Field of Blood (25 page)

Ì'll be outside,' the Inspector said. `Mr Rennie'll be here soon. You shouldn't go

out, not till he's been, and the kids shouldn't go out.'

She heard the door close. She took the milk from the fridge, and then opened a

cupboard and she saw the piles of plates and saucers, and cups, and mugs. There

was a mug with rabbits on it, and she reached for it without thinking, and then

she wondered if it had been left behind in the panic rush to get to a bedside in an

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English hospital. She wondered, and she blinked her eyes, and took down the mug. She might have smashed the mug, instead she filled it with milk.

She took the milk into the living room.

She saw pleading on her husband's face.

Ìt's nice, isn't it?' McAnally said. Ìt's a nice house ...'

`You're bought cheap. Running hot water, and a stair carpet, and

you're happy to bloody tout.'

Ìt's the best for us, for all of us,' he was shouting. Ìt's because I love you, you and the kids.'

Young Gerard ran from the window to clutch at his mother's waist. Ì'm sorry,'

she mimicked.

He looked out of the window. He saw the landrover, and the Inspector standing

by the door and smoking a cigarette. He looked the other way, down the length

of the room, out of the glass doors and across the back garden and he saw the

dark silhouette of a uniformed constable.

Ìt's a hell of a way to show you love us, Sean, bringing us here.'

Frankie crossed West Belfast many times that morning in his effort to measure the scale of the lifts. He was in Twinbrook and Suffolk, in Finaghy and Beechmount, in Ballymurphy and Whiterock, in Andersonstown and Falls. He

checked the homes and safe houses of the big men of Brigade and the Battalions.

He saw the smashed‐down doors.

He was known in the Organization as a willing helper. He held no Brigade rank,

nor any position in a particular Battalion. His friends liked to think of him as a troubleshooter, and that always raised a laugh in a snug bar or an upstairs back

room. He floated from the A.S.U.s and the Volunteers up the ladder to the big shots who surrounded the Chief. He knew almost every man who had been taken

to Castlereagh, and so he knew how grave the damage was.

That morning Frankie Conroy felt the fear of many men in the city. It was the fear

bred by a traitor, and the fear was fuelled by the danger of the domino. If one man turned and implicated a cell block full of friends, then would one of those friends go supergrass too? Where did it end?

There was one way, one way only, in Frankie's thinking, to handle the tout. He should be handled at barrel point. The informer should be terrorized into retraction. The long arm of the Organization had to reach to the safe house of the tout. And the bastard could be in any police station in the city, or in any 133

military barracks, or he could be up in Prot country in the north of Co. Antrim, or

he could be in the Air Force compound at Aldergrove ... where to begin to bloody

look?

He had called a meeting. Without authority he had taken charge. Who could give

Frankie Conroy authority to blow his bloody nose when Brigade staff was in Castlereagh, and half of the Battalion officers with them? The meeting was called

for lunch hour in the bar in Clonard where there was a private room, where Frankie was comfortable.

During the morning Frankie had worked hard. He had dug into the background lives of Sean and Roisin McAnally. In Turf Lodge, the Parade and the Drive ran parallel. He parked in the Parade and cut through a garden and climbed the low

common fence and came to the back door of a house in the Drive, the back door

of Number 12.

He saw the old woman in the kitchen, washing her smalls.

He rapped on the window.

She came to the back door.

Ìt's Mrs O'Rourke?

'Who's wanting me?

'Not to matter who's wanting you ... You're the Ma of Roisin McAnally? ... You're

the Gran of Gerard and Patty and Sean ...?'

He saw the nervousness in her face.

`Been to 63 this morning, Mrs O'Rourke?

'I have.'

Ànd I'll bet you didn't get much of a welcome this morning, Mrs O'Rourke.'

`What's it to you?

'Don't ask me questions, Mrs O'Rourke ... What did you find, at 63, this morning?'

