GAMES OF THE HANGMAN Page 4

  "I didn't realize smoked salmon needed so much protection," said Fitzduane.

  "It's the company it keeps," answered Kilmara.

  Whenever Ireland's idiosyncratic climate and the Celtic mentality of many of its natives began to get him down, Kilmara had only to reflect on how he had ended up in his present position to induce a frisson of well-being.

  Kilmara had been successful militarily in the Congo, and the saving of most of the hostages at Konina had been hailed as a classic surgical strike by the world press; but the bottom line had a political flavor, and back in cold, damp Ireland Kilmara was court-martialed—and found guilty. He did not dispute the finding.

  He had initiated the Konina stride against orders, and eighteen of his men had been killed.

  On the credit side of the ledger, the operation had been a success. More than seven hundred lives had been saved, and world public opinion had been overwhelmingly favorable, so he did dispute whether charges should have been brought at all. Many others, including the officers judging him at his court-martial, felt the same way, but the verdict, once the court was convened, was inevitable. The sentence was not. It could have involved a dishonorable discharge and imprisonment or even the extreme penalty. It did not. The members of the court demonstrated their view that the institution of such proceedings against one of their own was ill judged and motivated by political malice by settling for the minimum penalty: a severe reprimand.

  Kilmara could have stayed on in the army, since most of his peers regarded the verdict as technical, but a more serious shock was to follow. Under the guise of economy measures, the elite airborne battalion he had selected and trained to such a peak of perfection was disbanded.

  Although both the court-martial and the disbanding of Kilmara's command were publicized as being strictly military decisions made by the chief of staff and his officers, Kilmara was under no illusions as to where they actually originated or what he could do about them. He assessed the situation pragmatically. For the moment he was outgunned. There was nothing he could do. His antagonist was none other than one Joseph Patrick Delaney, Minister for Defense.

  "It's realpolitik," said Kilmara to a disappointed chief of staff when he resigned. Two days later he left Ireland.

  Many in the Irish establishment—political and civil—were not unhappy at Kilmara's departure. He had been outspoken and abrasive about conditions in the army and had an unacceptably high profile in the media. His very military success had made him into a greater threat. The establishment in conservative Ireland was fiercely opposed to change. It was glad to see the back of the outspoken colonel and was confident he would never return in an official capacity. Any alternative was unthinkable.

  It was assumed by his colleagues in the cabinet that the minister's active hostility toward Kilmara was merely the normal conservative's dislike of the outspoken maverick, leavened by a not-unnatural jealousy of the military man's success—and as such it was understood. They were right, up to a point. However, the real reason Joseph Patrick Delaney wanted Kilmara discredited was more serious and fundamental. Kilmara was a threat not just to the minister's professional ambitions but, if ever the soldier put certain information together, to the politician's very life.

  To put it simply, Delaney was a traitor. He had passed information about the plans and activities of Irish troops in the Congo to a connection in exchange for considerable sums of money, which had resulted in the frustration of some of the Airborne Rangers battalion's operations—and in the death and wounding of a number of men.

  The minister had not set out to be a traitor. He had merely put his ambitions before his integrity, and circumstances had done the rest. The minister was convinced that Kilmara suspected what he had done—though, ironically, he was wrong. Kilmara's undisguised contempt for him was based on no more than the typical soldier's dislike of a corrupt and opportunistic political master.

  After his resignation from the Irish Army in the mid-sixties, Kilmara should have vanished from Irish official circles for good. But then, in the seventies, the specter of terrorism began to make itself felt. It had been largely confined to British-occupied Northern Ireland and to Continental Europe, but violence, unless checked, has a habit of spreading, and borders are notoriously leaky.

  The Irish government was concerned and worried, but it was the assassination of Ambassador Ewart Biggs that made the critical difference.

  In 1976 Christopher Ewart Biggs, ex-member of Britain's Secret Intelligence Service, writer of thrillers—all of them banned by the Irish censors—and wearer of a black-tinted monocle, was appointed British ambassador to the Republic of Ireland. It was a controversial choice at best, and it was to end in tragedy.

