‘When?’
‘Soon as you like. But hit it for rush hour.’
‘Rush hour. Jesus Christ, man. We’ll kill thousands.’
Dan’s smile never wavered. But his eyes were fixed and black. Cross me and I’ll tear the flesh from your bones, those eyes said.
‘War can be a bad business sometimes. And there is no one that knows it better than you and I. Am I right?’
‘Jesus,’ Joe said again. ‘This is a lot to take on.’ What he needed was time, to think about this, to find some way out of it all. He had done a lifetime of bad things but how could he live with himself after doing something like what Dan was asking of him?
‘I understand how you feel, Joe. Really I do. I felt the same way myself whenever I was called on to do a big job. It makes it worse knowing that we’re not hitting soldiers. And I know what it’s like to lose someone I loved in just such a situation. You know it too. Maybe you know it more than anyone.’
This was nearly too much, having to listen to how he used Bríd in this way, even now after all these years, to coerce Joe into doing what he wanted.
But Joe knew he could give away nothing if he expected to find a door out of here. So he nodded, tried to fix his face with the distraction of shock. It wasn’t difficult.
‘Think of the conflict, Joe, the hundreds of years of repression. And think of men like you, men we sing about now. Sean South and Bobby Sands and men of their kind, men who sacrificed all they had for the cause. Or if it helps, think of yourself as one of those American pilots, dropping those A-bombs out in Japan. Theirs was a war and so is ours, Joe. Sometimes we have to do hard things in order to win. The end justifies the means. Try to remember that, hang on to it.’
Joe drank from his glass. Suddenly the Guinness in his mouth was like bile, as sour as that, but he drank anyway because it bought him time. If he said no, he’d never get out of here alive. It stunned him that there could be a comfort in such a thought, but rather than rest in it he pushed it away. Death was too good for him. Finally he lowered his pint, and looked at Dan once more.
‘If I do this, can that be it for me? I’m not looking for out, but I can’t go on with this kind of work. I can’t sleep nights for some of the things I’ve done. Will you square it that I won’t be asked to do any more? Bump me upstairs, executive position, something like that. I’ll lick envelopes, for Christ’s sake. I think I’ve earned a rest, don’t you? And I want to come home.’
He didn’t want to go home, wanted rather to get to the very ends of the earth. But he said it this way because it was all part of the game.
Dan clapped him on the shoulder. ‘Don’t worry, Joe. Do this one last job and I’ll see to it that you won’t ever be troubled again. And we’ll get you home too, I promise you. I’ll find you something with the party, something easy.’ He paused, stared into Joe again. ‘So, you’ll do it then?’ Joe could feel the grip of those eyes, and how they dug at him, into him.
‘I will.’
‘Good man. I knew you wouldn’t let us down, you were always the best we had.’ Dan turned, called out to the bartender for the same again over here. Joe caught a gesture, a nod of the head to the three labourers by the fogged window. They could relax now, they’d not have to earn their pennies this day.
The two of them drank a while then, and in the silence all the years of things that had passed between them seemed insurmountable. Joe couldn’t help but think of Bríd, and of his unborn son. Maybe, he thought, Dan was thinking of them too; after all, his blood ran in their veins, his genes shaping them to his form. But somehow, Joe didn’t think so. Dan would use them only to freshen his resolve, and like everyone else who had strayed into his life, they were to be used for a purpose and then cast aside.
‘You have a place to stay?’
‘I just moved out.’
A nod. ‘All right, good. I’ll sort it.’
‘I’ll need money, enough to get me away clean and in a hurry. It’ll be six months anyway, or a year.’
‘Money’s no problem. And I can set you up with a few addresses. Where’ll you go? The States?’
‘I suppose.’
None of this can ever end, he thought as he made a run on the tube. Two days had passed, and Dan, as always, had been as good as his word when he was getting what he wanted. Joe found an almost empty carriage on the tube and sunk down on to the seat. Really there was nothing to see, this was only routine, to absorb some of the feeling of the job ahead. It would of course, be different at rush hour. All the carriages would be crowded to standing then. And it would bring a devastation the likes of which had never been seen before.
