Читать книгу Rough Justice - Jack Higgins, Justin Richards - Страница 16

Looking back, Harry Miller remembered that year well, not just because of the bad March weather in London and the constant rain, but because what happened proved a turning point in his life. He was a full lieutenant in the Intelligence Corps at twenty-four and nothing much seemed to be happening. He shared an office with a young second lieutenant named Alice Tilsey, and she’d beaten him to it that morning. He took off his trench coat, revealing a tweed country suit, uniforms being out that year as the IRA had announced that men in uniform on London streets were a legitimate target.

Alice said brightly, ‘Thank God you’re wearing a decent suit. Colonel Baxter called for you five minutes ago.’

‘What have I done?’

‘I lied and said you were getting the post downstairs.’

‘You’re an angel.’

He hurried up to the next floor and reported to Baxter’s receptionist, a staff sergeant he knew well. ‘Am I in trouble, Mary?’

‘Search me, love, but he certainly wants you right now. In you go. Captain Glover’s with him.’

Baxter glanced up. ‘There you are, Miller. Just sit down for a moment.’

He and Glover had their heads together and enjoyed a brief conversation which made no sense to Miller, and then Baxter said, ‘Still living at Dover Street with your father?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘He’s certainly the sort of MP we can rely on. Always has a good word for the Army in his speeches in Parliament.’

‘Old soldier, sir.’

‘Captain Glover would like a word.’

‘Of course, sir.’

Glover had a file open. ‘You were on the Falklands Campaign seconded to 42 Commando, which of course was invaluable experience of war at the sharp end. Since then, you’ve been seconded once to the Intelligence Desk at Infantry Headquarters at the Grand Hotel in Belfast. What did you make of that?’

‘Interesting, sir, but it was only six weeks.’

Glover said, ‘Looking at your personal details, I see you’re a Roman Catholic, Miller. If I ask if your faith is important to you, please don’t be offended. It could be crucial to why you’re here.’

Uncertain what Glover was getting at, Miller said, ‘I was raised in the faith, I was a choirboy, I’m obviously familiar with the liturgy, and so on. Having said that, I must admit that, like many people, my religion is not at the forefront of my life.’

Baxter intervened, ‘So you’d be capable of going to Belfast for us as a Catholic?’

There was a distinct pause, Miller totally astonished, and it was Glover who explained. ‘Think of it as one of those old black and white British war films where SOE sends you to go to Occupied France as an undercover agent.’

‘Which is what we want you to do in Belfast for us.’ Baxter smiled. ‘Are you up for it?’

Miller’s stomach was churning. It was the same rush of adrenaline he’d experienced in the landings at San Carlos in the Falklands with those Argentine Skyhawks coming in.

‘I certainly am. Just one thing, sir, having visited Belfast, I know that the Northern Irish accent is unique, and I don’t know if –’

‘No problem. You’ll stay English,’ Glover told him.

‘Then I’m at your command, sir.’

‘Excellent. You’re in Captain Glover’s hands.’

In the planning room, Glover laid out a map of Belfast. ‘The River Lagan runs into Belfast Lough and the docks, it’s a busy area.’ He pushed a manila file across. ‘Everything you need is in there, but I’ll go through it anyway. Boats go backwards and forwards from Glasgow, trawlers, freighters.’

‘Illegal cargoes, sir?’

‘Sometimes, arms, for example, and people. There’s a pub in the dock area we’re interested in, the Sailor. The owner is a man named Slim Kelly.’

‘IRA, sir?’

‘Certainly. Did time in the Maze Prison and was released, so there’s good photos of him in your file. He’s supposedly clean these days, but he’s certainly killed many times. Our understanding is that he’s fallen out of favour with the Provos. Lately he’s been involved with a man named Liam Ryan, a psychopath who murders for fun. He’s another one the IRA want to dispose of. Our information is that he’s done a deal to supply Kelly with Stinger missiles. These things can be operated by one man and they’ll bring down a helicopter. We understand they’ll be delivered to Kelly by Ryan next week in a trawler called the Lost Hope. The moment you can confirm the meet, you call in your contact number in Belfast, which will bring in an SAS team on the run. It sounds simple, but who knows? Whatever happens, don’t use the contact number unless you are positive you have Kelly and Ryan in the frame.’

