Leo glanced at the three entrances, waiting for a shooter to come in and open up a hole in his head. He sipped on a 7 Up and tried to keep himself occupied. He’d already read the poster for the Karaoke King about ten times. He only glanced at the poster advertising the majorettes. He didn’t want people to think he was some kind of fucking pervert.
He scratched his hair and his beard. He smacked his lips as he watched all the golden pints being poured and slurped. He took a gulp of his lemonade. He’d love something with a bit more kick.
He hadn’t planned on seeing Father Pat before he left, but if he wasn’t coming back he reckoned he owed it to the priest, for all he’d done. And he wanted an act of contrition. His ma would kill him if he didn’t.
This spot, at the end of the bar, near the jacks, was where Ghost told him to be, at 8.30 p.m. sharp. Not that he told him as such when he went up to training. Ghost gave him a note with the message on it and then took it back off him. Before that Ghost had searched him. When he reacted, more instinct than anything, Ghost gave him a smack for his trouble.
His head was wrecked, between Ghost, the RA and the spooks. He was as paranoid as fuck in his bedroom, knowing there was at least one bug there. But he’d done what the spook told him. He repeated to himself the where and when of the meet, but in a way you would do if you were reminding yourself. Other than that, he did jack. He had kept off the gear. He wasn’t going to spurn his one chance by overdosing. So he spent his time rolling joints, smoking joints, and playing music, and lobbing blueys and yellies into him. He had the last bluey before he left.
Even with the tranquillisers, his nerves were jangled as he tried to keep sketch on the doors.
At first, he didn’t notice the tug on his jacket. Looking down he saw a kid. He was munching on crisps.
‘Here,’ the boy said, putting something into his hand.
Leo didn’t take it. Could be anything.
‘Take the fucking thing,’ the kid said, shoving it into his hand. The boy walked off towards the lounge area, crunching away.
It was a phone. Leo held it to his ear, not sure whether to expect a voice or the thing to blow up and take his head off.
‘Yeah?’
‘In the press under the sink in the jacks, there’s a set of clothes and runners. Go into the cubicle, take all yer clothes off, socks, jocks, the works, and put on the new ones. Leave yer clothes in the bag.’
‘Clothes. Right.’
‘Take everything off. We’ll know if ya haven’t when we meet. Make sure there’s nothing up yer jacksey either. Clear?’
‘Right, nothing up me hole.’
‘Don’t hang up. After ya change, go out the back emergency door and get on the next Luas. It’s due in eight minutes. It’s going to kick off in the pub after ya go into the jacks.’
‘Fuck,’ Hall said, after hanging up.
‘Everything okay?’ DI Slavin asked.
Only he and the deputy commissioner knew Shay’s full identity, Hall reminded himself. Slavin knew Shay only as CIS/3. Slavin was the handler for most of the assets. But the first couple of assets, Hall was still the handler. That was back when Hall set up the unit and before he got promoted.
‘That priest has contacted our asset,’ Hall said, eyeing the bank of screens in front of him. ‘About Leo and the gang.’
‘You think they could jeopardise the op?’ Slavin asked.
Hall rubbed his chin and stared at the backs of the detectives logging every detail of the surveillance teams.
‘We don’t have the manpower to go looking for him now,’ Hall said. ‘Can’t see what they can do, apart from saying a decade of the fucking rosary.’
Slavin snorted.
But Hall knew Shay was an unknown factor in all of this. And he hated unknown factors. He was spinning enough plates as it was. They had lost Leo last week from the church. He never said what that was all about, but in fairness, he did what he told him to do and gave the details about the meet, which set this operation in train.
Most important for Hall was keeping track of the Provo who met Leo in the church. It took that fucker eight hours to actually go home that day. They’d put 24-hour surveillance on him since. That had led them to a number of other targets, most of them associates of Sutcliffe. That, together with the work of the Subversive Intelligence Unit, resulted in a list of five targets.
Hall looked up at the screens. Screen one was an audio from inside the Dry Dock pub. Screens two, three and four were visuals outside the entrances. Below them was an array of screens on the five Provo suspects. Three had left their homes straight after Leo moved from the priest’s house. The Provos were being careful, though, Hall thought. They had got into vehicles they had never used since the surveillance started. As a result, there was no tracker on them. The gardaí had to do this the old-fashioned way. Eyes and ears. Hall had six teams – three cars and three motorbikes. One car and one bike on each target. Four other teams were still in situ on the two suspects who hadn’t budged.