He knew the tunnels well enough, had worked down here for a while back in the early 1980s with an Irish firm contracted to install fire alarms. He had form by then, had been inside, four years, but so had some of the other men, and since they worked hard and cheap, nobody cared very much. Night shift, that had been, not that it made a difference this far down underground. Down here, night and day were the same halogen glow, the same bleakly lit platform tiles, the same endless stairwells. He had spent eight months dragging cable through the tunnels, clipping it to the walls, following orders, and he’d work and listen to the rats chase circles in the blackness, the acoustics making them sound as big as bulls.
That had been a bad time to be in London, the movement had dictated an escalation to the war and bombings were rampant across the city. He had needed his alibi of work more than once during that period. And it was a difficult thing to bear, listening to how those explosions rang around the underground, rolling through the hollows like the worst anger. The secrets of the city. And when they finally passed, the fill of night that followed was a deathly silence. Must be something like that in hell, he often thought.
People boarded and departed at the different stops, their faces blank, their minds already with the day ahead and with their own problems. Joe tried hard not to look at them, but they kept fixing their details to his mind. Tomorrow he’d be killing them, or people like them. The lucky wouldn’t know what had happened, those on the right carriage, or the wrong one. The scene would be carnage, and beyond the immediate destruction the wider fallout would be just as horrifying. Numbers made no sense to his mind. Four of five killed in a bar or a shopping centre sounded shocking, but real. The kind of figures broken by tomorrow’s news broadcast would be vast multitudes of that sense. In the thousands, a number to stand with the worst tragedies in history.
Just think of it as war, Dan had said, but that was easy talk, hard action. Innocent lives just wiped out, and by his hand. Because it would be him that would set down the suitcase, him that would get off a stop later, just slipping through a crowd that wouldn’t even know of his existence. Not running because that would attract attention, just stepping out as part of the general, lucky exodus, making his way to the surface and then away, quickly away, a car waiting, a driver to take him to the airport. Probably they’d be watching the airports, but it would be a race by then and they couldn’t be everywhere.
He’d be away, or they’d take him in. It was as simple as that. And if they took him in he’d have his alibi ready, more than one in fact. They’d question his ticket, where he was going, and probably they’d get rough, knowing his history. But he could handle that, if he so chose. But maybe he wouldn’t choose, maybe he’d find solace in confession. Answer, finally, for the things that he had done.
He circled the city for what seemed like hours. On through early morning towards day. He walked around the National Gallery in Leicester Square, wandering through the various wings to gaze without much thought at the Van Gogh’s and the French Impressionists, taking in the serenity of Constable and the manic rage of Turner’s seascapes, ate a lunch of cod and chips straight from its newspaper wrapping up in Croydon, right in the street, the fish soaked in vinegar, and afterwards found an Irish pub to quench his thirst. But he spoke to no one, and he returned to the safe-house as darkness was falling, spent a sleeple
ss night on the shed floor at the bottom of an ex-priest’s garden, some friend or acquaintance of Dan’s.
That was the hard part, that night. In the shed, without even the comfort of a sleeping bag, breathing in the earthen stench of damp fungus and potted plants, he did his best not to think of the things that lay ahead. The shadow in the corner was the device, all cased up, all ready for destruction, packed into the discreet shape of a small suitcase. The bomb itself was big, but it was the enclosed space and subterranean aspect of the tunnel that would ensure the utmost chaos, the maximum devastation relying on chain reaction. He lay there on the hard floor, trying to fix on better things, but there were no better things, not in his life. With him, everything was tainted. As it should have been, he supposed.
Sometimes there was almost the offer of an entire alternate existence, but he only caught strands of it; Bríd as his wife, older, and their child – a boy, he knew with absolute certainty. A boy who would know nothing of this, a boy that he would shelter from bigotry and hatred and murderous acts. When he closed his eyes he caught details of them as they could have been, mother and child, heavenly, but it was a difficult thing to bear and so he forced himself awake, sitting up to watch until finally a watery light broke the sky and filtered through the shed window, that small square of glass filthy with cobwebs and dirt.
