'And the Lord God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shall thou eat all the days of thy life.' Genesis 3:14
THE SUMERIANS
Three thousand years before the birth of Christ, the first real moves towards civilisation emerged from southern Mesopotamia, around the lower reaches of the Euphrates andTigris rivers. Because the land was between two rivers—Sumer—the people there were called Sumerians.
Their ethnic origins have never been explained.
This race of people made three important contributions towards our advancement—four if you count the establishment of firmly governed communities.
The first two were these: The measurement of time in hours, days and months; and astrology, the study of the stars' influences, which eventually led to the science of astronomy.
But the third was most important of all, for the Sumerian high priests discovered a way of making man immortal. Not by eternally binding his spirit to its earthly shell, but by preserving his knowledge. These high priests devised the written word, and nothing invented since has had a greater effect on mankind's progression.
Yet little is known of these people themselves.
By 2400 BC they had been swallowed up by surrounding, less enlightened tribes, who absorbed the Sumerian culture and spread it to other lands, other nations.
So although their achievements survived, the Sumerians' early history did not. For the kings, the princes, and the high priests destroyed or hid all such records.
Possibly they had good reason.
1 MORNING DUES
The man was smiling. Halloran was smiling and he shouldn't have been.
He should have been scared—bowel-loosening scared. But he didn't appear to be. He seemed . . . he seemed almost amused. Too calm for a sane man. As if the two Armalites and the Webley .38 aimed at his chest were of no concern at all.
Well, that wisp of a smile on his unshaven face would spirit itself away soon enough. This 'eejit's'
reckoning was coming, sure, and it was a terrible unholy one.
McGuillig waved his revolver towards the van parked in the shadows of trees just off the roadside.
'Your man's in there.' The harshness of his tone made it clear he held scant patience with Halloran's manner.
'And your money's here,' Halloran replied, nudging the bulky leather case on the ground with his foot.
McGuillig watched him coolly. When he'd spoken on the phone to the operative, he'd detected a trace of Irish in Halloran's voice, the merest, occasional lilt. But no, he was pure Brit now, no doubt at all.
'Then we'll get to it,' McGuillig said.
As he spoke, rays from the early morning sun broke through, shifting some of the greyness from the hillsides. The trees nearby dripped dampness, and the long grass stooped with fresh-fallen rain. But the air was already sharp and clear, unlike, as McGuiliig would have it, the unclean air of the North. Free air.
Uncontaminated by Brits and Prods. A mile away, across the border, the land was cancered. The Irishman regarded the weapon he held as the surgeon's scalpel.
Just as McGuillig, brigade commander of D Company, Second Battalion of the Provisional IRA, watched him, so Halloran returned his gaze, neither man moving.
Then Halloran said: 'Let's see our client first.' A pause before McGuillig nodded to one of his companions, a youth who had killed twice in the name of Free Ireland and who was not yet nineteen. He balanced the butt of the Armalite against his hip, barrel threatening the very sky, and strolled to the van.
He had to press hard on the handle before the backdoor would open.
'Give him a hand,' McGuillig said to the otherprovo on his left. 'Don't worry about these two: they'll not be moving.' He thumbed back the Webley's hammer, its click a warning in the still air.
All the same, this second companion, older and more easily frightened than his leader, kept his rifle pointed at the two Englishmen as he walked over to the van.
'We had to dose up your man,' McGuillig told Halloran. 'To keep him quietened, y'understand. He'll be right as rain by tomorrow.' Halloran said nothing.
The backdoor was open fully now and a slumped figure could be seen inside. The olderprovo reluctantly hung his rifle over one shoulder and reached inside the van along with the youth. They drew the figure towards themselves, lifting it out.
'Bring him over, lads, lay him on the ground behind me,' their commander ordered. To Halloran: 'I'm thinking I'd like to see that money.' Halloran nodded. 'I'd like my client examined.' McGuillig's tone was accommodating. 'That's reasonable. Come ahead.' With a casual flick of his hand, Halloran beckoned the heavyset man who was leaning against their rented car twenty yards away. The man unfolded his arms and approached. Not once did Halloran take his eyes off the IRA leader.
The heavy-set man strode past Halloran, then McGuillig. He knelt beside the prone figure, the Irish youth crouching with him.
He gave no indication, made no gesture.
'The money,' McGuillig reminded.
Halloran slowly sank down, both hands reaching for the leather case in front of him. He sprung the two clasps.
His man looked back at him. No indication, no signal.
Halloran smiled and McGuillig suddenly realised that it was he, himself, who was in mortal danger. When Halloran quietly said—when he breathed—'Jesus, Mary' he heard that lilt once more.
Halloran's hands were inside the case.
When they re-appeared an instant later, they were holding a snub-nosed sub-machine gun.
McGuillig hadn't even begun to squeeze the .38's trigger before the first bullet from the Heckler and Koch had imploded most of his nose and lodged in the back of his skull. And the otherprovo hadn't even started to rise before blood was blocking his throat and gushing through the hole torn by the second bullet. And the Irish youth was still crouching with no further thoughts as the third bullet sped through his head to burst from his right temple.
Halloran switched the sub-machine gun to automatic as he rose, sure there were no others lurking among the trees, but ever careful, chancing nothing.
He allowed five seconds to pass before relaxing. His companion, who had thrown himself to the ground the moment he saw Halloran smile, waited just a little longer. McGuillig thought.
2 ACHILLES' SHIELD
The sign for Achilles' Shield was as discreet as its business: a brass plaque against rough brick mounted inside a doorway, the shiny plate no more than eight by four inches, a small right-angled triangle at one end as the company logo. That logo represented the shield that the Greek hero Achilles, if he'd been wiser, would have worn over his heel, his body's only vulnerable part, when riding into battle. The name, with its simple symbol, was the only fanciful thing about the organisation.
Situated east of St Katharine's Dock, with its opulent yacht basin and hotel, the offices of Achilles'
Shield were in one of the many abandoned wharfside warehouses that had been gutted and refurbished in a development which had brought trendy shops, offices and 'old style' pubs to lie incongruously beneath the gothic shadow of Tower Bridge. The company plaque was difficult to locate. To spot it, you had to know where it was. To know, you had to be invited.
