On Dangerous Ground

Ferguson roared with laughter. ‘Beware this one, Dillon, she ran across a hoodlum emerging from a supermarket with a sawn-off shotgun last year. Unfortunately for him she was working the American Embassy detail that week and had a Smith and Wesson in her handbag.’

‘So you convinced him of his wicked ways?’ Dillon said.

She nodded. ‘Something like that.’

Ferguson’s Guinness and oysters appeared. ‘We’ve got trouble, Dillon, bad trouble. Tell him, Chief Inspector.’

Which she did in a few brief sentences. When she was finished, Dillon took a cigarette from a silver case and lit it with an old-fashioned Zippo lighter.

‘So, what do you think?’ she asked.

‘Well, all we know for certain is that Billy Quigley is dead.’

‘But he did manage to speak to the Brigadier,’ Hannah said. ‘Which surely means Ahern will abort the mission.’

‘Why should he?’ Dillon said. ‘You’ve got nothing except the word that he intends to try and blow up the President sometime tomorrow. Where? When? Have you even the slightest idea, and I’ll bet his schedule is extensive!’

‘It certainly is,’ Ferguson said. ‘Downing Street in the morning with the PM and the Israeli Prime Minister. Cocktail party on a river steamer tomorrow night and most things in between.’

‘None of which he’s willing to cancel?’

‘I’m afraid not.’ Ferguson shook his head. ‘I’ve already had a call from Downing Street. The President refuses to change a thing.’

Hannah Bernstein said, ‘Do you know Ahern personally?’

‘Oh, yes,’ Dillon told her. ‘He tried to kill me a couple of times and then we met for face-to-face negotiations during a truce in Derry.’

‘And his girlfriend?’

Dillon shook his head. ‘Whatever else Norah Bell is, she isn’t that. Sex isn’t in her bag. She was just an ordinary working-class girl until her family was obliterated by an IRA bomb. These days she’d kill the Pope if she could.’

‘And Ahern?’

‘He’s a strange one. It’s always been like a game to him. He’s a brilliant manipulator. I recall his favourite saying. That he didn’t like his left hand to know what his right hand was doing.’

‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’ Ferguson demanded.

‘Just that nothing’s ever what it seems with Ahern.’

There was a small silence then Ferguson said, ‘Everyone is on this case. We’ve got them pumping out a not very good photo of the man himself.’

‘And an even more inferior one of the girl,’ Hannah Bernstein said.

Ferguson swallowed an oyster. ‘Any ideas on finding him?’

‘As a matter of fact I have,’ Dillon said. ‘There’s a Protestant pub in Kilburn, the William of Orange. I could have words there.’

‘Then what are we waiting for?’ Ferguson swallowed his last oyster and stood up. ‘Let’s go.’

The William of Orange in Kilburn had a surprising look of Belfast about it, with the fresco of King William victorious at the Battle of the Boyne on the whitewashed wall at one side. It could have been any Orange pub in the Shankill.

‘You wouldn’t exactly fit in at the bar, you two,’ Dillon said as they sat in the back of the Daimler. ‘I need to speak to a man called Paddy Driscoll.’

‘What is he, UVF?’ Ferguson asked.

‘Let’s say he’s a fundraiser. Wait here. I’m going round the back.’

‘Go with him, Chief Inspector,’ Ferguson ordered.

Dillon sighed. ‘All right, Brigadier, but I’m in charge.’

Ferguson nodded. ‘Do as he says.’

Dillon got out and started along the pavement. ‘Are you carrying?’ he asked.

‘Of course.’

‘Good. You never know what will happen next in this wicked old world.’

He paused in the entrance to a yard, took a Walther from his waistband at the rear, produced a Carswell silencer and screwed it into place; then he slipped it inside his flying jacket. They crossed the cobbled yard through the rain, aware of music from the bar area where some loyalist band thumped out ‘The Sash My Father Wore’. Through the rear window was a view of an extensive kitchen, and a small, grey-haired man seated at a table doing accounts.

‘That’s Driscoll,’ Dillon whispered. ‘In we go.’ Driscoll, at the table, was aware of some of his papers fluttering in a sudden draught of wind, looked up and found Dillon entering the room, Hannah Bernstein behind him.

‘God bless all here,’ Dillon said, ‘and the best of the night yet to come, Paddy, me old son.’

‘Dear God, Sean Dillon.’ There was naked fear on Driscoll’s face.

‘Plus your very own Detective Chief Inspector. We are treating you well tonight.’

‘What do you want?’

Hannah leaned against the door and Dillon pulled a chair over and sat across the table from Driscoll. He took out a cigarette and lit it. ‘Michael Ahern. Where might he be?’

‘Jesus, Sean, I haven’t seen that one in years.’

‘Billy Quigley? Don’t tell me you haven’t seen Billy because I happen to know he drinks here regularly.’

Driscoll tried to tough it out. ‘Sure, Billy comes in all the time, but as for Ahern.…’ He shrugged. ‘He’s bad news that one, Sean.’

‘Yes, but I’m worse.’ In one swift movement Dillon pulled the Walther from inside his flying jacket, levelled it and fired. There was a dull thud, the lower half of Driscoll’s left ear disintegrated and he moaned, a hand to the ear, blood spurting.

‘Dillon, for God’s sake!’ Hannah cried.

‘I don’t think He’s got much to do with it.’ Dillon raised the Walther. ‘Now the other one.’

‘No, I’ll tell you,’ Driscoll moaned. ‘Ahern did phone here yesterday. He left a message for Billy. I gave it to him around five o’clock when he came in for a drink.’

‘What was it?’