Mack slept for most of the transatlantic crossing. Five hours later he was still asleep when the flight attendant awakened him and suggested a few scrambled eggs and Irish bacon with soda bread for breakfast. They’d be landing at Dublin in thirty-five minutes.
Revived by a tall glass of orange juice, “Jeffery Simpson” adjusted his wig and enjoyed one of the great airline breakfasts. The hell with cereal and yogurt, he thought. This is the game for me.
They landed in Dublin on Sunday morning at 9:30 A.M. local. Mack picked up his bag and moved into his first serious test at a foreign immigration desk. He lined up and presented his U.S. passport. The official in the booth smiled and opened it, checked the photograph against Mack’s face, and asked, “How long will you stay in Ireland, Mr. Simpson?”
“Maybe a week.”
The official stamped the passport, confirming a Dublin port of entry, and said, “Welcome, sir. Have a grand visit.”
Mack moved outside and joined the short line for a taxi. He jumped aboard the first available cab and asked to be taken to the Shelbourne Hotel in St. Stephen’s Green. Traffic was light, and after seven miles and twenty minutes, they were moving through the outskirts of the relatively small city.
They crossed the Liffey, turned left, and ran along the south bank toward the outskirts of Ballsbridge. Up ahead Mack could see precisely what he was seeking—a large used-car dealership with a lot of flags flying and obvious activity.
He allowed the driver to drive perhaps four hundred yards farther, and then said in the best Irish accent he could manage, “Will you stop right here, sir? I’ve decided to have a quick cup of coffee with my aunt.”
“No problem. That’ll be twenty-four euros.”
Mack pulled a few notes out of his pocket and gave the man thirty. He climbed out of the cab and walked back to the car dealership, strolling slowly down the line of cars, not wishing to attract the immediate attention of an overeager salesman.
That represented his first failure of the journey. Michael McArdle, the owner, was upon him, telling him the Ford Fiesta at which he was currently staring was probably the greatest buy in the entire history of motorized commerce. “I’ll tell you something about this particular car,” he said. “It’s four years old and used to be owned by a local lady. It’s got only sixteen thousand miles on the clock, and I’ve serviced every last one of ’em meself. This particular car represents one of the great bargains of me life.
“Am I asking twenty t’ousand for it? Nossir, I’m not. Am I askin’ fifteen t’ousand for it? Nossir, I’m not. I’ll tell you what, twelve t’ousand buys it! And could anyone ever be fairer than that?”
“Depends,” said Mack. “How about ten thousand for cash?”
“Well, I’d have to let the check clear first.”
“I said cash. Bank notes. Ten thousand euros,” said Mack.
“I’ll take dat,” said Michael McArdle. “I’ll take dat, even though it’s like a dagger to me heart, to part with this car for that money . . . When do you need it?”
“Now.”
“Now! Christ! I have to do the paperwork, register it, fill in the forms. That’ll mean tomorrow.”
“Guess I came to the wrong place. See you,” replied Mack.
“Now wait a minute, sor,” said the proprietor of McArdles. “I’ll have to see what I can do. But I need to fill out a government form. I’ll want good identification.”
“No problem. I got a passport and a driver’s license right here. I don’t have to get my photograph done?” asked Mack.
“Jaysus, no. They don’t need that. Just the numbers.”
“You sure this thing runs okay?”
“I’m sure enough to give you the two-year McArdle guarantee,” he said. “And we’ve been here for half a century. This car breaks down in the first five t’ousand miles, you can have your money back and you can keep the car.”
Mack laughed. “Come on, Michael, let’s get this thing done.”
A half hour later, the Ford Fiesta in “moondust silver” with AC pulled out onto the road and swung left for Lansdowne Road. It was registered with the government authorities in the name of Patrick O’Grady who (a) did not exist himself, (b) had an address that was also nonexistent, and (c) possessed an Irish driver’s license that had never been issued to anyone.
Mack had managed to coerce a map of Ireland out of Michael McArdle, who confirmed that deals as generous as this would most certainly be the death of him. But nonetheless he hoped the wind would always be at Mr. O’Grady’s back.
Mack hit the gas pedal, and was happy to discover the Ford engine was as sharp and fine-tuned as Michael had claimed. He swung up to the Merrion Road, turned right after crossing Ballsbridge, and cut through to the main road to the southeast, heading straight for the Wicklow Mountains.
In the whole of Ireland, he had but one contact, a man named Liam O’Brien in the little Wicklow town of Gorey. And he came by that name only by the luckiest of circumstances. In the final days of his life, before he died in the tank, Charlie O’Brien had mentioned that he and his wife were planning a vacation in Ireland. Mack had asked him where they were staying, and Charlie had responded by telling him he had a long-lost cousin he had never met, in the town of Gorey. “He keeps a hardware store,” said Charlie. “But my father swears to God he was a senior member of the IRA. Liam’s father, who died years ago, was my dad’s brother.”
