Page 162 of Hang on St. Christopher

“You did more than look, mate.”

“O’Roarke’s plan was a good one. With ***** ****, Liam Flaherty, and ****** ******** dead, the O’Roarke brothers and their followers would become the majority faction on the Army Council. Any deal with the British would be scuppered. Peace would be put off for twenty years at least.”

“The Troubles continue well into the next century.”

“Exactly. But we’ve taken out the assassins. O’Roarke’s enemies are safe. And now everything is in place for a successful conclusion to the negotiations. With O’Roarke’s three most trusted and dangerous hit men in Northern Ireland dead?—”

“Wait. Three?”

“One of my colleagues took out the final member of O’Roarke’s team last night in Derry.”

“Shit. So what happens next?”

“I can’t tell you the rest.”

“You can and you will. I’m not a blabber, and you know it. But I have to know it all.”

I put the gun in his ear. When that didn’t work, I kicked him in the ankle.

“All right! Stop!”

“Talk.”

“You can’t breathe a word of this, Duffy,” he said between gritted teeth.

“I won’t.”

“We have a team in situ in Paris who are on the trail of Seamus O’Roarke.”

“And another team for his little brother, Brendan?”

“It’s the only way.”

“Back to my original question. What gives you the right to go around killing Irishmen and Irishwomen?” I asked.

“We have the full cooperation of the British and Irish governments. At the highest levels.”

“How high a level? The Home Office?”

“Higher. On both sides of the Atlantic. And in France. Executive level.”

“Oh, I see.”

I was way out of my depth here.

I took a deep breath.

“Would you really have killed me?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“These negotiations are too important. They cannot be jeopardized.”

“Why the trip to Knock, to the Marian shrine there?” I asked.

“What I’m doing is the right thing to do. But still, taking men’s lives?—”

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