‘What exactly is my cover, sir?’

‘You’re employed by St Mary’s Hospice in Wapping. There’s a branch in Belfast close to the Sailor, an old priory run by nuns that provides for the deserving poor, and so forth. It needs renovating, and it’s already had a building surveyor from London come in. You’re an ordinand, whatever that is.’

‘Someone who’s considering the priesthood.’

‘Perfect cover, I should have thought. You’re from the London estate office. You’ve got all the documents on what needs doing. The story is you’re there to confirm it. You’re the man from head office, in a way.’

‘Where do I stay?’

‘The Priory. It’s all arranged by the Mother Superior, a Sister Maria Brosnan. To her, you’re the genuine article.’

Which in some strange way made Miller slightly uncomfortable. ‘Can I ask how you’ve been able to make these arrangements, sir?’

‘As it happens, Colonel Baxter’s younger brother is Monsignor Hilary Baxter in the Bishop of London’s Office. St Mary’s Hospice in Wapping was facing closure because their lease was coming to an end. We’ve been able to resolve their problem.’

To that, there was no answer. ‘I see, sir.’

‘If you call round to Wapping this afternoon with the documents in your file, there’s an old boy called Frobisher who’ll go through them with you. All the necessary work’s been done. You just pretend at the hospice and look busy. Sister Maria Brosnan expects you Monday.’

‘What about my identity?’

‘It’s all in the file, Harry, courtesy of the forgery department of MI6.’

‘And weaponry?’

‘I’m afraid you’re expecting too much there. After all, you’re a travelling civilian heading into the war zone. There’s no way you could go armed.’

‘I see, sir, it’s we-who-are-about-to-die-salute-you time.’ It was a statement, not a question, and Miller carried on, ‘What you really want aren’t the Stingers on that boat. This is all about Kelly, the publican of the Sailor who has fallen out of favour with the Provos, and this Liam Ryan who you say is a psychopath.’

‘Two years ago, he formed a breakaway group, no more than a dozen people, calling it the Irish Liberation Movement. Wholesale butchery, torture, kidnap – his favourite pastime is removing his victim’s fingers with bolt cutters. Bad news for the Republican movement as a whole. The word is the Provos put their best enforcer on the case. Eight of Ryan’s people are known to have been executed for certain, but perhaps more.’

‘But not Ryan?’

‘A will-o’-the-wisp with all the cunning of a beast. He’s one of the few big players who’s never been arrested, so there aren’t prison photos. He’s always avoided cameras like the plague, a bit like Michael Collins in the old days, but we have one anyway.’

‘How is that, sir?’

‘He took out an Irish passport five years ago under a false name. There’s a copy of the passport photo in the file.’

Miller had a look at it. The face was very ordinary, cheeks hollow, the whole thing desperately stilted, the face of some little man for whom life had always been a disappointment. Miller replaced it.

‘Thanks very much, sir. Would you have told me all this if I hadn’t asked?’

‘It’s the name of the game.’ Glover shrugged. ‘I’d get on with it if I were you.’ He patted the file. ‘I’ll put the word out that you’re off on a spot of leave.’

The office was empty when Miller went in, so he sat at the desk and checked out the contents of the file. There was a passport in the name of Mark Blunt, aged twenty-four, a surveyor by profession, a London address in Highbury. He’d been to Italy once, France twice and Holland on a day trip from Harwich. The photo had the usual hunted look and made him look thinner.

He worked his way through the survey reports referring to various parts of the Priory in Belfast. It was all laid out simply and made perfect sense. There was also a Belfast street map, some photos of the Priory and the docks.

So far so good. He put the file in his briefcase and pulled on his raincoat, tense and slightly worked up. The door opened and Alice Tilsey came in.