Mack had somehow remembered that, and in the long days he spent alone after Anne had left had decided that here was a man who might know a gunsmith in England, because there was no question of trying to acquire a rifle anywhere else and then attempting to bring it through Britain’s red-hot customs and immigration.
To his great delight he had seen that Gorey was on the main Dublin road south, the N11, and in that moment had decided to take the ferry to England from Rosslare in County Wexford, rather than from Dun Laoghaire on the south side of Dublin. Gorey stands thirty-four miles north of Rosslare Harbor.
The trouble was, O’Brien’s hardware store was unlikely to be open, and Mack elected to get into the town, locate the store, and then try to get a number for Charlie’s cousin. He would not call from the magic cell phone, because he was already thinking like a man on the run. Mack actually found it hard to believe that no one had yet committed a crime, except against the Irish motor taxation authorities. And he did not really count that.
He drove through the Wicklows, running east of the Great Sugar-loaf Mountain, which rose above the highway. The Ford Fiesta then whipped past the range of hills that led up to the Devil’s Glen. It was a fast new road, and swept straight around the historic old port of Ark-low, County Wicklow’s busiest town, with history dating back to the second century.
Mack crossed the River Bann and ran into quiet little Gorey at around two o’clock Sunday, lunchtime. “Quiet little Gorey” is, however, a mild deception, because in this hillside town in southern Wicklow, there beats the heart of Irish Republicanism. It was for years a stronghold of the IRA. Indeed, when they blew that double-decker bus to smithereens in London a few years back, the perpetrator was from Gorey.
Mack Bedford did not, of course, know this; otherwise, he might have stepped more carefully. He could see there were a few shops open, and several bars, the iron grip of the Catholic Church having been released somewhat in southern Ireland in recent years. However, there was no luck at the hardware store, which he located on a small side street forty yards off the main road that ran through the middle of town.
It was very definitely closed, and the only information Mack acquired was the name, L. O’Brien and Sons, Hardware and Paint. Mack headed up the road to the church and found a telephone kiosk. He could see the phone book in there, and parked and scanned down the columns. He found the store, and right below it, he located another L. O’Brien of the same address. Plainly, this was the private number, and the family lived above the store. Mack considered this a stroke of good fortune because there were about se
ven thousand O’Briens in the phone book.
He went back to the car and boldly dialed the number of one of the most dangerous former IRA commanders in the country. A somewhat gruff voice answered, a noncommittal, “Yes?”
Mack decided to speak in his regular American accent and said:
Is that Mr. O’Brien?
Who’s asking?
I was a close friend of your American cousin Charlie O’Brien.
Oh, you were?
I was. I was with him in Iraq just before he died, and I told him I was coming to Ireland and then to England.
And what can I do to help you?
Well, sir, I am going shooting in England this fall, and I was trying to locate a gunsmith in London. Charlie said you might be able to help.
Who you planning to shoot? Liam O’Brien laughed.
Just a few pheasants and grouse.
Of course. Well, why not try one of the main gunsmiths in London, Holland and Martin? Maybe even Purdey’s?
I . . . I suppose I could. But I was hoping for something kinda unobtrusive. Well, if I’m any judge, you’re looking for a different kind of a gun. And it’s not against anyone’s law for me to steer you right.
I wouldn’t want to break the law, Mr. O’Brien.
No, of course not. I never wanted to meself. But I’ll tell you what, I’ll come downstairs at an agreed time, and I’ll hand you a piece of paper with your man’s name, address, and number on it. I’ll have to phone him, and give him a name. It’s going to cost you two thousand euros, and I don’t want to see your face, or know your real name. Take it or leave it.
I’ll take it. As for the time, how about now? I’m in Gorey.
Park yourself outside the shop in five minutes. And do not look at my face. Do you have the cash?
I do.
Men who want illicit rifles usually do, eh? Mr. O’Brien chuckled again. Mack Bedford liked doing business here in Ireland. No bullshit, right?
He drove back around to O’Brien Hardware and Paint and parked outside. One minute later, a figure moved fast out of a side door and positioned himself next to the car. One piece of paper was handed to Mack Bedford, which he swiftly read. The hand that gave him that piece of paper was still there, slightly open, and Mack pressed twenty 100-euro bills into it.
“Very trusting of you, sir. Especially as you don’t know the value of the information I just gave you.”
“It better be good,” said Mack.
“It had?”
“Yes, O’Brien. Because if it’s not, I’ll come back and probably kill you.”
“It’s good,” said the Irishman. “There’s still a little bit of honor among thieves.” He chuckled again, the same distinctive merriment Mack had heard on the phone.
“And what name shall I give him, for identification when you get there?”
Mack still never turned his face toward the man, and he said, without hesitation, “McArdle, Tommy McArdle.”
“I’ll make the call. Your man’s about a half hour west of London. He’s the best private gunsmith in England. . . . Stay safe, Tommy, and for Jaysus’ sake, shoot straight.”