  Cm the morning of July 21, Ewart Biggs seated himself on the left-hand side of the backseat of his chauffeur-driven 4.2-liter Jaguar. He was to be driven from his residence in the Dublin suburb of Sandyford to the British Embassy near Ballsbridge. Behind the Jaguar drove an escort vehicle of the Irish Special Branch containing armed detectives.

  A few hundred meters from the residence, the ambassador's car passed over a culvert stuffed with one hundred kilograms of commercial gelignite. The culvert bomb was detonated by command wire from a hundred meters away. The Jaguar was blasted up into the air and crashed back into the smoking crater. Ambassador Ewart Biggs and his secretary, Judith Cooke, were crushed to death.

  The killings sent a cold shudder through the Irish political establishment. Whom might the terrorists kill next? Would the British start revenge bombings, and who might their targets be? It wasn't a cheerful scenario.

  The Irish cabinet went into emergency session, and a special committee was set up to overhaul Irish internal security. It was decided to appoint a special security adviser to the Taoiseach. It was an obvious prerequisite that such an adviser be familiar with counterinsurgency on both an international and a national basis.

  Discreet inquiries were made throughout Europe, the United States, and places much farther afield. The replies were virtually unanimous. In the intervening decade, working with many of the West's most effective security and counterterrorist forces, Kilmara had consolidated his already formidable reputation. His contempt for most bureaucrats and politicians was well known. The cabinet committee was unhappy with the appointment, but having Kilmara around was preferable to being shredded by a terrorist mine. Just about.

  Kilmara drove a hard bargain. It included an ironclad contract and a substantial—by Irish standards—budget. Ninety days after his appointment, as stipulated in his contract, Kilmara set up an elite special antiterrorist unit. He named it "the Rangers" after his now-disbanded airborne battalion. The entire unit numbered only sixty members. Some were drawn from the ranks of the army and the police. Many had been with Kilmara in the Congo. A number were seconded from other forces like the German GSG-9 and the French Gigene. There were others whose backgrounds were known only to Kilmara.

  The performance of the Rangers exceeded expectations. Success did not mellow Kilmara. He remained cordially disliked—and, to an extent, feared—by much of the political establishment and, above all, by the present Taoiseach, a certain Joseph Patrick Delaney.

  But he was needed.

  They lunched alone. Their relationship had been that of commanding officer and young lieutenant—mentor and disciple—during the early days of their service together in the Irish Army, but shared danger in the Congo and the passage of time had made it a relationship of equals. They had been comrades-in-arms. They had become close friends.

  The cold buffet was excellent. The wine came from Kilmara's private stock, and its quality suggested that he was putting his French associations to good use. They finished with Irish coffees. They had been talking about times past and about the Ireland of the present. The matter of the hanging had been left by mutual consent until the meal was over.

  Kilmara finished lighting his pipe. "Ah, it's not a bad life," he said, "even in this funny little country of ours—frustrations, b
etrayals, faults, and all. It's my home, and we're a young nation yet."

  Fitzduane smiled. "You sound positively benign," he said. "Dare I add complacent?"

  Kilmara growled. "Sound, maybe; am, no. But enough of this. Tell me about Rudolf von Graffenlaub."

  Fitzduane told his story, and Kilmara listened without interrupting. He was a good listener, and he was intrigued as to why the death of a total stranger had so affected his friend.

  "An unfortunate way to start the day, I'll grant you," said Kilmara, "but you're not exactly a stranger to death. You see more dead bodies in a week in your line of work than most people do in a lifetime. I don't want to sound callous, but what's one more body? You didn't know the young man, you don't know his friends or his family, and you didn't kill him"—he looked at Fitzduane—"did you?"

  Fitzduane grinned and shook his head. "Not that I remember."

  "Well then," said Kilmara, "what's the problem? People die. It's sort of built into the system. It's what they call the natural order of things. What is Rudi von Graffenlaub's death to you?"

