me: where is this fucking going?’
Guy de Vere held up a hand. ‘John,’ he said, ‘Justin’s not threatening you. Do you think I’d be here if he was? He’s one of my oldest friends – you’re another. We’re on the same side, here.’
Carr sat back on his sofa.
Nicholls cleared his throat. ‘I’m obviously going about this the wrong way, John,’ he said. ‘My apologies. My intention was just to show you what was out there. And I mean was. It’s no longer out there – these images have been pulled off by us. They’ll never reach the courts. You have nothing to be… concerned about.’
Carr looked at them both.
He’d known Guy de Vere since the posh bastard’s first patrol – that fateful first patrol – back in Belfast twenty-five years ago.
A straighter guy he could not imagine; he trusted him implicitly.
‘Okay,’ said Carr. ‘Apology accepted. But the question stands – what are you here for?’
‘There have been a number of serious plots against targets in the UK and our overseas interests,’ said de Vere. ‘Some have been in the papers. Others haven’t. We’ve just about coped so far, but at any given moment we might drop the ball in a major way. I can’t tell you any more at this stage, but you know me, you know my background. I’m not a bullshitter, and I’m not bullshitting you now.’
‘Okay,’ said Carr. ‘I wouldnae say you’re not a bullshitter, but I get the general idea.’
‘The government is paying lip service, but the economic situation is dire, the cuts will continue and we all know there are plenty of yes men who will give the politicians the cover they need.’
‘Why are you telling me this?’
‘What if I were to say that there’s a group of individuals who want to do something about it?’ said Nicholls. ‘You’re looking at two of them, but it doesn’t matter who the others are. Take it from me that they sit in key positions within the government, MI5, MI6, other strategic organisations… you know the score.’
‘The mythical deniable operations?’ said Carr, with a broad grin. ‘I thought you were from Six, not the CIA.’ He chuckled. ‘What were you thinking? An advert in the Times personal column? Personnel wanted for dangerous overseas work, orphans preferred, family men need not apply?’ He shook his head. ‘I’m surprised at you, Guy. You and I both know that all goes to shite the first moment someone gets caught or killed.’
‘It’s not quite like that, John,’ said Nicholls. ‘But you’re on the right track. We aren’t putting it in the Times. We’re sitting in your drawing room.’
‘You and I also both know that there are a lot of sensitive places to which we can’t send UK servicemen for political reasons,’ said de Vere. ‘Or just because it would attract too much attention, or would take too long to do via the proper channels. But we can send contractors. The Americans have been doing it for years. They had a division’s-worth of military contractors in Iraq.’
‘Aye, and look how that turned out. How’s your Blackwater shares doing these days?’
‘We’re not talking about that kind of thing,’ said Nicholls. ‘We’re talking about a small outfit, sub-contracted through official channels, working in-country in a security role, or on fact-finding missions, or governmental outreach. It would vary. We need people who can go in, have a nose about, and take appropriate action. It might just be sending back intelligence. Or it might be laying the ground for the SAS or some other organisation to go in and do something official. Other times…’
Carr nodded.
Held up a hand.
Got up and wandered over to the large window.
Outside the sun was shining in the cold, blue sky.
Behind him, Nicholls continued. ‘You’d be an employee of a company which is sub-contracted to another company, and that to another, and so on… The whole thing will be bounced around the world so many times no-one will ever track it back to us. But even if they did, your work would be perfectly respectable. It’s just that, occasionally, you might be called upon to defend yourself. This is the real world. Shit happens. But self-defence is also perfectly legal. And I’ve just shown you what we can do to assist with… evidence.’
‘What if it all goes to shit? What if I get killed or captured?’
‘In the event of capture, we’d make the same efforts to recover you as we would any British citizen,’ said de Vere. ‘In the event of your death, your family would be well taken care of.’
In the street below, a young woman pushed a buggy containing a small child, a toddler tripping happily alongside, holding her hand.
Carr watched them go; his mind wandered back to a similar scene in Niddrie, forty years earlier.
Him and his own mum, toddling off down to the long-demolished library to take out some books, then on to the shops to get a Commando comic and some Findus fish fingers or a meat pie for his dad’s tea.
Someone had to protect little boys and their mums from the wolves prowling out in the badlands, that much was true.
But he’d done his share of that.
Mor
e than his share.
He turned to face the other two.
‘I’m flattered, fellas,’ he said. ‘I really am. A big part of me would like to get involved. But my life has moved on. I’m going to have to pass.’
Nicholls and de Vere looked at each other for a moment.
Then de Vere said, ‘Will you at least think about it?’
‘Never say never, Guy,’ said Carr. ‘But I’m not a man who changes his mind easily. You know that.’
‘I do. You’re a stubborn bastard.’
Both of the other men stood.
‘Thanks for your time, John,’ said Nicholls, extending his hand to shake that of Carr. ‘You aren’t the only man on our radar. We will be recruiting others. But I feel bound to say that I’m disappointed. Based on your background and on your… recent exploits. What you did took determination and courage, and, more importantly, you did it outside the law. A lot of men would have hesitated. But there it is.’
He reached down into his briefcase, and scribbled something on a piece of paper.
Clicked the briefcase shut, straightened up, and handed the paper to Carr.
‘Can I give you this?’ he said. ‘It’s my private mobile number. If you change your mind, please just contact me. Night or day.’
Carr nodded.
‘And, of course, this conversation never happened, on either side. Those photographs will never see the light of day. And we’d be grateful if…’
‘My lips are sealed,’ said Carr.
‘It’s been too long, John,’ said Guy de Vere, with a warm smile. ‘Let’s not leave it so long next time.’
John Carr shook his old boss’s hand. ‘You know where to find me, boss,’ he said. ‘I still like a drink, and it’s still your round.’
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thanks to my wife, who keeps me on the straight and narrow.
Thanks also to my agent, Jonathan Lloyd, and all at Curtis Brown for their support and counsel; and to my editors, Nick Bates and Lucy Gilmour, and all at HarperCollins, for their hard work and dedication.
Finally, thanks to friends and former comrades from the Parachute Regiment and the 22nd Special Air Service Regiment who have helped me along the way.