5

      Bessbrook

      ‘At last, we have intelligence,’ Cordwain said, with an almost visible glow of satisfaction.

      Lieutenant Boyd raised an eyebrow. ‘Our man has turned something up already, has he?’

      ‘Yes and no.’ The roar of a Wessex helicopter landing on the helipad outside rendered conversation impossible for a moment. Bessbrook had one of the busiest heliports in Europe. There were Lynxes, fragile little Gazelles, sturdy troop-carrying Pumas, and the old Wessexes, the workhorse of the British Army. The base itself was surrounded by a four-metre-high fence, topped with anti-missile netting and bristling with watch-towers and sangars. In the Motor Transport yard were a motley collection of Saracens, hard-roofed four-ton trucks, Landrovers and Q cars. Bessbrook was a mix of high-tech fortress, busy bus station and airport. In truth, it was also something of a slum for the assorted British Forces personnel who had to live within its cramped confines in the ubiquitous Portakabins, reinforced with concrete and sandbags against mortar attack.

      ‘No,’ Cordwain went on when he could hear himself speak. ‘You may find it hard to believe, but the initial info comes from across the border, from the Special Branch section of the Gardai.’

      Boyd was incredulous. ‘The micks have turned something up, and they’re handing it to us?’

      ‘They’re afraid, Charles. They think they may have stumbled across something big and they want us to pull their potatoes out of the fire for them.’

      Cordwain turned to the wall of his office, on which was pinned a large, garishly coloured map of South Armagh. He tapped the map.

      ‘I Corps has been given information by them of an Irish music festival which is to be held in the hamlet of Kilmurry, County Louth, in two days’ time. Kilmurry is approximately one kilometre from the River Fane, which, as you know, marks the border between north and south in that part of the world. An ideal jumping-off point for any operation. This morning our man Early in Cross utilized the DLB and left a message informing us that Eugene Finn will be at that festival. The Gardai have also informed us that they have identified at least eight major players from Louth or Monaghan ASUs heading north towards the border. Their routes all converge on Kilmurry.’

      ‘A regular PIRA convention,’ Boyd said. ‘Have we anything else?’

      ‘No. But I believe that this is not just a confab, Charles. We’ve hit Cross pretty hard in the past few days. It’s my belief the Provos are going to stage some kind of spectacular, and Kilmurry will be their base of operations. This bash is their cover.’

      ‘And because this place is in the Republic, there’s not a damned thing we can do about it,’ Boyd said bitterly.

      ‘Just so. I cannot authorize an incursion into the Irish Republic, Charles, and there is no time to refer it to the CLF or to the Secretary of State. Our hands are tied.’

      ‘So what can we do?’ Boyd asked.

      ‘Like you, I would dearly love to launch a preemptive strike, but the risk of adverse publicity is too high. There will be hordes of people in Kilmurry once this festival gets under way. There is no question of moving in there – the Provos have planned that part of it well. But I believe they will move north once they have been fully prepped, to launch a strike somewhere in the vicinity of Cross. That we can do something about. Look at the map.’

      Boyd joined his superior at the wall and together they stared at the complex pattern of small roads and hills, villages and hamlets, rivers and bogs.

      ‘See here, this dismantled railway, that more or less follows the line of the Fane?’

      Boyd nodded, and Cordwain went on.

      ‘There are old cuttings all along its length, ideal places to conceal a group of men and form them up for a riving crossing. The Fane is broad, so they’ll need a boat. It’ll be a night operation of course. I think they’ll get themselves ferried across where the cuttings, the river and the border all meet. Here.’ Cordwain’s finger stabbed at a point on the map.

      ‘Now look north, only half a kilometre. There’s a hill here, with an old ring-fort on top. Drumboy Fort, it’s called; we’ve had OPs on it in the past. There is your ideal spot to wait and intercept them. Good fields of fire in all directions, no civvy houses close by, and a perfect view of the river, and thus the border.’

      ‘You don’t expect them to be picked up by car, then?’ Boyd asked. Cordwain shook his head.

      ‘The nearest road is half a kilometre away. They’ll have to move across country to get to it. And we have all the roads down there sewn up tighter than a nun’s knickers. No, my belief is that they’ll yomp it, move across country to some prearranged RV and then perhaps meet up with a few friends north of the border before moving in on their objective.’

      ‘Which will be?’

      Cordwain shrugged. ‘I have no idea, though I have my suspicions. If you extend a line from the Fane up past Drumboy Fort, where does it take you?’

      Boyd peered at the map, then burst out: ‘The base! Crossmaglen security base! But that can’t be right.’

      ‘That’s what I thought. It would be foolhardy, to say the least. But you’ll have to bear in mind, Charles, that these jokers are after something big. Not a mortar – they’ll be travelling too light for that. But an ambush, certainly, perhaps of a foot patrol. I think they intend to wipe out an entire patrol, engage it face to face and then blow it away.’

      Boyd whistled softly. ‘What about their strength?’

      ‘This will be a big operation in their terms, comparable to Loughgall perhaps. I think you can bank on at least ten or twelve of them.’

      They turned away from the map and resumed their seats. Another helicopter took off, loaded to the gills with men and equipment. It was a Greenjacket fire team being airlifted out on rural patrol.

      ‘Fuck,’ Boyd said clearly. ‘This is all surmise though, isn’t it? All we know for sure is that a bunch of players will be at a music festival close to the border.’

      ‘Indeed, but I’ll bet both our arses they aren’t attending it to sit and fiddle. No, they’ll be moving north – you can count on it.’

      Boyd’s eyes shone. If he pulled off a large-scale ambush on a sizeable PIRA force it would be an enormous coup for the Government, the army and the SAS. But also for Lieutenant Charles Boyd.

      ‘I have four men tied up in the OP in Cross itself, but twelve men available here, a multiple of three bricks. That should do it.’

      Cordwain was not so sure.

      ‘I’d rather fly in some of the Special Projects team from G Squadron in Hereford.’

      ‘But we haven’t the time. And we don’t have enough evidence to go on. We’ll have egg all over our faces if we get G Squadron all the way over here and then nothing materializes.’

      Cordwain paused, clearly uneasy. ‘There is that, of course…’

      ‘James, twelve SAS troopers will take out anything the Provos can throw at them.’ Boyd appeared invincibly confident. Cordwain studied him for a moment. The young officer clearly still felt himself to be on a roll after the successful Tyrone operation, and wanted to add further lustre to his laurels. That was no bad thing, so long as it did not lead to overconfidence. But his brashness was appealing, and it was true that they had very little to go