Not until he was actually on his way did he give room to the idea of disobeying the order. By then he was already in the tube, already standing in the crush of bodies, the suitcase at his feet. It came suddenly, as huge as a punch in the stomach, the thought that he could just get off here with the case, get to the police with it or find some deserted alleyway. Prevent death instead of causing it.
In a way it helped that it would be a difficult thing to do. The easy option now that he had actually come this far was simply to let things run their course, follow the plan as it had been laid down. What had seemed so complicated that only a man of his expertise could be trusted with its execution, now became ridiculously easy.
The tube slowed in preparation for the next stop, and he didn’t even have to look up to know that it was time. Just step off, make his way to the surface, the long penitent climb to daylight and the waiting car. But when the doors opened and the crowd parted a little to make exiting room, he gathered up the suitcase.
Now his heart beat hard. There was a time concern, the detonation scheduled for 8:45 a.m., which gave him a little over twenty five minutes, by his estimation. Not long, but maybe long enough.
He searched his mind for the best alternative, but already his body seemed to have decided upon a course. What he would have wanted was to find Dan and to give him back his gift, make him eat it, even. Except, of course, Dan was already gone, back in Belfast since last night, probably, safely surrounded by his closest confidantes and counting down the minutes, the radio on the sideboard already tuned to the BBC in anticipation of the first mention that their mission had been successful. He was safe, untouchable. Just like always.
Without running – because there was a real danger that excessive disturbance could trigger the bomb prematurely – Joe moved steadily south. In truth, it wasn’t so difficult. The underground might have been choked with people but the side streets were reasonably clear to a pedestrian, the stores still closed yet. And so, he made it to the river in good time, twenty-five minutes to nine by the distant but readable face of the towering Big Ben.
It crossed his mind that he was betraying everything to which he had sworn allegiance, but in his heart those beliefs that might have swayed him once upon a time were long since dead to him now, and the betrayal, if that was what this really was, made the splash all the more satisfying as he swung the suitcase out over the guard-rail. It arced through the air, hit the surface with a loud slap some ten or fifteen yards out, and there was an instant when he really felt that it would blow. Instead, it began to sink.
He watched until the brackish water had consumed it and then, without looking to see if anyone might have seen him, he turned and walked quickly away. The direction of his retreat was suddenly unimportant, all urgency simply to be elsewhere.
The lunchtime news covered the incident, somewhere below a tremor in Pakistan and the latest in a merry-go-round of talks between Bush and Blair. Joe watched it over a pint of stout in a quiet pub in Portsmouth. He had used the place before, a good town in which to keep a low profile, especially in the winter season when tourists were scarce.
Police were investigating an explosion in the Thames river, right in the heart of London. The newscaster, a dark-skinned woman, into her forties but nice looking, read from a page, and her voice held none of the shock that it could have known, had the circumstances worked out differently. Some damage was reported, part of the banking wall and passing road had experienced some subsidence, and a woman passer-by was taken to hospital with minor injuries after being knocked over by the force of the spraying water. At this time, Scotland Yard were refusing to comment or speculate on the incident, but an unnamed source has indicated that it may have been a failed terrorist attack by a certain Irish Republican splinter group. Security has been tightened at nearby Westminster, thought by many to have been the intended target of the attack.
He watched the television from his seat by the window, along with the other punters who were enjoying a lunch-hour drink. In a casual way, so as not to arouse suspicion, and he watched the news that followed too, even the latest sporting update, the English football team’s preparations ahead of the vital World Cup qualifying game away to Spain, and the weather, which promised only more of the same, gale force winds from the east, and rain.
From time to time, he touched his jacket pocket, just to ensure that the money was still there. It was. He had missed his flight, but that didn’t matter. He knew how to disappear, even close at hand. There was a time to run and a time to sit tight. Maybe he’d just sit a while. And he had seven thousand pounds in used cash which would be enough to see him through. Not much perhaps in the eyes of many, and small compensation for the part of him that they had taken, but something.
