Once A Pilgrim: a breathtaking, pulse-pounding SAS thriller. James Deegan
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to look at Sean, he half-rolled, half-fell past the screaming woman and into her house.
He was standing, wild-eyed in the living room, bright red blood pulsing from his wound, his brain overloaded with information and questions, when two soldiers burst in.
Mick Parry and John Carr.
The three men stood looking at each other, panting – for a half-second, no more.
Then Carr stepped forward and stabbed Gerard Casey’s cheek with the barrel of his rifle, as if it was bayonet practice, breaking his cheekbone and putting him straight down onto the brown carpet.
The soldiers stood over the young shooter, rifles pointed at his chest.
Blood was still streaming from his wound; it would later transpire his carotid and subclavian arteries had been nicked by the SA80 round.
His eyes were vague and unfocused.
Parry bent down and slapped his face. ‘Wakey wakey,’ he said, with a grin. ‘It’s Para Reg time!’
Gerard Casey groaned.
‘We’ve just killed your mate,’ said Parry. ‘Shot the wanker in the face.’
‘My brother,’ moaned the stricken man. ‘No.’
He half-coughed, half-sobbed. A guttural sound.
‘Ambulance,’ he said, thickly. ‘Please. It hurts.’
He closed his eyes, and a vivid image swam through his mind of Sean’s head disintegrating.
He vomited and started choking on the bitter bile.
The housewife had come in, hand to her mouth in horror, and now she raised the receiver on the telephone.
‘You put that fucker down,’ said Parry, getting up and pushing her roughly into the darkened kitchen.
Carr got down, his left knee in Gerard Casey’s blood, and pulled a first field dressing from his webbing.
Ripped open the boiler suit and tore the sodden T-shirt underneath it apart.
The wound was pulsing red.
He lifted the injured man slightly and felt at the back.
No exit wound.
Young Casey’s eyes were starting to roll back in his head, and his breathing was becoming laboured and irregular.
Carr was applying the field dressing onto the wound on his collarbone when Parry reappeared.
‘What the fuck are you doing?’ he said. ‘We’re not saving this cunt’s life, John.’
‘We’re better than them,’ said Carr, through gritted teeth. ‘He needs an ambulance.’
‘Fuck that,’ said Parry. He squatted down next to Casey, pulled off the dressing and threw it across the room. ‘Three of my mates were killed at Mayobridge the other day by your mob, pal,’ he said to the groaning man. ‘Young lads, blown to pieces by cowards. If you think I’m calling yous a fucking ambo you must be confusing me with somebody who gives a shit.’
The blood was spurting more slowly, now, so Parry pressed his hand on Casey’s chest, making it flow quicker.
‘How does that feel?’ he said. ‘Does it sting a bit?’
‘He’s going tae bleed out, Mick,’ said Carr.
‘Yeah,’ said Parry. ‘That’s the general idea.’
Just then, they heard a stifled sob behind them, and turned to see the homeowner standing in the kitchen doorway, hands over her mouth.
‘Get her back through there, and tell her to fucking stay there,’ said Parry, to Carr. ‘Then get outside and tell the boss I’m giving this wanker first aid.’
Carr hesitated for a moment.
Then ushered the sobbing woman out of the room and into her kitchen, and left the house to do as he was told.
An ambulance was finally called ten minutes later.
By that time, Gerard Casey was unconscious.
By the time it arrived he was dead.
BILLY JONES SENIOR sat in the Long Bar on the Shankill Road, surrounded by a gang of his shaven-headed cronies.
The TV in the top corner of the pub was on about some shooting in central Belfast, but he paid it no particular mind. He was sipping his whisky chaser and trying to decide between another pint of Carling or a move on to Strongbow, when two uniformed RUC men walked in, faces nervous, flat caps in their hands.
Someone walked hurriedly out of the bar, head down, and through the open doorway Billy briefly saw flashing blue lights and the camouflaged tunics of a group of soldiers.
The RUC men’s eyes swept the room and settled on him.
They walked towards his table.
‘Evening, Billy,’ said one of them, respectfully. ‘We’ve been trying to get hold of you. Can we have a word in private, please?’
Billy Jones looked up at them with the dead gaze of a reptile. ‘Anything you want to say to me you can say in front of the boys,’ he said. ‘We’ve no secrets here.’
‘Only, we tried your house, Billy,’ said the officer. ‘Couldn’t get an answer, couldn’t find your wife, so… Well, we thought you’d be in here.’
‘Spying on me, is it?’ he said with a mocking grin, and a suck on his teeth. He shook his head, almost sadly. ‘You fucking peeler bastards.’
‘Billy, I really think it would be best in private.’
‘Spit it out.’
The two officers looked at each other. The one doing the talking sighed.
‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Have it your way. It’s about your son. Billy Junior.’ His eyes flicked up at the TV, which was showing a car park, now brightly lit and crawling with police. ‘He’s the one that was killed tonight.’
Billy looked at him. Not a flicker of emotion.
He casually picked up his Bells and threw it back.
‘Is that yous?’ he said, with a grimace at the heat of the spirit. ‘Are yous done?’
‘Aye.’
‘Then get the fuck out,’ he shouted. ‘Go on. Fuck off!’
‘We’re sorry, Mr Jones, our condolences, we…’
‘Fuck off, you fucking wankers!’
The two constables turned on their heels and walked away, heads down, hands resting lightly on their sidearms, Billy Jones’ eyes burning into their backs.
When the door was shut, the men at the table exchanged looks.
‘Billy,’ said one. ‘I’m sorry. He was a good kid.’
Billy Jones Senior looked at him in disgust. ‘You what? He was a fucking embarrassment, so he was, and you know it. If you can’t speak the fucking truth to me, you’re no fucking good to me. You can get the fuck out as well.’
‘Yes, Billy,’ said the man, and hurried out without finishing his drink or putting on his coat.
Jones looked up at the bar. A man in a blue Rangers shirt put down his pint, walked casually over, and bent his head.
‘You and Tam McDonald,’ whispered Billy Jones Senior, hoarsely. ‘You get fucking out there tonight and kill two fucking Catholics. Any fuckers, I don’t care, but it better be on the news first thing in the morning. Cut their throats.’
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