‘You clever bastard,’ she said. ‘Off on leave, are we? How in the hell did you work that?’

‘For God’s sake, Alice,’ he said. ‘After a year in the Corps, I’d have thought you’d have learned when to keep your mouth shut and mind your own business.’

A look of total contrition and horror spread over her face. ‘Oh, my God, Harry, you’re going in-country, aren’t you? I’m so bloody sorry.’

‘So am I, actually,’ he said and left.

Mr Frobisher at St Mary’s Hospice in Wapping was obviously in his early seventies and looked it. Even his office seemed like something out of Dickens. He stood at a drawing table and went through documents with Harry, in the kind of faded voice that seemed to come from another time and place.

‘I produced these plans after a visit to Belfast a year ago. I thought we’d never be able to attempt the necessary work, but Monsignor Baxter’s explained that everything’s changed. We have money now. You aren’t a trained surveyor, of course. He told me he was sending you for what he termed a layman’s opinion.’

‘I’m that, all right,’ Miller said.

‘Yes, well, it’s all detailed very clearly. The cellars extend along the whole waterfront, and in places there is flooding. It’s the docks, you see.’

‘Thanks for the warning.’

‘You’re an ordinand, I understand. Monsignor Baxter said you might enter the priesthood.’

‘Perhaps,’ Miller told him. ‘I’m not certain.’

‘Belfast was not good during my visit. Bombs at night, some shooting. A godless place these days.’

‘The world we live in,’ Miller said piously.

‘I would warn you of the pub next door to the Priory, the Sailor. I had luncheon there on occasion, but didn’t like it. The people who frequented it were very offensive when they heard my English accent, particularly the landlord, an absolute lout called Kelly.’

‘I’ll remember that.’

‘Take care,’ Frobisher said, ‘and give my regards to Sister Maria Brosnan, the Mother Superior. She comes from Kerry in the Republic, a beautiful county.’

Miller left him and walked up to Wapping High Street. He happened to pass a barber’s shop, and on impulse went in and had his hair cut quite short. It emphasized his gauntness, so that he resembled the man in the passport photo more than ever.

His Savile Row suit was totally out of place, so he searched and found a downmarket men’s outfitters where he bought a single-breasted black suit, three cheap shirts and a black tie. He also invested in a shabby fawn raincoat, much to the surprise of the salesman he dealt with, as he’d gone in wearing a Burberry. Spectacles were not possible, because they would have had to be clear glass, a giveaway in the wrong situation.

He walked on, reaching the Tower of London, adjusting to thoughts of his new persona: someone of no importance, the sort of downtrodden individual who sat in the corner of some musty office, not to be taken seriously at all. Finally, he hailed a taxi and told the driver to take him to Dover Street.

When he arrived, opening the front door, Monica appeared from the kitchen at the end of the hall. ‘Guess who?’

He dropped his bags. ‘Why aren’t you at Cambridge?’

‘I decided, purely on impulse, to spend a weekend with my dear old Dad and my loving brother.’ She kissed him and pushed the bag containing the clothes with her foot. ‘What have you been buying, anything interesting?’

‘No, nothing special.’ He put the bag in the cloakroom and took off his decent trench coat. ‘Regarding the weekend, I’m afraid I’m only good for tonight. I’ll be going north on the train tomorrow.’

‘Oh, dear, where?’

‘Catterick Camp, Paratroop headquarters.’ The lies came smoothly, the deceit. He was surprised how easy it was. ‘A week at least, perhaps more. I report Sunday morning.’

She was disappointed and it showed. ‘I’ll just have to hope that Dad’s not doing anything. Come on into the kitchen. I’ll make you a cup of tea.’

There is an old saying that in Belfast it rains five days out of seven and it certainly was raining on the following Monday morning when Miller went down the gangway of the overnight boat from Glasgow. He carried a canvas holdall which contained his file and the barest of necessities: pyjamas, underwear, a spare shirt and a small folding umbrella. He raised it and proceeded along the quay, in the cheap raincoat and suit, making exactly the impression he had wanted. Having examined the streetmap thoroughly, he knew where he was going and found St Mary’s Priory with no difficulty at all.

