Lingard had his back to the window in his office. It offered a view of a cluster of administration buildings, felled oblongs that looked like polystyrene. A thin tree, not long planted, with a yellow plastic flag tied round its neck, was rattled by the wind. From time to time a soldier walked past. Not no man’s land but a nobody’s land.
On the side wall was a theatre poster for a J. M. Synge ‘Playboy of the Western World’ performance in Belfast. Lingard’s desk bore a few gadgets: an address book which one dialled, a set of eight silver balls suspended by fine, almost transparent, threads. He had a leather-edged ink blotter and an ink pen. There was a framed photo of his family arranged by kneeling height; his hands on his wife’s shoulders, hers on the first child’s and that child’s on the next. This was positioned with precise nonchalance, facing the interlocutor as much as the deputy governor. His chair bounced and squeaked and railed at his movements. With hands performing a variety of limbering-up exercises over the terrain of his blotter, Lingard explained to Dunn how significant his visit was and how he hoped it might augur well.
It was like being in with the headmaster. Part of the latest statement issued to the prison officers by the Provisionals came to Dunn’s mind,
‘The only safe place for them to live will be in jail.’ This took on a new light as he surveyed the yellowing room with its yellowing occupant.
‘Perhaps one or two more of your colleagues will see me as a resource and not the enemy itself! I could get you a tea if you like.’
‘No thanks.’
‘Ah! You’re a cut to the chase sort of fellow,’ said Lingard, alternating his expressions between humorous indulgence and serious attention. ‘Are you a Catholic?’
He rifled in his drawer and produced a tin of boiled sweets with a fine dusting of sugar on them. He offered one to Dunn.
‘No. No, thanks.’
Lingard took one, biting on it as if it were a problem. ‘Wondered. Motivation, you see. Anyway, you’re a man of few words. Why are you here?’ He broke through the sweet and his teeth collided. ‘Basically.’
‘Well, I’ve probably made a procedures mistake, Sir. When I was on
General Duties I was assigned to visits.’
‘With our Mr Jaws. Oh yes, I know the nicknames. For all of them. Have you got one yet? You will do. I wonder if they give us lot nicknames? Do you think they do?’
‘I don’t know, Sir. I’m new here – still the outsider.’
‘Yes of course.’
‘Anyway a little rolled-up note, it looked like a pill to me, fell from the table and I picked it up and put it in my pocket. The thing is you see, right before it happened I heard the prisoners talking about the prison officer murders and I was a bit taken aback. I wasn’t sure what action to take with the note thing.’
‘I’m with you,’ said Lingard, swallowing the last of the sweet. ‘I’m with you. Of course procedure is to hand it immediately to the PO of visits. But that’s beside the point now. I could count on one hand the number of occasions we’ve intercepted notes between the IRA and prisoners. So well done Dunn. No pun intended. First thing I want to ask you,’ he lay his hands flat on the blotter, ‘who was the prisoner and who was the visitor?’
‘O’Malley was the prisoner. Brendan Coogan his visitor.’
‘Really? Well, well. Where is the note?’
‘Here, in my pocket.’
‘Good. Mind if I see it?’
Dunn slipped it on to the table and Lingard felt for his spectacles in his jacket pocket, never taking his eyes off the pill-shaped note. Dunn was reminded of the television programme that Angie enjoyed, Antiques Roadshow. He thought that Lingard might offer him an appraisal and a price too. ‘Long Kesh 1979, cellular clearly, HMP Maze, that is, been carried orally I’d say . . . Two pounds fifty.’
‘You haven’t read it then,’ said Lingard, touching it with his sheathed pen.
‘No, Sir, I didn’t want to.’
‘Right.’
‘I believe the prisoner is the OC for the block and I’ve seen his visitor on the local news, you see him giving the Falls Road side of things.’
‘Yes, Brendan Coogan, he does all the talking. The public face of the IRA.’ Lingard’s pleasure was evident. ‘I’m amazed that you haven’t been tempted to read it, Dunn. What forbearance. You must be a chess player?’
‘No, Sir.’
‘Good, good.’ He gave the tiny white missive one final prod with the pen. ‘Well, let’s unwrap it, shall we?’
‘Well, over to you now, Sir, I’ll be off if you’ve nothing . . .’