“See ya, Liam,” called Mack, chuckling as he pulled away, still staring dead ahead, never having cast his eyes on the roguish Liam O’Brien, and never having allowed the Irishman to see him.
He pressed on south, heading directly to the ancient town of Enniscorthy, with its mighty round-towered Norman castle and spectacular Roman Catholic cathedral, designed by Augustus Pugin, who also designed the Houses of Parliament in London.
He ran through Enniscorthy, which was much more tourist-busy than Gorey, and he crossed the River Slaney on the one-way bridge. He turned right and followed the meandering course of the river on the fast, flat, wide road to Wexford town. There’s a bypass here, and the road hooks right on a split highway, moving traffic swiftly down to the port of Rosslare.
Mack Bedford stopped at a garage on top of the hill above the harbor, gassed up the car, and bought himself a cup of coffee, which he drank slowly on the forecourt, gazing across the road, out to sea, at the calm waters of the St. George’s Channel.
He drove down the steep hill to the ferry port at around half past four, parked, and walked to the Stena Line desk to inquire about a ferry to England.
“Actually, it goes to Wales, sir,” said the clerk, a young man whose name tag identified him as Seamus. “And it doesn’t sail ’til 10:15 tonight. You can go aboard around half eight.”
“Not before?” asked Mack.
“Well, before that she’s in the middle of the Irish Sea,” said Seamus. “So I’d say not.”
“What time does it get in?”
“Just before three. Fishguard, South Wales, and you can drive off right after that. But if you take a cabin and decide to stay in your bed until six thirty, that’s fine too. Just tell us when you want to disembark so we can put your car in the right place.”
“Okay, Seamus. Give me a round-trip first-class ticket, for a cabin and a Ford Fiesta car.”
“No one else traveling with you?”
“No.”
“And when will you return, sir?”
“Leave it open, will you, because I’m not sure.”
“That’ll add twenty euros to the cost, sir, without a firm date I mean.”
“I can handle that,” replied Mack.
“Name?”
“Patrick O’Grady.”
“Irish passport?”
“Yup.”
When Seamus asked for the color and registration number of the car, Mack told him dark blue, and then altered at least three of the numbers on the registration, hoping no one would notice, which they didn’t.
“Which card will you be using for payment?”
“No card. Cash.”
“No problem.”
Mack handed over three hundred euros, took his tickets, and left. He considered it, so far, a good day’s work. He was leaving the American Jeffery Simpson behind in Ireland, and he was driving onto the ferry with a ticket made out to the Irishman Patrick O’Grady, who had never been born, and lived nowhere. The false Irish passport had been noted, and the return ticket would never be used.
The car Mack was driving was recorded in the ferry office in the wrong color, with vast discrepancies in the registration, thus rendering it, and its driver, untraceable by any police force in the world. If anyone ever came after him, that is.
Mack retired to the parking lot, which was quite busy, and settled himself in the front seat with the windows open, and a copy of the Irish Sunday Times he’d bought in the garage. He decided not to join the line of cars waiting for the 10:15 sailing until around half past seven, because right now he’d be the only one there. What Mack wanted in the line was a car behind him and one in front.
The two-and-a-half-hour wait passed slowly. Mack slept for a half hour, but he had a lot of time to think. And one worrying truth kept crossing his mind. On every mission, no matter where, from the Afghan mountains to the backstreets of Baghdad, there are surprises, sudden unexpected problems and downright bad luck. There is also apt to be one stroke of very good luck. Amidst all the horror, something almost always breaks for a top SEAL commander. What worried Mack was that, on this mission, he’d already had his one bit of real good luck, and its name was Liam O’Brien. From now on, he pondered, things might not fall right for me. . . . I’d better be real careful, or I’m going to end up dead.
He joined the long line at around a quarter of eight. They boarded on time, no one asked for any further identification, and he placed his car among the very few first-class ticketed vehicles. He checked his cabin, which was small, but neat and spotless. The steward told him he was welcome to go up to the first-class lounge, where he could have a drink and some dinner if he wished.
He took his bag and climbed the stairs to the upper deck, found the lounge, and poured himself some coffee. He ordered, on the steward’s recommendation, a fresh Dublin Bay sole, off the bone, with french frie
s and spinach. He drank only orange juice, and finished his dinner with a plate of Irish apple crumble with fresh cream.
The huge ship sailed at 10:15, running slowly along the jetties and out past the great hooked harbor wall. They stood fair down the channel, running out toward the flashing light on the jutting rocky ledge, which marks the maritime roads in and out of Rosslare.
Mack took his bag and left as soon as he sensed the changed beat of the engine, when the ship began to move. He went outside and leaned on the rail, watching the harbor lights disappear, feeling the old familiar roll of the ocean, which would increase as soon as they came out of the shadow of the land and sailed into the rough open waters of the Irish Sea, with the Atlantic swells surging in from the southwest. He saw the high light flashing on the ledge and guessed as they passed that they were making fifteen knots. It reminded him of home, and the towering light on Sequin Island.
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