  Fitzduane gathered his thoughts.

  Kilmara spoke again. "Of course I'll help," he said. "But I am curious about your rationale for what seems, on the face of it, a somewhat arcane project."

  Fitzduane laughed. "I don't have one neat reason," he said. "More like a feeling that this is something I should stay with."

  "You and your instincts," said Kilmara, shaking his head. "They are, as I remember full well from the Congo, downright spooky. So what's on your mind?"

  Fitzduane refreshed his memory from his notes. "I'd like to talk to the pathologist who carried out the postmortem on our freshly dead friend. The normal pathologist for the area was away at a conference, and Harbison was tied up on some thing or other. A Dr. Buckley drove up from Cork for the occasion."

  "I know Buckley," said Kilmara. "A smallish man with salt-and-pepper hair. Originally from West Cork. Now based in the South Infirmary."

  "That's the boyo," said Fitzduane.

  "Buckley's a good man," said Kilmara. "He's first-rate, but he's like a clam when it comes to professional matters unless there are good reasons for him to talk."

  "That ball is in your court," said Fitzduane. "I tried ringing him off my own bat and got nowhere. He was affable but firm."

  "Ah, the people of West Cork have great charm," said Kilmara. "It must go with the scenery. I'll see what I can do. What's next?"

  "I'd like copies of all the relevant reports: police, forensic, coroner's. The lot," said Fitzduane.

  "It's certainly improper and arguably illegal to give that sort of thing to a civilian. But okay. No problem."

  "I need some sort of introduction to the authorities in Bern," said Fitzduane. "That's where Rudolf von Graffenlaub came from. That's where his parents and friends live. I want to go over and ask some questions, and I don't want to be politely deported on the second day."

  Kilmara grinned. "This one calls for a little creative thinking."

  "Finally, what do you know about Draker College?" asked Fitzduane. "And I don't mean have you got a copy of the college prospectus."

  "I thought you might get to that one sometime," said Kilmara. "Now it's my turn for a question. Do you have any idea what you're looking for?"

  Fitzduane smiled gently. "No," he said, "but I expect I'll know when I find it."

  They were silent for a few moments. Kilmara rose and stretched and walked over to the window. He peered through the Venetian blinds. "The rain isn't so bad," he said. "It's only spitting now. What about a stroll in Herbert Park?"

  "It's winter and it's March and it's cold," said Fitzduane, but his movements belied his words. He shrugged into his still-damp coat. "And there are no flowers."

  "There are always flowers," said Kilmara.

  They walked the short distance to Herbert Park and turned onto the deserted grounds.

  The four security guards moved in closer, though they were still out of earshot. They were perceptibly edgy. The light was dull, and the shrubbery provided cover for a possible assailant. It was unlike the colonel to expose himself for this length of time in what could not be made, with the manpower available, a secure area. The bodyguard commander called in to Ranger headquarters for backup. He wondered what the two men were talking about. He hoped the rain would get heavier so they'd return to bricks and mortar and a defensible perimeter.

  They were talking about terrorists.

  "Take our homegrown lot," said Kilmara. "We hunt them and imprison them, and occasionally we kill them, but I still have a certain sympathy for, or at least an understanding of, the Provos and other splinter groups of the IRA. They want a united Ireland. They don't want Britain hanging on to the North."

  "By exploding bombs in crowded streets, by killing and maiming innocent men, women, and children, by murdering part-time policemen in front of their families?" broke in Fitzduane.

  "I know, I know," said Kilmara. "I'm not defending the IRA. My point is, however, that I understand their motives."

  They left the ponds and gardens of Herbert Park and crossed the road into the area of lawn and tennis courts. Wet grass squelched underfoot. Neither man noticed.

  Kilmara continued. "Similarly, I understand other nationalist terrorist organizations like ETA or the various Palestinian outfits, and the Lord knows there are enough of those. But I have great difficulty in grasping the motives of what I tend to think of as the European terrorists—the Bader-Meinhof people, the 'Red Army Faction,' as they call themselves, Action Directe—or gangs like the Italian Brigate Rosse.

