Seventy Times Seven (4 page)

Chief Inspector Frank Thompson stood beside his desk, staring out of the window at the dank, overcast Belfast sky. Even on the rare occasions when the weather did clear there was no colour in the urban skyscape for the sun to illuminate: the most it could achieve was more shadows.

It had finally stopped raining: how long for was anybody’s guess.

He’d just poured a cup of freshly brewed coffee and was contemplating having another cigarette: his third so far that morning.

Frank had given up smoking.

His dark-brown hair was longer than the regulations permitted, but as everyone on the front line in Northern Ireland knew, anything that marked you out as a member of the security forces marked you out as a target: that included the shine on your shoes, the crease in your trousers as well as the length of your hair and a hundred other nuances that had to be considered every day of your life if you wanted to survive. This attention to detail turned even the simplest of chores into a stressful endeavour.

Frank blew a circle in the thin film of fingerprint dust on top of the battleship-grey filing cabinet to his right, then placed his cup in the centre.

Frank had joined the Met in London as a cadet. He’d worked his way up through the ranks and was considered to be a good cop. He was a grafter: not one of the college boys who appeared on the scene every now and then with a firm grasp of the regulations and a head full of theory, but no common sense. Frank had gained his knowledge on the ground.

He’d made chief inspector before he was forty and was now – at the age of fifty-two – head of the intelligence-gathering unit in Northern Ireland known as Special Branch.

He had been groomed for the job in London and had made several trips to Northern Ireland over the years until one day he got the phone call offering him the post.

There was a lot to take into account before accepting the job. His wife and family were well established in their North London home. He had a good team around him that it had taken years of careful planning and meticulous vetting to put together: none of them would be coming with him. It wasn’t an easy decision, but in the end his wife and his team told him to go – it was too good an opportunity to miss.

For the most part Frank enjoyed his job. But he’d had a lot of shitty times over the course of his career, and today was the pointy bit at the top of the steaming pile, as far as he was concerned.

Detective Inspector John Holden pushed through the door: hair matted to his forehead, a dripping wet coat flopped over his arm. Unusually for him, he was in uniform.

‘Why do the big stories always break when it’s pissing it down?’ he said, loosening his tie. ‘We should do press conferences indoors, like civilised people. Those photographers took pictures of everything but my arsehole,’ he continued. ‘When I left this morning there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. I tell you, I’ve been rained on, hailed on, snowed on – it did everything but shit on me out there, it’s unbelievable.’

‘What did you tell them?’ asked Frank, still staring out of the window.

‘I said you’d be making a full statement on the six o’clock news and left it at that. I think it’s pretty obvious we don’t know what the hell is going on. The press are better informed than we are.’

John walked over to Frank’s desk and was about to place a file on it when he stopped.

‘Is this still a crime scene?’

 ‘No, you’re fine, but don’t touch the filing cabinet, they haven’t finished with it yet,’ answered Frank.

John nodded.

‘Smells like the bastards were smoking in here. Can you smell it? Disgusting.’

‘That was me,’ replied Frank flatly.

‘Thought you’d given up?’

‘That was when I was worried about dying of cancer. Right now . . .’

Frank didn’t finish the sentence.

‘Right,’ said John, not sure where to take it next. He’d never seen Frank in such a foul mood.

He tried to change the subject. ‘Gerry Clarke from Counter Surveillance called up to say the sweep of the office was clear: the bastards didn’t leave any listening devices behind so we’re okay to go about our business. They’ve scanned everywhere except the toilets. I said to him, the IRA is not going to get much information out of there unless their microphones can pick up smells. Which reminds me.’ John waved the file he was holding. ‘The security guard that let the buggers in: this is his statement. If you want a laugh have a read. It stinks to high heaven. He’s already got a claim in. Says he’s too frightened to return to work, so he’s been signed off on full pay. They must have beaten him with a bag of cotton wool; there isn’t one mark on his entire body. The word “collusion” is floating above his head in big, bright dayglo letters. I’ve got Sheena doing a background on him. Supposed to have been vetted before he started working here, but the security for this place is subcontracted out to a private firm. Can you believe that? Nobody even checks their bloody paperwork. Bet you a ten-spot there are some skeletons in his cupboard wearing black balaclavas and carrying Armalites.’

