through the curls between his pectorals and brushed his belly with his knuckles until his fingers were deep inside the band of his trousers.
‘OK.’ Oweny cleared him.
Terry walked through into the kitchen. Dominic was sitting at a pine breakfast bar. ‘Sugar?’ he asked.
He took the stool facing Dominic and raised a hand. ‘Fine as it is.’
They sat quietly for a moment, Terry warming his hands on his mug.
‘You had a hard time with the peelers, but the training helped, right?’
‘They nearly broke me, Dom. Because I don’t feel good about that operation. If I felt OK about it, I’d be impenetrable. I’m not.’
‘What is it worries you most?’
‘That they could turn me, Dom. I swear to you – there were long nights when it seemed only right that they should. I can’t do this any more.’
‘It’s not for everybody,’ said Dominic, ‘but the way things are going, there’ll soon be a lot less of the dirty jobs and more political work. You’d be good at that.’
‘Dom, we killed a kid.’
‘It’s what happens in a war, Terry. Do you think Maggie Thatcher was squeamish about killing kids?’
‘So that’s what makes a good warrior – not being squeamish about killing kids?’
‘That’s certainly part of it. And you only deal with it by comprehending the full context, by seeing that this is an evil that is not of our making and that when we are free, we’ll create a world in which the children of the nation are safe.’
Maybe Terry just didn’t believe that stuff any more.
Oweny put the morning mail and a few newspapers on the counter and Dom glanced down at the headlines. There was a photograph on the front of The Irish News of a boy with a plastered leg in traction after a punishment shooting.
‘He looks all sweet and innocent now, doesn’t he?’ said Dom. ‘Look, it’s clear you are not ready to go back to this, and maybe you are leaving us. That’s OK, a chara. No problem. Nobody’s going to hold that against you, believe me. You’ve made a big contribution.’
Terry felt immense relief at that. He had always trusted that if things went bad, he could turn to Dom and Dom would sort it out. So they drank their coffee and talked about other things: ‘Have you heard the new Christy Moore album?’ said Dom. ‘Has he found religion or something?’ They laughed.
Then Dom said, ‘The way we’ll work it is this. You’ll go away for a year. That will help you clear your head and remove you from any operations. If the Special Branch think you can be worked on to tout for them, then it’s best you know nothing of day-to-day stuff. Come back in a year and then if you want to get involved again, there’ll be a place for you. That’s a promise. OK?’
Terry was wrestling to comprehend this. Dom, in the gentlest way possible, as if it was a kindness, had just ordered him out of the country. Where would he go? He had nowhere to go.
‘You won’t be under army orders. OK? But I’ve asked Ig and Dan to debrief you on your time in Castlereagh. It’s just to help other guys going through the same thing. They’ll take you away for a couple of days and help you talk through it all. It will help no end with our training. You’ll be obliging as you can, won’t you, a chara? You will surely.’
Ig and Dan were on the internal security team. These were the men who killed informers.
‘I am not an informer, Dominic.’
‘Turlough, I know you’re sound. This is just to help the lads understand the newest methods the Brits are using to break them. You just be as open and honest as you can be and you’ll come to no harm at all. OK?’
‘OK.’
‘They are in a small white van at the corner of the street. Oweny will walk you down. Sin é,’ he said and got up and walked out of the kitchen.
***
It was amazing for Terry to think now that that was nearly thirty years ago, for the taste of his fear returned when he recalled the moment that Dom McGrath handed him over to the nutting squad.
Oweny had led him out through the airlock and into the street. It was a beautiful bright early spring day and Terry feared he might never see another like it. He followed Oweny down the hill to the corner. He almost needed to tell his legs what to do. They were within sight of the cemetery, and about as far in another direction from the dark, shielded police station. Oweny appeared to have no fear of being seen. The white van was parked outside a doctor’s surgery. Oweny opened the rear door and waited for him. Terry could have made a run for the police station. If he was sure he was going to his death that would have been the sensible thing to do. But he gambled on the margin of possibility that he would survive this, so he did as he was told. He stepped up and wobbled a bit with his head down. Then the door closed behind him. He would not escape now. Dan, the driver, started the engine and drove off.
Ig was in the front passenger seat. Terry had seen Ig at meetings in the early days, at teen dances earlier still. He’d had that nickname at school. It was short for Ignatius, from St Ignatius Loyola. And Dan had been one mean hurler for the parish team – short and fast. The big lumps of fellas that got picked for backs fell over each other when he wove through them.
‘Put this over your head,’ said Ig.
He threw a black cotton bag over his shoulder without turning round. Terry picked it up. So they didn’t even trust him to see where they were going. He drew the bag over his head. It smelled of other people’s sweat and sick. You’d think they’d clean these things, if only to get rid of forensics on them. He settled himself as comfortably as a man can in the back of a moving vehicle with a low ceiling and a ribbed floor.
Ig spoke again. ‘Here’s the deal, Terry. You are ours now, to do with as we wish, and you are safe if you give us nothing to worry about. The next few days are going to be the worst of your life. That’s the way it is. Nothing we can do about that and nothing personal. So just sit there and be quiet, and if you pray, pray into yourself.’
They would be the worst days of his life. However much he had feared the police or his own conscience, before he let him go, Ig would make sure Terry feared the IRA more.
They drove for an hour, much of it at speed on a long open road, probably the motorway, with the radio on. The chirpy music now sounded sarcastic. Ig and Dan talked about football, occasionally lapsing into a thoughtful silence as if remembering their mission. Terry tried to think through what he would say to them later, when they had him tied to a chair. He’d already told Dom he had weakened; he could hardly brag now that he had stood up to the Special Branch and braved their interrogation without flinching. Was there any small detail they would be able to work up into a real suspicion of him? He couldn’t think of one, but he knew that if there was one they would find it.
The last part of the journey was up a stony country lane and Terry heard distant cattle, sheep and a dog running breathlessly alongside the van, then the darkness deepened, the acoustics softened. They were inside. Dan opened the rear door and he stumbled out onto rough ground and into the smell of stale peat, straw and damp wood. Hands gripped his arms.
