A Very Big Bang Read online

  *

  It was a battle, hard fought and argued. The priest, McCrory avowed, would not and could not break the confessional. Pacifically Shard agreed but said it was worth a try even so: the priest could always say no, it would be entirely up to him and no pressure would be applied. McCrory’s views would be passed on faithfully. McCrory said the confessional was customarily anonymous. Again Shard agreed, knowing that this was not invariably so and feeling that a policeman, if confessing about something that impinged on a duty assignment of the nature of this one, would make his confession in the privacy of the presbytery, for even churches could hold hidden ears. In the end Shard won. McCrory even lent him a plain car and a plainclothes Garda driver to speed him through the Dublin streets to the suburb where Casey had lived. Old Dublin, the spacious city that had once known the rule of the Lord Lieutenancy, the Union Flag flying over its government buildings until the final culmination in 1922 of the long fighting that had changed the face of Ireland, faded into modern bungalow town, incongruous, in daylight at all events, under the distant backdrop of the Wicklow Mountains. The church was as new as the bungalows, built of brick with a conical bell-tower and the presbytery adjoining snugly.

  Shard told his driver to wait, and walked up a gravel path to a small porch, where he rang a bell. An old woman, bent and wrinkled, came after some delay: a crone from the west of Ireland, Shard fancied, who not so long ago would have worn the shawl and was even now dressed entirely in black: one of the faithful, maybe, who had accompanied the Father from some earlier cure of souls?

  “Yes?” she asked in a creaking, ancient voice. “Who is it, then?”

  “Is Father Donnellan in?”

  “He is. Who are you?”

  Shard said, “Someone in need of help. Does the Father need to know more than that?”

  The old woman sniffed. “I dare say not, though if it was me, sure I’d send the half of yer packin’. Tis confessions and advice, confessions and advice mornin’, noon and night till the poor man never has time for a meal let alone get to his bed.” She opened the door wider. “Come in with yer then, tis a cold night for the time of the year. Wait in the hall till I tell the Father.”

  Beady black eyes, brilliant in the hall light, stared at him. The old woman banged the door shut and went off muttering under her breath, her black-stockinged legs twinkling along with astonishing agility. She knocked on a door, spoke, turned and beckoned to Shard, who felt as guilty as any sinner. “Come along then,” she called shrilly, “and don’t keep the Father away too long from his sleep.”

  Shard approached the open door of a study, furnished contemporarily but comfortably. To his surprise, the priest was not old as he had somehow expected: he was a youngish man, no more than in his late twenties, with a friendly smile and fashionably long fair hair that fell to the clerical black of his coat collar. Shard smiled. “Father Donnellan?”

  “That’s right. How can I help you?”

  “That may take some time to explain. First, you’ll want to know who I am —”

  “Not if you don’t want to tell me.”

  “Oh?” Shard felt a small shock of surprise, but went on, “No, I shall tell you, though I’ll ask you to keep this visit to yourself, Father Donnellan.” He explained his status, making a reference to the Garda chief. The priest raised his eyebrows, but didn’t comment. Shard said, “You’ll understand that my edict doesn’t run in this country but —”

  “You’re off your patch, Chief Superintendent?”

  “Er — yes, you might say so, indeed!”

  “And you’ve not come to me to confess?” the priest asked, smiling.

  “No, I —”

  “In that case,” Father Donnellan said cheerfully, “sit down and join me in a nightcap. Whisky?”

  “Thank you, yes.”

  “It’s Scotch, I’m afraid, not Irish. It’s unpatriotic of me, but I got the taste when I was in London.”

  “You’ve been in London, then?”

  The priest nodded, and moved across to the cupboard. “I was one of the many clergy at Westminster Cathedral. So I know your manor fairly well, Mr Shard.” He came back with a decanter, a soda syphon and two crystal tumblers. When he had poured two stiff glasses, he cocked an eye at Shard. “Well? What do you want of me, Mr Shard?”

  Shard came direct to the point. “I’m seeking vital information, and I mean vital. A lot of lives may be at stake. I’m going to ask you, Father, to break the vows of the confessional.”