John paused for a second and stared over at Frank’s coffee cup sitting in the circle of dust on the filing cabinet. ‘I’m hoping the filing cabinet’s not the only thing they’ve checked for prints?’

‘Probably the only thing they would have touched,’ replied Frank‚ retrieving his cup. ‘The security guard let them through all the pass doors and into this room. They knew exactly where the list was kept. They weren’t here for anything else.’

‘How did they know it was here? There can’t be that many people who even know it exists, let alone where it’s kept. D’you think someone inside this unit’s tipped them off?’ asked John.

‘It’s got nothing to do with anyone in this unit, John. “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” There’s a bigger game in play: we just need someone to give us a peek at the rulebook.’

The phone on Frank’s desk started ringing. He put a cigarette in his mouth, flicked his Zippo and picked up the receiver.

‘Special Branch.’

The voice at the other end sounded calm: self-assured.

 ‘Frank Thompson?’

‘Speaking,’ replied Frank as he eased himself into his chair.

‘Robert Clancy, MI5.’

Frank covered the mouthpiece and indicated with a nod of the head for John to leave. ‘I need to take this, John.’

‘I hear those nasty terrorists have broken into your office and made off with a dirty-laundry list,’ continued Clancy.

Frank interrupted him. ‘We don’t know for sure who it was yet . . .’

 ‘We do know for sure, Frank,’ said Clancy, talking over him. ‘This is a “for your information” call to say, don’t lose too much sleep over the situation. No need to look too closely into this one, and no arrests without calling us first, d’you understand? As far as the press are concerned, you can make as much noise as you like – “official inquiries”, “thorough investigations”, all that sort of nonsense – but keep the detail vague. Button up the sou’wester and ride the choppy seas, Frank, in a few days they’ll be on to the next big story and those newspapers will be used to wipe their sorry Irish arses.’

‘Thanks for the advice, Robert,’ said Frank, making no attempt to hide the irritation in his voice, ‘but it’s more than just a dirty-laundry list. It’s a list of informers we’ve invested a lot of time nurturing and bringing on, to the point where we get reliable and important information from them. When they start showing up with their heads blown off we’ll need to do a lot more than make reassuring noises to the press.’

‘It’s not your problem, Frank. Ride the storm.’

‘Our entire intelligence-gathering operation has just been flushed down the pan, Robert, so why don’t—’

The line went dead.

As he replaced the receiver back in its cradle a piece of ash fell from Frank’s cigarette, glanced off his tie and landed on his lap. It left behind a powdery grey trail just to the left of the razor-sharp crease.

The trousers had been picked up from the cleaners’ that morning.

Frank took a long drag on what was left of the cigarette and sat for a moment in silence. He let the smoke escape slowly from his mouth and picked up a worn leather notebook from his desk, running his finger down the gold-edged pages until he reached the letter ‘C’. Aside from ‘Chrysaor Sa Runlifu’, the only other thing written on the page was a telephone number.

‘Chrysaor’ was the codename for the Head of Intelligence and Anti-Terrorism, back in London: Frank’s boss.

Frank had looked up ‘Chrysaor’ in the dictionary once: turned out it was a creature from Greek mythology. He wondered who the hell had the time to come up with these names, and couldn’t be bothered trying to pronounce it, so called him ‘Neil’ instead. ‘Sa Runlifu’ was Frank’s version of ‘In Case Of Emergency’. It stood for ‘Sound Alarm, Run Like Fuck’.

He picked the telephone receiver up and paused for a second . . . If this wasn’t an occasion to sound the alarm, what was? 

Frank punched in the number.

There was no answer.

He looked at his coffee mug and thought about taking a sip. The kind of day he was having, he knew – guaranteed – as soon as he lifted the coffee to his lips the person at the other end would pick up.

Frank drew the chipped mug across the desk, leant forward and sniffed: he loved the smell of fresh coffee. He picked the cup up and held it to his lips.

‘Chief Inspector Thompson.’

