'At least it's predictable,' said O'Neill.
'We'll try to set up some kind of decoy so that your sister can slip away.'
‘Thanks.'
The Long House was a warehouse. It was owned by a wholesale newsagency that distributed stationery, magazines and periodicals throughout the north and as such, with the ephemeral nature of news, it was ideal cover for the IRA with delivery vans coming and going at all hours. They had been using the building successfully for two years without problem, utilising its extensive cellarage for administration, meetings at top level and, when the circumstances dictated it, for living quarters. Circumstances dictated that O'Neill stay there for the present.
The doctor was already in the room when O'Neill was helped in by the two men who had brought him. They laid him gently on the table as the doctor continued to scrub his hands and forearms in the sink.
The thought of someone else poking and prodding at his wound prompted O'Neill to ask, 'Can you give me something? The pain's bad.'
'You'll feel better in a moment,' said the doctor, drying his hands and picking up a syringe.
The tiny prick of the needle was followed by a warm feeling of well-being and peace which spread inexorably through O'Neill's body, bringing a tranquillity that he had seldom experienced. He did not feel drowsy, more weightless, as if he were floating in a world free from pain and care.
'How's that?' asked the doctor.
'What did you give me?' asked O'Neill.
The doctor told him.
'I can see the attraction, ’replied O'Neill.
'You do know that your arm will have to come off?' asked the doctor.
‘The nurse told me.'
The Bairn says I have to do it here. We can't risk a hospital with what you know.’
‘I’d like to see my sister.’
‘The Bairn says no, not until after.'
'There might not be an after. That's why I want to see her.'
‘The Bairn says no.' 'Bastard,’ said O'Neill softly.
'He's taken over from O'Donnell,’ said the doctor. 'He's the new commander.'
Finbarr Kell, known as The Bairn to everyone within the organisation, but never to his face, scared O'Neill. For years he had been convinced that Kell was a hopeless psychopath but, within the organisation, his credentials were impeccable and he had risen relentlessly until now he was their new commander. O'Neill had never known anyone so lacking in compassion of any kind.
Kell seemed to O'Neill to have been born to violence and baptised in hatred. When this was combined with a street cunning that would have made him the envy of a New York street gang and a brain that was devious to the point of genius, Kell inspired fear in all who came to know him.
Hatred, cunning and the bravery of a lion had made The Bairn a living legend. His exploits were the stuff of folklore, or at least they had been until a bomb that he had been setting had gone off prematurely. The blast had fractured his spine and blown off both legs but he had survived, and survived to rise within the organisation.
Since the loss of his legs Kell had been transported around in a contraption that resembled a pram, hence the nickname The Bairn. If Kell had ever possessed the tiniest spark of decency it had been totally extinguished by the accident. He was a cold, cruel man, feared, loathed, but always obeyed. The thought that now he would no longer be subject to the moderating influence of Kevin O'Donnell was not one that O'Neill could take any pleasure in. As the anaesthetic took effect he thought of O'Donnell's last order.
Through a sea of pain O'Neill could hear voices. They were far away, as if he were at the bottom of a well and the voices were at the top, but he could hear what they were saying.
'Probably won't make it through the night…'
'Surgical shock too much in his condition…'
'Desperately weak…'
'No blood to give him
‘The Bairn's coming down just in case he comes round.'
'What about his sister?'
‘The Bairn says no.'
O'Neill tried to open his eyes but found that he could not. He concentrated hard but still to no effect. It was ridiculous. He was conscious but trapped inside a body that refused to respond to any instruction he issued. He could feel nothing except a burning pain coming from his left arm, but that was the thing that was not there any more. Perhaps he was dead? It was a big disappointment if he was for he was still there, damn it! Locked inside a useless hulk of flesh. Good God, he would be able to hear everything at his own funeral, the volley of shots, the patter of earth on the lid of the coffin and then nothing, endless, eternal, black nothing. But he would still be there!
O'Neill's brain rebelled violently at the thought and sent a tremor down his right side. The tremor shook him free like an air bubble that had been trapped at the foot of a pond and he surfaced to open his eyes.
'Doctor!' said a voice. 'He's coming round.'
A shadow moved over the light and the voice of the doctor said, 'How are you feeling?'
Another voice said in rasping tones, 'Move! I have to speak to him.'
O'Neill recognised the voice as Finbarr Kell's. He struggled against the intransigence of his lips but to no avail. He was falling into blackness again. Down, down, down. Perhaps there would be sunshine when he stopped falling. That would be nice, sunshine… grass… flowers.
O'Neill was unconscious for the better part of two days while his body struggled to scrape by on the borderline oxygen supply that his vastly depleted blood volume could transport. On the third day he was through the crisis and started to get better and Kell came back to the Long House in the evening. O'Neill heard the squeak of the pram wheels as Nelligan, Kell's constant minder, manoeuvred him through the door to park him at the foot of the bed.
There was a long moment when neither man spoke but just looked at each other. Kell's head had always struck O'Neill as being too big for his body but he supposed that this was an illusion created by his legless torso. Nevertheless it seemed as if all the pores on Kell's face were quite discernible as the cold eyes, magnified by strong, rimless glasses, surveyed him under a hairless head.
'Well, Martin, it seems that even an intellectual has given up something for the cause at last, eh?' said Kell eyeing O'Neill's bandaged stump. He seemed pleased with his joke.
'I'm no intellectual, Finbarr.'
Kell smiled but there was no humour in it. 'Of course you are,' he said softly. 'All that book learning… of course you are.'
O'Neill stayed silent.
'What went wrong?' asked Kell.
'The Brits knew we were coming. They were waiting for us.'
'Bastards!' spat Kell. Then they were tipped off?'
'Must have been,' said O'Neill.
'Any ideas?'
'No.'
'I'll find the bastard if it's the last thing I do,' said Kell in a way that utterly convinced O'Neill that he would.
'Meanwhile I need the keys to the safe. Do you know where they are?'
'No,’ lied O'Neill. He had a promise to keep before he handed them over. 'Have you checked O'Donnell's room?'
Kell looked at him as if he were mentally defective. 'Of course I've checked O'Donnell's room,' he rasped.
‘They'll turn up', said O'Neill.
'No doubt,' said Kell with a look that sent shivers down O'Neill's spine.
'I'd like to see my sister,' said O'Neill.
'Ah yes, the schoolteacher sister.' Kell smiled and O'Neill thought that he looked even more evil when he did