  The priest smiled. “In that case, Mr Shard, I’m afraid you’ve had a long journey for absolutely nothing. I take it, of course, you’re not a Catholic. But I’d have thought you’d have known all the same.”

  “Yes, I do know. I’m very sorry to have to ask you this, believe me. Mr McCrory doesn’t approve and was certain you would not help. He could be right, and I have no means, even if I wished to use them, of making you do what you don’t want to do. That’s understood.”

  Donnellan nodded, frowning. “Why not sit down?” he said.

  “Thank you.” Shard sat in a curious-looking whitewood chair with a small table by its side. He placed the whisky tumbler on this table: the priest sat opposite him and said, “You don’t look to me an irreligious man. A priest can tell, you know. Many policemen do have that look, the stupid, bullying look, but not you. That may not be a compliment to a policeman, but it’s meant as such.”

  Shard smiled. “Thank you!”

  “You spoke of something being vital, and of — I think — lives at risk. Have you come on a junkie hunt?”

  “No, not that at all. This is — something very much more immediate that may involve the deaths of very many people within the next few days. Time’s that short! We would very much appreciate any help you can give us, Father.”

  “Can you be more precise?” The priest paused. “No?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “I see. But, you know, you haven’t framed a question yet! Don’t let the cloth put you off, nor even the confessional. We men of God, Mr Shard, are worldly enough beneath the dog-collar — and we do hear things that aren’t covered by any vows.”

  Shard inclined his head gratefully. “Thank you again, Father. My first question is this: do you have in your parish a Garda officer named Casey?”

  “I think you know I have, or you wouldn’t have come.”

  “Right! I do know. Can you tell me, is he in the habit of confessing to you, Father Donnellan?”

  “He’s a good Catholic. You may infer from that … what you wish.”

  “Very well,” Shard said, smiling, “I have inferred! Now, here’s the hard part, or anyway the start of it. What I say must not be repeated, please.” He occupied himself with his whisky tumbler but, under cover of this, watched the face of the priest with immense care and concentration. “Tom Casey was a good friend of mine and Tom Casey’s dead. Murdered very horribly.”

  The priest’s head jerked up, the eyes widening: Shard was convinced the reaction was natural, that the news had shocked. “No!”

  “I’m afraid, yes. Currently, we don’t know who did it. We have no leads, none at all. He was working on something he didn’t need to work on but wanted to, because he wanted to save lives. Now, only you can do that — or may be able to. Not being a Catholic, I don’t know if the confessional holds its sanctity after death —”

  “Then let me assure you, it does.”

  “I see,” Shard said in a flat tone. “In that case, you’ll not be able to tell me if a woman had come into Tom Casey’s life. A woman that he may have told you about … a woman that he would not wish his wife to hear of.”

  “A woman?” The priest’s eyes had narrowed, and he was looking more than ever troubled: Shard felt he had scored a point. He got to his feet, his face hard now.

  He said, “Yes, a woman. The way Tom died …” In a few words, he described the injuries as reported by the Yard. “Father, you must be aware of Arab customs. They aren’t pretty! This sp
eaks to me of the involvement of a woman, an Arab woman, and if we knew who she was, then we would have a good lead. Father, Tom Casey’s dead.” Shard was sweating now, his voice urgent. “Do you really think it will offend your God and mine if you help to find his killers — if by so doing you save so many more innocent lives, the lives of men, women and children, many of whom will be Catholics like yourself, even perhaps former colleagues — if that’s the word — at Westminster Cathedral? Do you?”

  He mopped at his face, was surprised, when he looked again, to find Father Donnellan smiling. The priest said, “Oh, there’s no vow involved. Tom Casey was a realist, you know, and honest with it. Not for him the sinning, and then the confession, and then the sinning again! When he came to me, he came as a friend in search of advice and comfort, not as a priest. His confessions were genuine ones, when he made them, and those sins were not repeated after forgiveness. He talked to me about his special weakness outside the confessional.”

  “So there was a woman?”

  “There were several women — I say this in confidence, of course, and never mind the non-confessional nature —”

  “Yes —”

  “His wife must never know. I trust you with the information, which broadly perhaps you knew already —”

  “Yes, I did. The name of the most recent woman, Father?”