‘Come on, Dunn,’ his fingers were at the Clingfilm. ‘I think I can trust you if you can trust me.’
‘Actually, I’d rather not be involved in any way, Sir, I’m just handing it in, that’s all . . .’
Lingard was already smoothing out the paper with his fingers.
‘Don’t worry about that. You’ve done the right thing Dunn. Sorry. I’m on the inside of the Northern Ireland Office, if you know what I mean.’ He looked up and gave Dunn a film star smile. ‘I’m on the political side of things. Right. Now I’ve got something on you and you on me. Okay?’ He looked over the top of his glasses. ‘A Chara,’ Lingard started to read. ‘That means dear friend, In response to comm. of 29/11 got to tell you that hunger strike is number one on our agenda in order to secure our main objective vis a vis the Brits and exposing all aspects of their imperialism in this country, criminalisation, normalisation, Ulsterisation. As this affects us. He could mean criminalisation da-dee-da as this affects us or he could be starting afresh, hard to tell the writing is perishing small. God knows how they write them. It’s a piece of that bloody bog paper you know, like wax paper; we don’t get much better up here. Doesn’t absorb, fingers go through it. The hunger strike is the most effective method at our disposal and the most credible to rebut the strategy of criminalisation. The Billy McKee hunger strike of 1972 got political status from Whitelaw. Who knows with the Brits but you’ve got to think they won’t let prisoners die, due to international protest. At the least, it will speed up the talks. You wrote that we might pull off the hunger strike before the final days. Think this is a dangerous thought. Have not communicated it. The level of commitment is running high. There would be no half measures. Well, that’s about the heap for now, slán. Kevin.
‘Well. That’s really something. Hunger strike. Now I need to consider the information. What would you say was key in there, John?’
‘I couldn’t say, Sir.’
‘The dangerous thought. Dangerous for them is good for us. I mean, strategically speaking. This letter states that the hunger strike is their last card. He asks Coogan, their public representative, to play it. Now that’s important. There’s something in this, Dunn. I just need time to think it through. We all have our part in the game, don’t we, John? You’ve played yours. Now over to me. Although I’ve got orders, they’re probably not what you’d think of as orders, I’ve got a free hand in some ways. But the truth is I’m from over there, and I have a certain way of looking at things. Justice. This is not my war. I’m here to try and stop it, to foul it up if you like. Put the brakes on. Personally, I don’t like killing. I believe in putting killers away and hampering those still on the outside. The IRA have been trying to kick up a big bloody fuss over this place. Making heroes. They’ll be creating merry hell about a bloody hunger strike. You said you were a chess player?’ Lingard’s space heater started to buzz and he tapped it gently.
‘No, Sir, I am not.’
‘Ah, shame. You see if we know that their Achilles heel so to speak is this dangerous idea, that they might not go through with a hunger strike, that their last card is a bluff, then we might pursue a policy of shall we say . . . brinkmanship.’ He looked at the theatre poster.
‘Nobody wants a fellow to die which ever way he dresses, but that’s not going to happen, not unless there’s a major cockup. That’s what this letter here is telling us. So Dunn, there will be no dying, no suicide pact. We have a number of options. We can subtly communicate to them that it won’t work and that will be an end to it. They’ll pull off and no one will die. We might even manage a little popular support to dampen the bravura of the whole thing. Funny how it’s only the Catholics seem able to mobilize themselves that way, but maybe we can get the ones who’re more for peace coming out and saying “No to dying”.’
He seemed roused, failing to register Dunn’s growing expression of disbelief.
‘Oh, I’m just speculating, John. I’m a visionary in here. The only one. No, they’d never do anything as low as to get any public opinion working for them. Good God no! Not the Northern Ireland Office. No, I’m an outsider on the inside.’ He laughed shortly.
Dunn looked at his watch. It was comfortable sitting in that warm room far from the cell block, and he wouldn’t have minded staying longer if Lingard hadn’t been spouting on. Dunn hated to hear men talk at length that way. It was only pardonable in drink. He had more than likely made a mistake in giving the note to Lingard. He had hoped to clear the decks, to set himself straight. But things were never straight. The noose just tightened. This mess was of his making and he wanted to move away from it, physically, now.