Between his finger and his thumb he could have broken her thin wrist, but he held her wrist lightly, like a friend, and he spoke softly, like a saviour.

`Found nothing, found them gone.' There was a dribble glistening at her eyes.

`Gone without telling her Ma?

'She never said nothing about going.'

`You've a telephone, Mrs O'Rourke?'

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**`She never rung me. I've a telephone. She never rung to say she was going.'

`Where's she gone, Mrs O'Rourke?'

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The wet eyes dropped. Frankie was inside the kitchen. He closed the door behind

him. She didn't answer him.

`Where's your man, Mrs O'Rourke, where's Roisin's Da?

'He's in bed, with a chest. It'd kill him to know what she's done.' `You know what

she's done?

'Her furniture's taken, little enough of it, but it's gone.'

`Shall I make a pot of tea for us, Mrs O'Rourke ... Sean McAnally's gone supergrass ... Where's your kettle? ... Your Roisin's married to a tout . . . 'Scuse me for the tap ... Your grankids have an informer for a father . . .'

Frankie had filled the kettle. He lit the gas ring. He was looking to the shelves for the tea tin, and she pointed to it.

Ìt's not out yet, Mrs O'Rourke, but it's going to be out. The dad of Gerard and Patty and Sean is an informer. He's buying his freedom with the gaoling of thirty

men. He's a paid perjurer. He's going to lie his way through a show trial. The men

he's named, they're some of the finest Irish patriots ever born. Mrs O'Rourke ...

we'll need some milk ... Mrs O'Rourke, Sean McAnally is going to be hated in this

city wherever there is pride in the nation of Ireland. He's going to be hated, along with your daughter, along with your grankids ... The kettle's boiled, Mrs O'Rourke.'

She made the tea in the old teapot, the pot she had been given at her wedding.

She passed Frankie Conroy his mug of tea. She put him in a spoon of sugar, and

her hand was shaking, and the grains were spread on the table beside the pile of

waiting washing.

`What do you want of me?

'I want to help you, Mrs O'Rourke. I'm not asking for anything from you, I'm trying to help you, to save you from what's going to hit you when it's known that

your Roisin's man's a tout.'

`What do you want from me?

'You've got it wrong, Mrs O'Rourke, I'm helping you ... it's good tea ... a man's going to come to see you, a law man, he's going to ask something of you. Mrs O'Rourke, we want to get Roisin back to you, back to her home with your grankids, that's all we want. Mrs O'Rourke, if Roisin telephones for you, find out

where she is. If she's not to be hated as the enemy of the Irish people then we have to know where she is ... that's a grand cup, thanks ... we don't want her hated like Sean McAnally, do we, Mrs O'Rourke?'

He left his tea half finished. He went out of the kitchen, and back the way he had

come.

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*

Rennie held up his warrant card at the gate barrier. The soldier on sentry scrutinized it, nodded him through, and Rennie gestured behind him to draw attention to the two following cars.

He knew the way, after a fashion. It was a dozen years since he had worked in Palace Barracks, but he remembered the layout although the married quarters had been extended since his time.

St Andrew's Close, Number 15. It was a bugger to find because all the Closes and

Terraces and Gardens and Avenues were damn near the same. He asked a

housewife, deciphered her Plymouth accent, and found the house with the

landrover and the Inspector parked outside.

He went to the door. There were two men, younger than Rennie, behind him.

McAnally opened the door.

Àlright, Gingy?' Rennie asked, as if there could be no problem.

`She won't speak to me, fucking cutting me out.'

`Leave her to me, Gingy.'

He went through the door and the two men followed him. They were of a type,

old slacks, heavy shoes, sweaters and anoraks. They were alert, interested, they

were at work as if going through the door was the act of card punching.

The television was on in the living room, soap opera, trivial lives where no one thought of blasting a judge to his maker with a Sovietbuilt R.P.G. warhead.