It looked out over the harbour as it had done since the late nineteenth century, he knew that from the documents in his file and because that was the period when Catholics were allowed to build churches again. It had a medieval look to it, but that was fake, and rose three stories high, with narrow stained-glass windows, some of them broken and badly repaired. It had the look of some kind of church, which the pub down the street from it didn’t. A sign swung with the breeze, a painting of a sailor from a bygone age on it wearing a faded yellow oilskin and sou’wester. A long window was etched in acid Kelly’s Select Bar. In spite of the early hour, two customers emerged, talking loudly and drunkenly, and one of them turned and urinated against the wall. It was enough, and Miller crossed the road.

The sign read: St Mary’s Priory Little Sisters of Pity. Mother Superior: Sister Maria Brosnan.

Miller pushed open the great oaken door and went in. A young nun was at a reception desk sorting some sort of register. A large notice promised soup and bread in the kitchen at noon. There was also a supper in the canteen at six. There were times for Mass in the chapel noted and also for Confession. These matters were in the hands of a Father Martin Sharkey.

‘Can I help you?’ the young nun asked.

‘My name is Blunt, Mark Blunt. I’m from London. I believe the Mother Superior is expecting me.’

The girl sparkled. ‘You’re from Wapping? I’m Sister Bridget. I did my novitiate there last year. How is the Mother Superior?’

Miller’s hard work reading the files paid off. ‘Oh, you mean Sister Mary Michael? She’s well, I believe, but I’m working out of Monsignor Baxter’s office at the Bishop’s Palace.’

A door to the panelled wall at one side of her, labelled Sacristy, had been standing ajar, and now it opened and a priest in a black cassock stepped out.

‘Do you have to bother the boy with idle chatter, Bridget, my love, when it’s the Mother Superior he’s needing?’

She was slightly confused. ‘I’m sorry, Father.’

He was a small man, fair-haired, with a lively intelligent face alive with good humour. ‘You’ll be the young man with the plans for the improvements we’ve been waiting for, Mr Blunt, isn’t it?’

‘Mark Blunt.’ He held out his hand and the priest took it.

‘Martin Sharkey. You know what women are like, all agog at the thought that the old place is going to be finally put to rights.’ There was only a hint of an Ulster accent in his voice, which was fluent and quite vibrant in a way. ‘I’m in and out of the place at the moment, but if there’s anything I can do, let me know. You’ll find the lady you seek through the end door there which leads to the chapel.’ He turned and went back into the sacristy.

The chapel was everything Miller expected. Incense, candles and the Holy Water, the Virgin and Child floating in semidarkness, the confessional boxes to one side, the altar with the sanctuary lamp. Sister Maria Brosnan was on her knees scrubbing the floor. To perform such a basic task was to remind her to show proper humility. She stopped and glanced up.

‘Mark Blunt, Sister.’

‘Of course.’ She smiled, a small woman with a contented face. ‘You must excuse me. I have a weakness for pride. I need to remind myself on a daily basis.’

She put the brush and a cloth in her bucket, he gave her his hand and pulled her up. ‘I was talking to Mr Frobisher the other day. He asked to be remembered to you.’

‘A good and kind man. He saw what was needed here a year ago and doubted the order could find the money.’ She led the way into the darkness, opened a door to reveal a very ordered office, a desk, but also a bed in the corner. ‘But all that has changed, thanks to Monsignor Baxter in London. It’s wonderful for all of us that the money has been made available.’

‘As always, it oils the wheels.’

She went behind her desk, saying, ‘Take a seat for a moment,’ which he did. ‘As I understand it, you will examine everything referring to Mr Frobisher’s original findings and report back to Monsignor Baxter?’

‘That’s it exactly, but let me stress that I don’t think you have the slightest need to worry. There is a very firm intention to proceed. I just need a few days to check things out. I understand I can stay here?’

