Dillon unhooks his thirty-four-centimetre long metal flashlight and hits the boy in the face with it, then shines the light directly into his eyes
'Leave him alone, dear God!' the woman screams from the cab. She leaps down, coat billowing around her. She kicks out at Dillon, face twisted in a rage of anguish that is pitiful in its sheer helplessness. 'Dear God, just leave us alone, they're just kids…'
Dillon lets go of the boy and with the back of his hand slaps the woman so hard across the face that she is knocked reeling into the side of the truck. He grabs the boy by the collar, drags him to the front of the truck. Harry and Taffy are sorting out the other one. They have him pinioned between them, a shrimp between two whales, an arm apiece, their two faces an inch either side of the boy's, shouting into his ears, 'Name age address, Name age address, Name age address.'
Dillon has the young boy bent backwards over the mudguard, arm across his throat. The boy is choking, turning blue. In a croaking whisper he gasps out, 'Lee Farm, I'm sixteen… what have I done, leave us alone… Ronan… me name's Ronan Shaw…'
With two Toms covering him from the road, Jimmy has climbed up into the back of the truck. Rifle up in the firing position, he unclips his flashlight and shines it over the bales of straw. He crouches on one knee, directing the beam into the gaps underneath and between the bales. Jimmy stiffens as he sees something move. Not a trick of the light, not just a shadow, he's damn sure of that. Vaulting backwards off the truck, Jimmy rams the rifle butt into his shoulder and pumps off half a mag. The shots crack and reverberate over the empty dark fields, rolling away like distant thunder. Something shrieks.
Dillon appears at the run, eyes dark, glittering, under the leather rim of his Red Beret.
'Jimmy?… Jimmy?!'
A thin, shrill yelping sets their teeth on edge. Holding onto the side of the truck, the woman swings her face towards them, mouth bleeding, and starts screeching, 'Bastards, bastards, it's the dog, you filth, you scum, it's the dog!'
In the flashlight beams the long narrow head lifts up and falls back. It tries again, gets its head up, paws scrabbling feebly, and slides down again, slipping in its own blood. The rough rope halter around the dog's neck, tied to the back of the cab, gleams wet and dark red.
'It's their dog, Jimmy,' Dillon says in a low voice. 'What the fuck have you done?'
'It moved!' Jimmy retorts indignantly. 'It was hidden under the straw.'
'Put it out of its misery. Do it!' Dillon glares at him, and then his grim face suddenly cracks in a smile. 'They should've given us a lift, so sod 'em.'
He walks back to where the woman is tending to the farm boys, dabbing at their cuts with a soiled rag. Both are scared witless, both crying openly. The woman gives Dillon a look of venomous hatred. He shoves her towards the cab, signals the three of them to get in. From the back of the truck the piteous whimpering of the dog is cut short by a single shot. Dillon wafts his hand. 'On your way, go on, get moving.'
The engine roars, and as the truck moves off, the woman leans out. Her face has a wild, tortured look, framed by long grey hair straggling in the breeze. 'I hope you all die of cancer,' she says into Dillon's eyes, and spits at him.
Dillon runs alongside the truck, keeping pace, shouting up at her, 'I remember your face, bitch! You hear me, move, go on, get out!'
The truck disappears into the gloom, its single faulty tail-light flickering dimly. The squad trudges on through the heavy drizzle. Only four miles to go. Jimmy catches up to Dillon. After a minute or so, sloshing side by side through the mud, he says, 'They must have been headin' for the Lifford.' Dillon looks at him. Jimmy nods, an impish smile lurking at the corner of his mouth. 'The dog, it was a greyhound!'
'Be in their stew tonight,' Dillon says, eyes straight ahead, ploughing on. 'Animals all of them.'
Ten minutes later the best sight of the night, a Bedford RL lumbers into view. Everybody yells, fists in the air, Dillon included, and all give the driver their choicest repertoire of foul abuse as he rumbles up, flashing his lights.
Clutching her fur collar, the woman stared up into Dillon's face. She was visibly shaking, hair bouncing on her shoulders. 'You dirty bastards, they're pissin' over the railings, animals…'
'I'm sorry, okay.' Dillon held up his hand. 'I'll go an' quieten 'em down.'
'I know who you are, Frank Dillon!' the woman suddenly said. She pointed an accusing finger. 'I'm gonna call the police.'
Shaking his head, and feeling it start to spin, Dillon moved to the top of the stairwell. Holding out both hands in appeasement, he stumbled down a step or two, and the woman dodged back as if a pan of boiling water had been tipped over her foot.
'Don't come near me!'
Dillon swayed on the steps the lethal mixture of keg bitter, brown ale, lager, Scotch and Tina Turner combining and igniting in his brain like nitroglycerine. He tried to turn back, missed his footing, and slumped instead against the wall, his face scraping the concrete. Down on his knees, cheek pressed to the wall, Dillon whispered in a voice near as dammit to weeping, 'I got two kids… I got two kids.'
CHAPTER 32
Falls Road District. Belfast. March 1988.
It is night, the streets are quiet, the pubs and clubs emptied and dispersed nearly an hour ago. A cold wind blows along the street of terraced houses, each with its tiny square of garden bordered by a low brick wall, rattles the chip papers in the gutter. A garden gate creaks, four hunched shapes scuttle in, flatten themselves like limpets to the front wall of the house. A light burns above behind floral bedroom curtains, a glow from the hallway through the stained-glass fanlight above the door. Crouching close to the wall, the brick is chill and damp against Dillon's cheek. He checks the illuminated dial of his watch. The green second-hand creeps into the third quadrant. Very slowly he eases himself up and looks back to the corner of the street. A single ruby-red light winks from the driver's aperture, telling him that the APC is in position, ready to move in.
Once more Dillon looks at his watch, for the last time. The green hand sweeps away the final seconds. Dillon gives the signal.
Jimmy steps up and with one swing of the sledgehammer smashes the front door open. The armoured personnel carrier is already at the gate, the rest of the squad piling out, the alsatians straining on their short leashes, soldiers in visored helmets deploying along the street. At the kerb, a lance-corporal speaks into a shortwave walkie-talkie, confirming to the 21/C that entry has been effected.
The hallway of the small terraced house is suddenly packed with bodies. A woman with cropped dark hair and a narrow pinched face stands screaming at the foot of the stairs, arms held wide barring access; a pregnancy in its seventh month makes a bulge like a bowling ball in her quilted housecoat.
'No, please, dear God no!' The woman retreats one step up but keeps her scrawny grip on the banister. 'Oh, God help me please, don't harm my kids… there's just children upstairs.'
'How many upstairs, who's upstairs?' Dillon barks at her. He grips her arm tight, shaking her. 'Gimme their names, ages, come on!'
From the living-room and kitchen, the sounds of drawers being wrenched out, cupboard doors flung open, their contents scattered, ornaments swept off shelves, crockery breaking.
'I swear before God it's just my kids,' the woman weeps, her eyes pleading with Dillon.
Jimmy comes through waving a family allowance book.
'She's got seven bastards, eldest is seventeen, one fifteen, an' two twelve-year olds, rest are girls.'
'Get away from the stairs.' Dillon twists her arm, prising her grip from the banister. 'I said move it!' He turns, gives a curt nod to the four Toms crowding in through the front door. 'Back up, move up.' Roughly shoving her aside, Dillon cautiously mounts the stairs, clicking the firing control of his rifle to automatic, a live one up the spout, ready to fire.