The Wedding Day
The air in Crowley’s Bar & Lounge had an intimidating thickness. A wet November Saturday with evening coming in fast, the few gathered guests stood or sat in pockets, chatting in hushed voices so that the conversations wouldn’t carry, stopping only to drag at rolled-up cigarettes or to swallow from their glasses. Murphy’s for the men, the bulk of the stout broken up by the odd drop of Paddy; sherry for the mothers of the bride and groom; snowballs for the bride and the bridesmaid. The wedding reception was two hours old and had already lost its edge, but they had all been here for wakes too. Celebration or sadness, the atmosphere in Crowley’s was always the same.
Snowballs had a way of making Lucy want to cry. She sat with Fiona, her sister, at a table in the centre of the floor and spoke in whispers, keeping her head down. Her eyes studied a peeling beer mat and its spongy dampness was so alluring that she kept wanting to touch it. When she did, the wedding ring looked out of place on her finger, too thick and ugly. Her hands were ugly too, made that way from handling raw meat all week long.
Old Gould, her boss, hadn’t wanted to give her the time off for a honeymoon, but then Father O’Leary stopped by and had a word with him and after that everything was okay. Old Gould even called to the church for the service. The butcher shop closed from one to two, so he had the hour to spare. He came up to them at the end of the service, kissed her dryly on the cheek and shook Kevin’s hand. ‘I hope ye’ll be very happy together,’ he said, then he had a few words with her father and Kevin’s father and hurried away to reopen the shop. He had already given her a wedding present, a pound note folded in with her usual wages. Which, everyone agreed, was very decent of him.
A spurt of laughter rose from the end of the bar, where the fathers of the bride and groom were sitting. John Joe Feehan was a big man, and Kevin was like him in looks, especially around the mouth. They both had the same pinched way o
f considering things. It made them appear slow where actually they were only cautious. Now that pinched mouth was swallowing a large draught of stout. The paraffin lamp was set at John Joe’s elbow and its cast glow made the sweat shine yellow as it traced rivulets down across his bald temples. When he lowered the glass he smiled, a little embarrassed. The bellow of laughter had been his; Lucy’s father, Dan, never laughed out loud. It was not his way, even though he had a violent wit. There was no doubt that he had drawn the laughter from the other man, some joke that he’d picked up or a sharp observation shared about someone they both knew.
Lucy watched him but the memory of how he had hit her when she broke the news pushed to the surface, making her lower her eyes to the beer mat on the table and her own red fingers again. The only time that he had ever raised a hand to her, the only time he’d ever raised his voice, even. She deserved it, of course, but it was her mother who had caused him to snap, with her sobbing and nagging and her constant need to end every biting sentence with ‘Isn’t that right, Dan?’ so that he was in the middle of it whether he wanted to be or not, and she got worse and worse until finally he could take no more. Not a slap even, but a punch, and for the better part of a week Lucy felt sure that her cheekbone had been broken. It hurt to eat and to talk, and she couldn’t sleep on that side which meant she couldn’t sleep at all. Dan had earned himself a reputation for fighting, especially in his younger days, and she’d heard the stories and knew the respect in which he was held by the other men of the village. But all of that was long behind him and it was shocking to everyone when he hit her. She had to tell people that she’d walked into a door. The blow had knocked her to the ground and she saw the look of fear on her father’s face as he stood over her. Hannah, her mother, was crying and smiling triumphantly, but when she started to say something about how any girl deserved that for acting like a whore, one glance from Dan was enough to shut her up. Lucy lay there on the floor, crying until something shifted inside of her, or hardened itself to her plight. The following day Dan, ashamed of what he had done, couldn’t bring himself to look at her, but he knelt before the fire, trying to coax a blaze, and muttered that she shouldn’t worry, that these things happened sometimes and it wasn’t the end of the world. She knew he was sorry for hitting her and she wanted to forgive him, so she thanked him in a whisper, and after that the situation was put to rights.
In Exile Page 10