‘Absolutely. I’ll show you around now.’

‘I met Father Sharkey on my way in,’ Miller told her.

‘A great man, a Jesuit no less.’

‘Soldier of Christ.’

‘Of course. We are fortunate to have him. Father Murphy, our regular priest was struck down the other week with pneumonia. The diocese managed to find Father Sharkey for us. He was due at the English College at the Vatican, a great scholar, I understand, but he’s helping out until Father Murphy is fit again. Now let’s do the grand tour.’

She showed him everything, starting with the top floor, where there was dormitory space for twenty nuns, the second floor with specialist accommodation for nursing cases of one kind or another, a theatre for medical attention. There were half a dozen patients, nuns in attendance.

‘Do you get people in and out on a regular basis?’

‘Of course – we are, after all, a nursing order. Five of the people on this floor have cancer of one kind or another. I’m a doctor, didn’t you know that?’

All Miller could do was say, ‘Actually, I didn’t. Sorry.’

The doors stood open for easy access, and a couple of the nuns moved serenely in and out offering help as it was needed. Some patients were draped in a festoon of needles and tubes, drips of one kind or another. Sister Maria Brosnan murmured a few words of comfort as she passed. The end room had a man in a wheelchair, and what appeared to be plaster of Paris supporting his head, a strip of bandaging covering his left eye. He was drinking through a straw from a plastic container of orange juice.

‘Now then, Mr Fallon, you’re doing well, but try a little walk. It will strengthen you.’

His reply was garbled and they moved to the next room, where a woman, looking pale as death, lay propped up against a pillow, eyes closed. Sister Maria Brosnan stroked her forehead and the woman’s tired eyes opened.

‘You’re very good to me,’ she whispered.

‘Go to sleep, dear, don’t resist it.’

They walked out. Miller said, ‘She’s dying, isn’t she?’

‘Oh, yes, and very soon now. Each is different. A time comes when radiotherapy and drugs have done their best and failed. To ease the patient’s journey into the next world then becomes one of our most important duties.’

‘And Fallon?’

‘He’s different. According to his notes, he has a cancer biting deep into the left eye and it also affects his speech. He’s only been with us for two days, waiting for a bed at the Ardmore Institute. You see, radiotherapy is beyond our powers here. Up at Ardmore, they do wonderful things.’

‘So there could still be hope for him?’

‘Young man, there is hope for all of us. God willing. With cancer, I’ve seen total remission in my time, in some cases.’

‘A miracle?’ Miller said.

‘Perhaps, Mr Blunt.’ Her simple faith shone out of her. ‘Our Lord performed them.’

They were on the ground floor: kitchens, canteen, a dormitory for twenty-five, with a divider, women one side, men the other.

‘Street people. They queue to get a bed for the night.’

‘Amazing,’ Miller said. ‘You really do good work.’

‘I like to think so.’ They were back in the entrance hall, Bridget at her desk.

She produced a parcel. There was a bright painted label which read Glover Hi-Speed Deliveries.

‘For you, Mr Blunt,’ she said. ‘A young man on a motorcycle – I had to sign for it.’

Miller took it and managed to smile, ‘Something I needed to help me in my work,’ he said to the Mother Superior.

She accepted that. ‘Just come this way.’ He followed her towards the chapel entrance, and she turned into a short corridor with a door that said Washroom and two doors opposite.

‘Father Sharkey has one room, now you, the other.’ She turned the key in the door and opened it. There was a locker, a desk and a small bed in the corner.

‘This will be fine,’ Miller told her.

‘Good. Obviously, you’re free to go anywhere you want. If you need me, just call. One thing, do keep your room locked. Some of our guests can be light-fingered.’

She went out. Miller locked the door, sat on the bed and tore open the package. Inside in a cardboard box was a soft leather ankle holder, a Colt .25 with a silencer and a box containing twenty hollow-point cartridges, a lethal package if ever there was one. There was no message, the name Glover Hi-Speed Deliveries