  "What the hell are they after? Most of the members come from well-to-do families. They are normally well educated—sometimes too well. They don't have material problems. They don't have nationalistic objectives. They don't seem to have a coherent political philosophy. Yet they rob, kidnap, maim, and murder. But to what end? Why?"

  "What are you leading up to?"

  Kilmara stopped and turned to face Fitzduane. He shook his head. "I'm buggered if I know exactly. It's a kind of feeling I have that something else is brewing. We sit on this damp little island of ours with mildew and shamrock corroding our brains and think all we have to worry about, at least in a terrorist sense, is the IRA. I'm not sure it's that simple.

  "I've no time for communism, which is self-destructing anyway, but all is far from well in Western democracies. There is a gangrene affecting our values that gives rise to terrorists like the Red Army Faction, and I'm beginning to get the smell in this country."

  They started walking again. To the great relief of the bodyguard commander, the heavens opened, and rain descended in solid sheets. The colonel and his guest headed toward a Ranger car.

  "Is this instinct or something harder?" asked Fitzduane. "Is this academic discussion or something that crosses what I'm up to?"

  "It's not academic," said Kilmara, "but it's not hard. It's bits and pieces sifted from intelligence reports and interrogations. It's the presence of elements that shouldn't be there. It's stuff on the grapevine. It's the instinct of someone who's been a long time in this game. As for whether it affects you, I don't see how—but who knows? Suicide is about alienation. There are other ways to show society you're pissed off. And there is a lot about our society to piss people off."

  Kilmara stopped as they approached the car. The sky was black, and thunder rumbled. Rain poured down and cascaded off the two men. Lightning flashed and for a moment illuminated Kilmara's face. He started to say something, then seemed to change his mind. He reverted to what they had just been discussing. "In this new modern Ireland of ours—and for Ireland you can substitute the Western capitalist world—our idea of progress is a new shopping center or video machine. It just isn't that simple. Life can't be that hollow."

  Fitzduane looked at his friend.

  "I've got children," said Kilmara, "and I'm not sure I like the view in my crystal ball."

  They returned to the hotel and dried off and had a hot whiskey togeth
er for the road. They drank in companionable silence. The hotel's central heating was as usual too hot, but their coats and hats, draped over the radiators and dripping onto the carpet, were drying out. The room smelled like an old sheepdog.

  "I wonder what you've got into this time, Hugo," said Kilmara. "You and your fucking vibes." He swirled the clove in his hot whiskey. "Tell me," he said, "do they still call you the Irish samurai?"

  "From time to time," replied Fitzduane. "The media have picked it up, and it's in the files. It livens up a story."

  Kilmara laughed. "Ah," he said, "but the name fits. There you are with your ideals, your standards, your military skills, and your heritage, looking for a worthwhile cause to serve, a quest to undertake."

  "The idea of a samurai," said Fitzduane, "is a warrior who already serves, one who has already found his master and has his place in the social order, a knight in the feudal system answerable to a lord but in charge of his own particular patch."

  "Well," said Kilmara, "you've certainly got your own particular patch—even if it is in the middle of nowhere. As to whom you are answerable"—he grinned—"that's an interesting question."

  The thunderstorm was working itself up to a climax. Rain drummed against the glass. Lightning split the sky into jagged pieces.

  "It's the weather for metaphysics," said Fitzduane, "though scarcely the time."

  Fifteen minutes later Kilmara was connected by telephone to a white-tiled room in Cork.

  A smallish man with salt-and-pepper hair and the complexion of a fisherman was given the phone by the lab technician. The smallish man was wearing a green smock and trousers and rubber apron. His white rubber boots were splashed with blood.

  "Michael," said Kilmara after the proprieties had been observed, "I want you to take a break from cutting the tops off Irish skulls with that electric saw of yours in a fruitless search for gray matter. I'd like you to take a friend of mine out to dinner and do a wee bit of talking."