Hall figured the Provos had some sort of tracker on Leo. Where they put it, he didn’t know. The Provos knew Lock Man was a paranoid fucker, so wherever the tracker was it better not be spotted. Otherwise, there’d be no final act to this drama.
Hall had wanted to keep the job purely within his Special Research Unit, but given he had eleven surveillance teams in total and three intervention teams, it wasn’t possible. Hall had the assistance of the National Surveillance Unit for the operation. The ERU was in three intervention teams: Black 1 for the Provos, Black 2 for the Canal Gang and Black 3 was backup. All of the units came under ISD and Deputy Commissioner Nessan’s control. Hall had full operational command and kept information on a need-to-know basis.
The plan was to swoop on the Provos before they struck. They would nail them for possession of firearms, membership of a terrorist organisation and, hopefully, conspiracy to commit murder. It would be the first successful operation against the RCAD.
More than that, this was an opportunity to nail the Canal Gang. For that, Hall had to wait until the meet, when Leo was with them. That way they could do them for false imprisonment, assault, if they roughed him up, and firearms, if they had any. Or they could get Leo to testify against them, about the drugs he was caught with before he disappeared. It would be a double victory for ISD and for him.
Hall had quietly considered the scenario of it all going tits up: of the Provos succeeding in taking out the Canal Gang before they could pounce. Questions would be asked, he knew, but, given the outcome, it would be lost in the praise. They would have a prompt arrest afterwards of the Provos. And no one would mourn the Canal Gang. Hall’s status as a rising star in the force would be confirmed and promotion would be guaranteed.
As long as he managed to keep all the plates spinning.
‘What’s the location of the Provos?’ he asked.
‘T/1 is still in Ballyfermot,’ Slavin said, ‘T/2 is moving this direction from Tallaght and T/3 is driving around the Coombe.’
‘We still got nothing on the Canal Gang?’
‘No.’
It was the one loose thread: they had no eyes on the gang. They had bugs in some of their homes and trackers on many of their known vehicles, as well as Ghost’s jacket. But all was silent. They were obviously being extra careful. Hall told himself he simply hadn’t the resources to conduct physical surveillance on them round-the-clock as well. They had concentrated on the Provos and Leo. His thinking was that they would bring them to wherever the Canal Gang would be.
‘8/0 to 5/0. Bait is on the phone.’
Hall listened to the audio from the team inside the pub.
‘He’s turning and going to the toilets, I think.’
‘5/0 to 8/0,’ Slavin said. ‘Keep your distance, but get sight on the bathroom. Make sure you pick him up when he comes out.’
Slavin looked at Hall.
‘He’s going to move,’ Hall said. ‘We’ll have to be on our toes, from here.’
‘5/0 to 8/1, 8/2,’ Slavin said. ‘There could be movement soon.’
Hall looked up at the feed on the Provos. No change.
Right then, all hell erupted. Hall and Slavin pulled the bluetooths from their ears at the screeching and feedback. On the command centre audio they heard shouting and roaring. Tables and chairs scraped against the floor and women screamed.
‘5/0 to 8/0. Report,’ Slavin said. ‘What’s going on?’
‘8/0 to 5/0. Fight has broken out. We don’t have sight of the toilets.’
‘5/0 to 8/0,’ Slavin shouted. ‘We need eyes on Bait. Do we have eyes?’
Hall could hear an alarm going off, adding to the racket.
‘8/0 to 5/0. No.’
Hall clenched his fists.
Shit. We’ve lost him.
‘5/0 to 8/1, 8/2,’ Slavin said. ‘Bait is 5/7. I repeat, Bait is 5/7.’
Leo pushed through the emergency door, still holding the phone, nearly shitting himself at the blaring alarm. A mass of punters streamed out, screaming and pushing behind him. He moved among them and headed for the canal. Bangers and fireworks were going off all around. He saw a Luas coming. At the green by the canal, near the flats, a fire was blazing. A car was heading slowly towards it. A shape jumped out of the driver’s seat and rolled onto the green. Leo ran to the Luas stop, surrounded by others, and hopped on. The car exploded and a massive flame erupted into the sky.
Leo slipped down low on a seat, shaking, and pressed the phone to his ear.
‘I’m on.’
‘Get off at Smithfield stop. Someone will meet ya there.’