'When this is over…'
'Oh, for Christ's sake.'
'You are coming out of here…’’
'Not again.'
'Even if I have to take you kicking and screaming…'
'Do piss off.'
'I am going to put you what you are safe and where there is a normal life to be lived. I am going to do that before it is too late for you. I love you…'
'Watch the bloody screen,' she said.
He stared at the farmhouse on the screen, at the light from an upper window on the back yard. He saw nothing move. He wondered if she would think the more of him if he shot Jon Jo Donnelly.
19
He lay on his back.
There was the glow and the wetness of her body against his.
Jon Jo Donnelly and his Attracta after the collapse of love- making.
It was what he had cried for during the months away. She nestled against him. He was back and he was home.
It should have been beautiful.
She hadn't talked to him of danger, she hadn't demanded of him when he was leaving. He had the new route into the farmhouse, in the shadow of the lean-to where the logs were stacked, and through the larder window that she had left unlocked, squeezing inside. If the house were watched then he would not be seen because he did not have to use the back door and the front door that were obvious. She hadn't questioned him about England, not about a schoolboy and not about two schoolgirls.
It should have been wonderful.
There had never been a tout on the mountain. There had been touts in Belfast and in Derry and in Newry and in Lurgan. There had never been a tout identified on Altmore… When he had been home, before he had gone away to England, there had twice been a suspension of operations because of tout fear. After the search up beyond old Hegarty's home, a mile beyond him, where the cache had been found with the R.P.G. 7 and the two rifles and nothing other than information could have taken the soldiers to that corner of a field. After the controlled explosion of a culvert bomb on the Ballygawley road, in place three days, and no military activity prior to the helicopter coming over, repeated sweeps, with the electronics, there had been the second tout hunt. It was four years back and it was two years back, and each time the outsiders had been called onto the mountain to sift for evidence. Nothing decided, nothing proved, but the unit had been stood down each time for a month, and the outsiders had moved among the volunteers with their sharp questions…Who knew of what operation? Who had been told? Who knew the locations of the caches and the identity of targets He had been questioned himself by a bald bastard with a squint and a Derry accent. There had never been a tout found on the mountain. He knew the way of touts. There would be no scramble to clear a unit from an area, not the way the handlers directed their player. They chipped at an Active Service Unit, a man here and a man there, lifted, a weapon here and a made-up bomb there, recovered… He knew about the money and he knew about the threats. He knew that men were trapped with money and bludgeoned with threats. He knew how the handlers gained their players There was no mercy for touts. There was no sentiment, Touts was for killing.
He lay on his back and she was cuddled close to him and sleeping, and the poison of a tout on the mountain filled his mind.
'Can you not sleep, Jon Jo?'
He kissed her.
'Thinking.'
'You don't have to be gone, not yet.'
'Thinking on what you said.'
'What did I say?'
'You said there was a tout on the mountain, you said that's why I was better away…'
'Who knows you're back?'
' There's just two. The O.C. and the Q.M., it's all.'
'If it wasn't wee Patsy, who might it be?'
Her fingers played in the hair on his chest. Her nails furrowed in his skin. There were some who took women when they were away, and one had gone in London to whores. There were some who screwed the girls that were in the A.S.U. s over the water. He had never met the woman or the girl that matched his Attracta. Never wanted to. He felt the soft blackness of her hair on his shoulder.
'Mossie Nugent was looked over. It was Mossie that named Patsy.'
There was quiet wonderment in her voice. 'Mossie's been a good friend to us. He's done all the painting and papering for us. Plus the electrics when it all fused. I give him eggs, and Siobhan, because Mossie'll not take money from me…'
'It's Mossie that's pointed at.'
'I'd give my life to Mossie and know it were safe. I'd give him your life…'
'I'm just telling you what I'm hearing.'
'What'll you do, Jon Jo?'
'It's not right, it's not for talking about.'
There was the anger of her breath against his skin. 'He's been my friend.'
He started up. He heaved himself onto his elbow. He looked down at her. 'What's that mean?'
'When you weren't here, and Kevin and I were alone for bloody months on end, Jon Jo, he was my friend.'
'But…'
'But nothing – would you kill him, Jon Jo, my friend?'
'If it was him…'
'Would you kill him for touting, or would you kill him because when you were away he was my friend?'
Her fingers held tight in the hairs. The pain stung him. He had been a boy when Mossie Nugent had first gone to gaol. He had been a child and first learning to kick the gaelic ball from his hands and to swing the hurley stick. He could remember when Mossie had gone down for Possession and he could remember the talk in the village when Mossie had been arrested again in the Free State. He had been the volunteer, the kids hanging at his ankles and the old men buying him drink in the bar, when Mossie Nugent had come back from England. Clever, sharp, good at what he did, and Jon Jo had thought him an arse crawler.
Clever at setting up, sharp on his reconnaissance, good at his planning, and an arse crawler because he always wanted to be praised
… He could not remember when, in three years, Mossie Nugent had fired a rifle nor when Mossie Nugent had detonated a bomb… And now Mossie Nugent was Intelligence Officer and knew each move and knew each target. The man was in his mind, with the shambling walk from the injury that was always the excuse for not firing, not detonating.
Jon Jo said, 'He has a bad leg.'
'He fell off a ladder, everyone knows that.'
'And he ran from the S.A.S. feckers who shot the Devitt boy and Jacko and Malachy…'
'You'd kill him? Wouldn't matter what I said?’’
He said, heavy, 'Touts is for killing. Doesn't matter who they are, doesn't matter what friends they have, they're for killing… Time I was gone.'
When he was out of the bed he pulled the sheets and blankets back over her. The fear of the tout had broken the loving. He dressed in the darkness and he sensed that she had turned away from him. When he was dressed he picked up her nightdress and carried it to the bed, and put it underneath the bedding to warm it for her. He kissed