‘Sir,’
‘Mr Lingard at a push, if you must, but not ‘Sir’ for gawd’s sake.’
‘Having just been on those protest blocks for just a few weeks, I’ll tell you, I’ve seen those young lads in there, I’d say they’re quite capable of dying on a hunger strike no matter what anyone says.’
Lingard held his pen up at his lips. ‘Would you, John, would you? Still this letter is entre amis, as they say, between friends. I think we have to take it at face value. I think they’d know their own minds. Won’t keep you, but very, very impressed. You did the right thing with this.
Anything else comes your way, you bring it to me. Between us . . . well, if there were more men like you . . .’
Dunn took his cap off the desk. He stood up and his new set of keys, for the block, swung on their chain against the desk. He put them back in his pocket.
‘You and those bloody keys, eh? That gave me a laugh I’ll tell you. You’re not like the others are you? What’s your story, I wonder. Listen, the wife and I like to have people round for drinks from time to time, casual you know, Martinis and jazz music, that sort of a thing. Would you and yours care to come for a drink and a bite? I’ll have to check the diary, hold tight.’ He held the diary open with one hand and ran a finger down the other side. ‘All the bloody Christmas piss-ups. Hang on, Wednesday 19th we’re free, would that suit?’
‘Thank you, I appreciate it but I’m bound to be working.’
‘Well, I’ll have a word with the duty officer. Can’t promise of course.’ He hopped up and gave Dunn a pat on the back as he went to the door. Dunn shrank away and ducked out.
‘The only safe place for them to live will be in jail.’ How much did his own safety matter to him? After half an hour in Lingard’s world, it seemed unimportant, nothing worth dying for.
It was the day of Prison Officer William Benbow’s funeral; all visits were cancelled, so the mess was charged with bored anxiety. At unlock, the young kid, Moran, had head-butted Rabbit this time. He was making a name for himself. He’d been put in cell twenty-six again while the PO arranged for someone to come down and issue the order for his transfer back to the boards. He’d only just come back to the block.
‘He ought to get it into his thick skull that being on the protest is enough of a qualification.’ Bolton was standing in shirtsleeves outside his office doo, peeved, when the deputy governor arrived. ‘Come in for a moment, Mr Lingard, we’ll have a chat while one of the fellas brings the man up.’
Rabbit offered and went off.
In the mess, Dunn had out the AA pocket map of Northern Ireland that Angie had borrowed from her office. He was studying it ostensibly for directions for the day out with the boy, but he’d become quite gripped by the motoring information, especially the mileage chart. He felt like a whole new vista was opening.
‘Listen to this. Me and the lads have cooked up a great fucking scam.’ Frig was holding the door handle behind him. ‘The scam to end them all. My old Ford, the engine’s fucked. Can’t shift it. Tomorrow we’re going to park it round where the army patrol comes haring in the morning, up past Main Gate. Just round the bend, on the wrong side. We’re running a book on the compensation. You in? What about a pound on flattened and full comp to the market value of the car? Any takers?’
‘A pound says they stop before they get to it.’
‘A pound says you can’t get it started to get it there,’ said Shandy, stirring a mug of Ovaltine.
‘You’re a bunch of misery gutses. You’ll change your tunes when I get that compensation.’
Shandy tuned the radio, ‘Simply having a wonderful Christmas time . . .’ When the disc jockey announced the time, Dunn and Skids adjusted their watches.
‘I gave him another kicking.’ Rabbit came in, breathless. ‘He gave me a fucking headache, that little Fenian cunt, so I gave him ballsache.’
There was no one in the TV room. It was Songs of Praise from Portadown. The door cracked and Skids shuffled in, sat right him, too close again.
‘I’m seeing this woman in Lisburn. Did I tell you? She’s married, but she’s cracking looking. We’re meeting in a pub tonight.’
Dunn said nothing.
‘I ought to leave my wife. I’d do the right thing and give her money for the wean. I shouldn’t be carrying on like this, this’ll be the third time I’ve seen her. The thing is, like if I start thinking about her and her old man in bed, having sex, it makes me feel sick to my stomach so it does. I was thinking of telling her to get him to use a rubber johnny. I don’t want to go in where he’s been.’
Dunn excused himself and went off to the privacy of his toilet. ‘My church,’ he thought, trousers round his ankles.