The well-educated English accent betrayed no hint of surprise at receiving the call, but there was definitely a little irritation in the tone. ‘Everything all right, Frank? I assume not, otherwise why the phone call? What seems to be the problem?’

Frank took another pull on the cigarette and tried not to boil over.

‘I made the breakfast news this morning, Neil. The press are all over the story of the break-in like flies that have just discovered shit comes from a cow’s arse . . . I’m the cow’s arse. They – like me – want to know how the Provos were able to stroll into my “high security” offices like they had their own set of keys and make off with a list containing the names, addresses and fucking dick sizes of every informer we’ve ever used throughout the entire course of the conflict. And why the list included three of my own men who were working undercover until one of them was shot in the neck outside his house just a few hours ago. Also‚ how did the press get to know about this so bloody quickly? That’s a bit of a problem too – I’ve just had a phone call from MI5 telling me to lay off anything but a cursory investigation, which is fine by me, but I’m the one left looking like I’ve got my dick in my hands, and a member of the IRA stroking my balls. So in answer to your question, Neil, yes, I do have a problem. I have several problems: one of the biggest being I have no idea what the fuck is going on.’

‘I’m not really in a position to talk right now, Frank: meeting at Downing Street in five minutes. Why don’t I call you back later this afternoon and I’ll talk you through it.’

Frank could hear voices in the background: Chrysaor wasn’t alone, but Frank didn’t care, he needed answers now.

‘I can’t wait till this afternoon, Neil,’ cut in Frank. ‘The bodies are already starting to pile up. How about I ask the questions and you try your best?’

Without waiting for a reply he launched straight in. It was a standard Special Branch line of attack. Keep your subject on the tilt. Don’t give them time to think.

‘Did we know the list was going to go missing?’

‘Possibly.’

‘Possibly? For Chrissake Neil, c’mon, we either did or we didn’t.’

‘Is this line secure?’ asked Chrysaor.

‘Possibly,’ replied Frank. ‘Although the way things are going round here I can’t bloody guarantee it.’

‘We did know.’

It was the answer Frank least wanted to hear, but he didn’t have time to let its implications sink in. ‘Our entire intelligence-gathering operation is well and truly fucked now, Neil. We’ll never be able to recruit another source again. If they know that we handed the IRA the list on a golden platter it’s all over. The informers on this programme are supposed to be under our protection.’

‘Not any more,’ replied Chrysaor. ‘The political situation has improved substantially over there: we’re not under as much pressure as we once were, we needed to make some cutbacks. The resettlement programme to which you are alluding – with all that entails – is bloody expensive; we had to find a way of winding it down.’

Frank interrupted. ‘We’ve just signed their death warrants, Neil, you know that.’

‘If they can be found,’ replied Chrysaor. ‘I don’t imagine many sources will be hanging around to find out what fate awaits them . . . that’s why we fed the press a few titbits this early on in the game. Publicise the theft of the list to give the buggers on it a chance to make their escape. It’s the least we could do for them, but let’s not get too sentimental, Frank. It’s a little bit of housekeeping that needed to be done. What better way than to let those who created the mess in the first place tidy it up themselves? I admit that it’s rather a crude method of saving money, and I did argue that we would be throwing away a lot of very useful and productive people, but there was no way of simply handing over the names of informers that were no longer of any use. It would have been too obvious what we were trying to do. Unfortunately it was an all-or-nothing play. I’m sorry you weren’t told, Frank. That wasn’t down to me, but it’s done now.’

‘The Thevshi’s file is missing,’ said Frank.

There was silence at the other end of the line.

‘Did you hear me?’ said Frank.

Chrysaor didn’t sound too concerned. ‘That’s unfortunate. I would have thought his file might have been kept separate from all the others . . . in a safe, possibly.’

‘This whole fucking building’s a safe, Neil. If I’d known you were giving away the combination I’d have changed the bloody locks.’

‘Yes, well. Nothing I can do about it, Frank, I’m afraid he’s on his own now. And if anyone is well placed to get themselves out of the shit‚ it’s him.’

 Frank’s secretary Sheena poked her head round the door and mouthed to Frank, ‘I’ll come back.’