Rennie's nose turned. He reckoned the baby must have peed on the carpet. A fog

of cigarette smoke. He saw the filled ashtray on the arm of the chair in which she

sat. Half the smoke was going up the baby's nose ... perhaps the little bugger peed on the carpet in protest.

Rennie said, `Let's get the introductions over ... This is John Prentice, this is Andy Goss. John and Andy are the guarantee of your safety . . .'

Roisin McAnally looked up at him, there was a sneer on her mouth. Àre they here to see we don't run away?

'They're here as guarantees of your personal protection, no more and no less ...

Spare me a minute, please, Mrs McAnally.'

He nodded his head back towards the door. It wasn't a request, and she stood and followed him. They went out of the room, and without comment Rennie led

the way up the stairs and into the main bedroom. She had not made the bed, she

had not unpacked the suitcase.

`Sit down, Mrs McAnally.'

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She sat, and she stared up at him and her eyes were bright with pain and suspicion.

À few facts, Mrs McAnally. Your Sean, in our book, is a Converted Terrorist. That

means that we are prepared to give him immunity from prosecution, while he is

prepared to testify in court against the men with whom he formerly engaged in

criminal and illegal acts. Some men

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**who have taken a similar road have abandoned their families, left them at home to face the music. Sean insisted that you and your children should be taken

into our protective care, and we are very happy to provide that care. For the next

few weeks we will keep you in Belfast because there's still a hefty amount of ground for Sean to cover with us, after that you may go across the water to England or we may look further away ‐ Cyprus, Gibraltar ‐ but all that depends on

the timing of the Magistrates' committal proceedings in which Sean will provide

prosecution evidence. When that's done we'll be thinking about something

permanent, a new start for you all. After the trial proper we promise to build a new identity for Sean, you, the children, a new identity in a new location.

Financially you will be looked after, not luxury, but comfortable . . .'

`Sean's got immunity?

'Correct.'

`He's guaranteed immunity?

'Correct.'

`We're not prisoners here?

'You're free to go whenever, wherever you wish.'

Ànd you'll not stop us going now ... going home now ...' She stood.

`Hear me out, Mrs McAnally.'

Ì'm going home.'

There was a winter smile spreading on Rennie's face. He took a folded sheet of

paper from his pocket.

`Thought this might interest you, transcript of the local lunchtime radio ...

Listening, Mrs McAnally?'

Her eyes never left his face. He thought that if Sean Pius McAnally had blown Howard Rennie away, then she'd have given him an extra screw that night, to tell

him he'd done well.

`This is what they said on the lunchtime ..."Shortly after a West Belfast family were taken by police into protective care early this morning, Security Forces 137

launched their largest arrest operation of the year. A Provisional Sinn Fein spokesman has admitted that Sean Pius McAnally of the Drive in Turf Lodge has

implicated many leading Republicans after turning supergrass following his arrest

a week ago in connection with the R.P.G. attack that killed Mr Justice William Simpson and two of his police bodyguards." . . . Listening, Mrs McAnally? . . .

"Police sources were claiming this morning that Mr McAnally's statements had led to the arrest of the entire Brigade staff of the P.I.R.A. in Belfast and of many Battalion‐ranking officers. One senior detective said, `We now have firm

evidence against some of the most vicious killers who have been preying on our

community.' It is known that at least thirty men were picked up in the dawn swoops." . . . Got it, Mrs McAnally?'

Rennie replaced the sheet of paper in his pocket.

`You haven't a home to go back to, Mrs McAnally.'

`You bastard.'

Ànd you're a sensible woman.' `What did you do to him?'

`Your baby's crying, Mrs McAnally.' `You've bloody destroyed him.'

Ì didn't destroy him, Mrs McAnally. I didn't kill a judge and two

police officers, I wasn't staring down a twenty‐five‐year stretch ... I'm

bloody Father Christmas to you and your family.'

`He'll be looking over his shoulder for the rest of his life.'