Once A Pilgrim: a breathtaking, pulse-pounding SAS thriller. James Deegan
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It was de Vere’s turn to laugh. ‘I’m certainly English,’ he said, ‘and some might say I was posh, but my parents were married and I promise not to fuck you about any more than I absolutely have to.’ He paused for a moment. ‘So what made you join?’
Carr thought for a moment. ‘Always wanted to be a soldier,’ he said. ‘Since I was a boy.’ He grinned. ‘I like a good scrap, boss, and there’s no better way to get yourself into a scrap than join the Paras.’
‘And what are your plans?’
‘Selection.’
‘The SAS?’
‘Aye. I’m down for the next course.’
‘Good luck.’
‘No such thing. Hard work and mental strength, that’s what’ll get me through.’
De Vere polished off his tea and looked round the room.
His eye fell on Mick Parry, deep in conversation with the two RUC men.
‘Corporal Parry seems an impressive guy,’ he said.
‘Sound as a pound,’ said Carr. ‘Hard fucker, like. But fair. The blokes love him. Officers, not so much.’
De Vere nodded.
‘Brave, as well,’ said Carr. ‘Where we met Gilfillan, down on Ballygomartin? We were there three weeks back. Friday night. Drizzly, it was. Road was wet. Fucking joyriders come down there at seventy, maybe eighty. Stolen XR2i.’
He paused.
‘You know we lost one of the guys to a joyrider at the start of the tour? Never stopped. Hit him on the white line in Andytown. Good mate of mine. Fucking tragic.’
De Vere said, ‘Yes, I know about the incident.’
‘Ever since that, the blokes are fucking twitchy about joyriders,’ said Carr. ‘And the joyriders know it. So this XR2i comes down the road, sees us, and the driver jams on the anchors. Greasy road, shit tyres, the driver was only fifteen. No idea how to get out of the skid. He rolled the car and it hit a lamp-post fifty metres from our position. Set on fire. The lad was fucked up and dead, but there was three other kids trapped in the car – his mate and two wee girls. Mick run straight up the road and dragged them kids out of that car. Knowing it could have gone up at any minute. Or that some PIRA wanker might see him and have a pop.’ Carr finished his own drink. ‘He should get an award for it, really.’
‘And what…’ said the young lieutenant, but he was interrupted by the tramp of Mick Parry’s German para boots on the green lino.
‘Right, John,’ he said, to Carr. ‘Time to get the lads sparking.’ He looked at the lieutenant. ‘You too, boss. Can’t sit around all day chin-wagging with this idle fucker.’
AT AROUND THAT moment, a call was being made from a secure line at 10 Downing Street in London.
The man making the call was a major in the Royal Anglians who was on military liaison attachment to Mrs Thatcher’s personal staff.
The man receiving the call was the 3 Para adjutant in Belfast.
The call was to confirm final arrangements for an event which the two men had been discussing over the previous three days – an unannounced flying visit to Belfast by the PM.
The previous Thursday, gunmen from the Provisional IRA’s Belfast Brigade had shot three off-duty RUC men in a pub off the Shankill Road, killing two and seriously injuring the third. It came hot on the heels of the deaths of three members of the Parachute Regiment in the Mayobridge bombing, and together they demanded a political response.
At some time after 6pm that evening, Mrs Thatcher would be flying in for a secret visit to Knock, to meet grieving family members, and to rally the troops.
A pre-Christmas morale booster.
And, because of that, the city would be crawling with extra Army patrols, cars full of Special Branch, undercover members of 14th Intelligence Company – the surveillance specialists known as ‘the Det’, whose job it was to infiltrate both the Republican and Loyalist communities – and various other watchers, followers and shooters.
AT A QUARTER-TO-FIVE, as the winter darkness fell, the Casey brothers and Ciaran O’Brien finally left the house in Lenadoon Avenue.
Gerard felt simultaneously light and heavy, terrified and excited.
It was weird how the other two looked so relaxed; he tried to copy them.
Well-practised in counter-surveillance, they moved on foot – you spotted a tail much quicker that way – and headed across Lenadoon Park, a nice, wide-open space with enough ambient light to see if you were being followed. They walked out onto Derryveagh Drive, and then down to the Suffolk Road, which was long and straight enough to give good views in either direction.
They turned north.
Almost immediately, Sean said, ‘Shit!’ and dropped his head into his collar.
On the opposite side of the road, a joint Army–RUC mobile patrol was approaching, moving between one exercise in fucking up people’s lives and another. The front driver slowed, and the top-cover in the tail vehicle gave them a long stare, his SA80 rifle held at the ready. A tall, slim officer, he was new in the Province, but he was a diligent man, and he’d spent hours poring over mugshots of the main players. He might well have recognised Sean Casey and Ciaran O’Brien, had the light been better, and that would have been enough to get them a tug. Worse still for the IRA team, the soldiers were Paras, which quite possibly meant hours of being pissed about, and the job off for that night.
But in the gloaming and the drizzle the top-cover couldn’t make them out, and the Land Rovers rumbled and trundled on their way.
A few minutes later, the three of them walked in to McKill’s. It was early and empty, and the barman was polishing glasses. One man sat nursing a pint at a table by the wall – a low-level player who nodded respectfully to Sean and Ciaran. Gerard Casey, his stomach light and queasy, threw a strained half-smile at the barman, and got a quizzical look in return before the fellow went back to his polishing; something was clearly up, but he knew better than to see or ask anything.
They headed straight through to the office at the rear of the building.
The door was locked.
Sean rapped on the flaking green paint with his knuckles.
It was opened – slightly, at first, then wide – by a dark-haired man in his mid-thirties who was wearing dungarees and a thick jumper.
Gerard realised to his surprise that he knew the guy – his name was Martin Thompson, and he coached a kids’ Sunday football team down on the Rec there.
Gerard had had no idea that he was a member of the RA.
The cell structure, in action.
They stepped past Thompson, and the door was locked behind them.
The room was empty apart from an old table, a few chairs, a sports holdall, and a telephone.
Sitting on the table was another man, late twenties, a ginger bog brush on his head, and a face full of freckles – Brian ‘Freckles’ Keogh, Gerard knew his rep alright.
Next to Freckles was what Gerard recognised in the glare of the single bare lightbulb as a folding stock AK47, with two of its distinctive curved magazines lying beside it. There were also two pistols – he couldn’t have named them, but one was a modern-looking thing and the other an old revolver. Next to the revolver was a mug which bore the Celtic FC crest and contained a magazine for the automatic and six rounds