  “A striking one. Tom said she was a striking woman too! The name — Nadia Nazarrazeen.”

  Shard blew out a releasing breath. “For that I thank you, Father Donnellan! Did Tom ever say anything else — about his work perhaps, anything that —”

  “Would lead you to Miss Nazarrazeen? No, he didn’t. I don’t think you’d have expected him to. I’ve no idea how or where or why they met —” Very suddenly, the priest broke off. In the silence that followed his upraised hand, Shard heard a sound, a small one, from the hall outside: like a faint cry, quickly stifled. Before Shard could move to stop him, Father Donnellan had run across to the door and jerked it open. What followed was like some sort of sleight-of-hand: now you saw him, now you didn’t. There was the shattering roar of a gun, three times rapidly repeated, a belch of acrid-smelling gunsmoke. Behind the door, the priest fell, reeling, clutching at his throat, breath rasping. As the body fell out of sight behind the door, Shard, his own revolver in his hand now, slid towards the jamb and looked through: a hooded man stood there, a big man with brilliant eyes visible behind slits in the canvas hood, a man engaged in kicking death out of his way into the study.

  Four

  Shard was lucky in one way, unlucky in another: his reaction was fast, almost too fast. He fired blindly through the panel of the study door, and the heavy bullet of the Smith and Wesson Chief’s Special hit flesh. There was a kind of gargling cry and something thumped back against the door, smashing it against Shard. Shard came out from cover and saw the man on the floor, lying half across the body of the parish priest; and saw the widening stain, the thick ooze of blood welling up and out from around the waistband of check-patterned bell-bottoms.

  He bent and felt for the beat of hearts: Father Donnellan was stone cold dead, the hooded man lived still but wasn’t going to last long. In the meantime he was in no condition to talk: the mouth hung slack when Shard dragged off the hood, the eyes seemed already glazing. Breathing was heavy, stertorous. And the skin was brown, the features Arabic, classic Arabic of hooked nose, black eyes, thick brows, black moustache and beard. Maybe things were starting to jell, but the flavour hadn’t yet become apparent; and it was a thousand pities the man with the hood was going to die before he could talk.

  Shard picked up the murder weapon from where it had fallen: oddly, it was a Uzi — a sub-machine-gun of Israeli make. Uzis were good: compact too — 9mm, 25-round magazine, detachable, with a sliding metal stock, 25 inches extended, gibs loaded weight. The magazine was in the right-hand grip and a grip-safe stopped it blasting off if dropped. Shard wondered about the Uzi: a trophy from one of the nine-day-wonder Israeli-Arab wars, or simple thieving? Whatever the origin, that Uzi could talk after the death of its owner, but what it had to say would depend upon whether or not the fingerprint sections at the Foreign Office, Special Branch or the Yard’s GRO had the filed wherewithal to interpret. Laying down the gun Shard went across for Father Donnellan’s telephone: not unexpectedly, the line was dead. Moving back fast for the door, Shard stepped over the bodies and went out into the hall. Here it was quiet, but a door stood open at the back end. Gun in hand, Shard advanced. He kicked back the door savagely and it rebounded in his face, bouncing off more death: a hummock of faded black — the old woman, garrotted, with a bootlace tight-knotted around the flabby, wrinkled neck. As he bent to the body the front door opened behind him and he came upright, gun ready: but it was the driver of the police car, looking dead scared.

  “Are you all right, sir?”

  “I’m all right.” Shard gestured down at the bodies. “Get a plain van, no fuss.”

  The driver turned away; Shard stopped him. “Didn’t you see anyone approaching the presbytery?”

  “I did not, sir. Not a thing.”

  “No cars parked after we did?”

  “No, sir.”

  “All right, off you go. I’ll wait. Fast as you can.” The policeman went out and Shard followed. He looked around: as the man had said, no cars. The gunman could have parked anywhere in bungalow-ville and then walked.

  *

  “It’s being taken very seriously,” Hedge said at four o’clock next afternoon on the security line to Seddon’s Way. “The Cabinet’s meeting in half an hour and you’ll be required to attend with me. Is —”

  “Use your influence, Hedge. Prevent a hoo-ha.”

  “Hoo-ha?”

