the room was brightly lit. 'Anything?' he asked.
Major Gunther Horst and a Ranger lieutenant looked up from their examination of the two terrorist's belongings, which they had found in the hastily abandoned Ford Escort.
'Personal belongings, maps, and guidebooks,' said Gunther. 'Nothing that looks likely to help our immediate problem, though the forensic boys may find something in time.' He paused and then picked up a hardback book from the table. He handed it to Kilmara. 'But I think you might be interested in this.'
The impact of the photo on the front cover of the book was total. In grainy black and white, against a background of swirling dust and smoke, there was the tired, strained, unshaven profile of a soldier. He held a dove in his hands very close to his face and was looking at it with obvious tenderness. Tied to his webbing belt, just next to his water bottle, were two severed human heads.
The book was entitled The Paradox Business. It was subtitled “A Portrait of War by One of the World's Top War Photographers – Hugo Fitzduane.”
'Well I'll be buggered,' said Kilmara. He looked at Gunther. 'Let's find him and get him here. Perhaps he can make some connection we've missed.'
'And where might he be?'
'At a guess, still in Dublin,' said Kilmara. 'Try Etan's flat or any good restaurant with a decent wine list in the area.' He looked at his watch. It read 9:40 p.m., which without conscious thought Kilmara translated automatically into military twenty-four-hour time. 'You could also try RTE. He sometimes picks up Etan there after her show.'
'I'll give it a shot,' said Gunther.
Kilmara smiled. 'I've faith,' he said. He turned to the lieutenant. 'Give me a shout when the house plans come.'
Fitzduane sat against the back wall of the small control room of RTE Studio Two and watched Etan do useful damage to the self-possession, credibility, and viewpoints of an eminent churchman,
the Minister for Justice, and an associate professor of sociology from UCD.
From the looks she was receiving toward the end of the program, it appeared that the assembled panel of experts on the causes of terrorism were more afraid of Etan than of terrorists. The Minister for Justice had no real answers, and it showed visibly as a thin sheen of sweat fought a winning battle with his makeup.
The program was due to be over in a few minutes. Fitzduane looked at the bank of ten monitors and listened to the producer and the production assistants plotting camera movements while the seconds ticked by. Idly he noticed that they all wore dark stockings and ate mints and chain-smoked while they stared at the monitors, controls, and running order with intense concentration. It didn't seem like the kind of occupation that would lengthen your life.
The credits rolled, there was a blast of theme music, and the show was over. Back to the commercials. For a moment the sheer disability of the medium shook him, and he was glad he worked in print.
The monitors were still live. The studio floor cleared. The monitors featured only the image of Etan, who had remained behind alone to tidy up her notes. She bowed her head, suddenly looking tired and vulnerable. It made Fitzduane what to take her in his arms and wonder what the hell he was doing going away yet again. Perhaps the time had come to settle down. He felt tired enough himself.
The production team looked from Fitzduane to the monitors and back again. He seemed unaware of their existence. The producer put her hand on his shoulder.
'Come and have a drink,' she said. 'Etan will be along in a few minutes.'
The “Today Tonight” Hospitality Room served the same general purpose as the emergency room of a hospital, except that experience had taught the editor of the program that alcohol, if administered in very large quantities soon enough, guaranteed a faster recovery rate.
Interviewers on the program tended to go for the jugular, yet it was important, if the victim was to come back for more, that he have some element of self-esteem restored. The effect of the hospitality room was to ensure that many a politician or bureaucrat, whose dissemblings and incompetence had been revealed only minutes before on prime-time television, soon felt, after a couple of Vincent's gins, that he had carried off the ordeal with the aplomb of a David Frost – and was raring to come back for a second round.
This pleased the editor, who knew that in a small country like Ireland there was only a limited supply of video fodder. Also, he was a nice man. He liked people to be happy except when being interviewed on his program.
So as not to set a bad example, Fitzduane accepted an oversize gin, a drink he normally never touched, and thought thoughts he had avoided for close on twenty years.
Etan came in freshly made up, the professional mask on again. He checked her legs. She, too, was wearing dark stockings. Full house. He maneuvered her into the corner of the small room for a minute of privacy. 'I've been thinking,' he said.
Etan looked at him over the top of her glass and then down at the melting ice and slice of lemon. 'Of what?'
'Our future together, settling down, things like that,' he said.
'Good thoughts or bad thoughts?'
'The very best thoughts,' he answered. 'Well, I think they are the very best thoughts, but I'm going to need a second opinion.' He leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead.
'Is this a consultation?' she asked. She had gone a little pale.
Across the room, which meant no distance at all, given its size, a very drunk Minister for Justice went into shock at the sight of his erstwhile tormentor displaying human emotion. It was clear that he would have been less surprised had she breathed fire.
The telephone rang. Less than thirty seconds later Fitzduane was gone.
The minister came over to Etan and put a beefy arm around her shoulders. He was pissed as a newt. 'Young lady,' he said, 'you should learn which side your bread is buttered. You work for a government-owned and -licensed station.' He leered at her.
Etan removed his arm with two fingers as if clearing away something unpleasant. She looked him up and down and wondered, given that Ireland was not short of talent, why such scum always floated to the top. 'Fuck off, birdbrain,' she said, and it coincided with a general lull in the chatter.
The editor choked on his drink.
Geronimo Grady had not acquired his name for nothing.
In his hands the modified Ranger Saab Turbo screamed through the streets of Dublin and out onto the Galway road in a blurred cocktail of flashing blue light, burning tire rubber, and wailing siren. When the traffic ahead failed to give way fast enough, Grady drove the wrong way up one-way streets, cut through the front lots of garages, or took to the sidewalks with equal ease. Fitzduane regarded him as a skilled maniac and gave thanks that Ranger regulations stipulated four-point racing harnesses and antiroll bars in pursuit vehicles. He winced as Grady roared through a set of red traffic lights and sideslipped around a double-decker bus. He kept his hand tight over the top of his gin and tonic glass and tried to retain the sloshing liquid.
They covered the thirty-eight miles to the mobile command center in half an hour. Fitzduane was glad his hair was already silver. He unclipped his safety harness and handed Grady his now-empty glass.
'You really deserve the ears and the tail,' he said.
8