  “You know what I mean: we do not, repeat not, want a full-scale operation yet. I want to lull them — they still may not know Casey was in contact —”

  “No? Then how d’you explain a tail being put on you?”

  Shard whistled through his teeth. “We don’t know it was a tail. Personally I don’t believe it was. If we assume it was, then we must assume Casey actually talked — under some nasty pressure. I don’t believe Casey would do that. On the other hand, Casey used to grow maudlin when he’d had a drink. Maudlin in a religious sense, Hedge. Are you with me?”

  Hedge snapped, “No, I’m not!”

  “The priest, Hedge, Casey’s priest. They’d have known he was a Catholic for a start. They could have had just the same idea as me. Now d’you get it?”

  “So they silenced the priest?”

  “Exactly. Just in case. Not knowing I’d got there first.”

  There was a grunt along the wire. Hedge asked, “Anything fresh on the hooded man?”

  “Nothing. I was about to ring you … all fingerprint sections report a blank, and as you know already, that includes Dublin and Belfast —”

  “The body — the man himself —”

  “No identification.”

  “He’s absolutely not known in Ireland?”

  “I told you. No Garda or RUC knowledge at all, not that I expected it.”

  “So we’re no further ahead?”

  “Except for Nadia Nazarrazeen. That’s important —”

  “Yes, yes.” Hedge sounded stiff, as though he would have liked to reprimand Tom Casey: one day, Shard thought, the man would grow up. Even policemen felt the pangs of sex, though Hedge’s view appeared to be that they had no right to. “Poor show — that. On Casey’s part, I mean —”

  “Never mind the sex lectures, Hedge. This meeting: I’ll come as ordered —”

  “Of course you will —”

  “— but I don’t want to hang about, Hedge, because I’m going north this evening.”

  “York?”

  “Yes.”

  “This — er — woman, Nazarra-something?”

  “Zeen. Yes.”

  Hedge said disparagingly, “Shard, do be careful, won’t you?”

  Shard grinned into the mouthpiece, icily. “
Oh, I will, don’t worry. If you’re concerned about my private parts, don’t be. I’ll not be making contact at this stage —” He stopped, grinning still. Hedge had hung up on him, slam bang. Shard sat back for a moment, rocking back on his chair-legs, arms at full stretch against his desk. He marshalled his thoughts, preparing for a grill from the Cabinet brass. Casey, Dublin, Donnellan, Nazarrazeen, a hooded Arab thug, four men to carry the explosives, and a pretty clear mental image, plus maps and statistics, of London’s underground system. What he knew was little enough: it shouldn’t take long to put bare facts across to the Cabinet. Shard’s thoughts moved homeward to Beth, facing another night alone, with him chasing Arab dolly birds, if she did but know, in York. He left Seddon’s Way and drove to Number 10, where the Cabinet meeting was to be held.

  *

  The brass was in full muster plus: some of them were not in fact Cabinet ministers. The P.M. sat fatly soft at the highly polished table, surveying Home Secretary, Minister of Defence, Secretary of the Environment, Foreign Secretary, the ministers concerned with health and housing and local government and a lot more. Also present as well as Hedge was Assistant Commissioner Hesseltine with his chief, and the chairmen of London Transport and the GLC. Full as the muster was, Shard had a strong and depressing feeling that the threat was in fact being taken less than duly seriously. A tall, thin man with thick glasses and a face like a corpse, a man whom Shard failed to identify, talked sotto voce to his neighbour all through the preliminaries: Shard, longing to shake him by the scraggy neck, heard him say something about terrorists being too familiar a part of the scene to get one’s knickers in a twist about: the neighbour guffawed his agreement and proceeded to fix a round of golf at Sunningdale for the next day. Shard thought helplessly and with grinding teeth about Detective Sergeant Casey and Father Donnellan and others …

  He heard his name spoken by the Prime Minister: he stood up, notes in hand.

  “Your full report, please, Chief Superintendent.”

  Shard gave it, fully factual, unemotional, concise: the thin man continued talking waggishly, behind his hand, and Shard seethed inside. When he had finished there was a silence, this time total, until the Prime Minister said “Thank you. Your opinion, Chief Superintendent?”