“Look on the bright side, babe. You’ve got a guide who can tell you everything you ever wanted to know about Lord Jones’s castle on the coast of whatever. You’ll have plenty of time for it, too.”
“Yeah,” she said, “the police said we’d be staying over a while longer than we planned. I’ll have to talk to Professor Lewindowski about that.” She shrugged. “They’ll understand.”
“How do you like the new place? Better than the hotel?”
“You’re going to have to see — no, you’ll have to experience it.” She laughed. “I think hospitality is the national sport over here. They must teach it in the schools, and have quarterly exams. And guess who we’re having dinner with tonight?”
“I don’t have to guess.”
“Jack, they’re so nice.”
“I noticed. Looks like you’re really getting the VIP treatment.”
“What’s the Special Air Service — he’s some kind of pilot?”
“Something like that,” Jack said diffidently. Cathy might feel uncomfortable sitting next to a man who had to be carrying a gun. And was trained to use it with as little compunction as a wolf might use his teeth. “You’re not asking how I feel.”
“I got hold of your chart on the way in,” Cathy explained.
“And?”
“You’re doing okay. Jack. I see you can move your fingers. I was worried about that.”
“How come?”
“The brachial plexus — it’s a nerve junction inside your shoulder. The bullet missed it by about an inch and a half. That’s why you can move your fingers. The way you were bleeding, I thought the brachial artery was cut, and that runs right next to the nerves. It would have put your arm out of business for good. But” — she smiled — “you lucked out. Just broken bones. They hurt but they heal.”
Doctors are so wonderfully objective, Ryan told himself, even the ones you marry. Next thing, she’ll say the pain is good for me.
“Nice thing about pain,” Cathy went on. “It tells you the nerves are working.”
Jack closed his eyes and shook his head. He opened them when he felt Cathy take his hand.
“Jack, I’m so proud of you.”
“Nice to be married to a hero?”
“You’ve always been a hero to me.”
“Really?” She’d never said that before. What was heroic about being an historian? Cathy didn’t know the other stuff he did, but that wasn’t especially heroic either.
“Ever since you told Daddy to — well, you know. Besides, I love you, remember?”
“I seem to recall a reminder of that the other day.”
Cathy made a face. “Better get your mind off that for a while.”
“I know.” Ryan made a face of his own. “The patient must conserve his energy — or something. What ever happened to that theory about how a happy attitude speeds recovery?”
“That’s what I get for letting you read my journals. Patience, Jack.”
Nurse Kittiwake came in, saw the family, and made a quick exit.
“I’ll try to be patient,” Jack said, and looked longingly at the closing door.
“You turkey,” Cathy observed. “I know you better than that.”
She did, Jack knew. He couldn’t even make that threat work. Oh, well — that’s what you get for loving your wife.
Cathy stroked his face. “What did you shave with this morning, a rusty nail?”
“Yeah — I need my razor. Maybe my notes, too?”
“I’ll bring them over or have somebody do it.” She looked up when Wilson came back in.
“Tony, this is Cathy, my wife, and Sally, my daughter. Cathy, this is Tony Wilson. He’s the cop who’s baby-sitting me.”
“Didn’t I see you last night?” Cathy never forgot a face — so far as Jack could tell, she never forgot much of anything.
“Possibly, but we didn’t speak — rather a busy time for all of us. You are well, Lady Ryan?”
“Excuse me?” Cathy asked. “Lady Ryan?”
“They didn’t tell you?” Jack chuckled.
“Tell me what?”
Jack explained. “How do you like being married to a knight?”
“Does that mean you have to have a horse. Daddy?” Sally asked hopefully. “Can I ride it?”
“Is it legal, Jack?”
“They told me that the Prime Minister and the President would discuss it today.”
“My God,” Lady Ryan said quietly. After a moment, she started smiling.
“Stick with me, kid.” Jack laughed.
“What about the horse, Daddy!” Sally insisted.
“I don’t know yet. We’ll see.” He yawned. The only practical use Ryan acknowledged for horses was running at tracks — or maybe tax shelters. Welt, I already have a sword, he told himself.
“I think Daddy needs a nap,” Cathy observed. “And I have to buy something for dinner tonight.”
“Oh, God!” Ryan groaned. “A whole new wardrobe.”
Cathy grinned. “Whose fault is that. Sir John?”
They met at Flanagan’s Steakhouse on O’Connell Street in Dublin. It was a well-regarded establishment whose tourist trade occasionally suffered from being too close to a McDonald’s. Ashley was nursing a whiskey when the second man joined him. A third and fourth took a booth across the room and watched. Ashley had come alone. This wasn’t the first such meeting, and Dublin was recognized — most of the time — as neutral ground. The two men on the other side of the room were to keep a watch for members of the Garda, the Republic’s police force.
“Welcome to Dublin, Mr. Ashley,” said the representative of the Provisional Wing of the Irish Republican Army.
“Thank you, Mr. Murphy,” the counterintelligence officer answered. “The photograph we have in the file doesn’t do you justice.”
“Young and foolish, I was. And very vain. I didn’t shave very much then,” Murphy explained. He picked up the menu that had been waiting for him. “The beef here is excellent, and the vegetables are always fresh. This place is full of bloody tourists in the summer — those who don’t want French fries — driving prices up as they always do. Thank God they’re all back home in America now, leaving so much money behind in this poor country.”
“What information do you have for us?”
“Information?”
“You asked for the meeting, Mr. Murphy,” Ashley pointed out.
“The purpose of the meeting is to assure you that we had no part in that bloody fiasco yesterday.”
“I could have read that in the papers — I did, in fact.”
“It was felt that a more personal communique was in order, Mr. Ashley.”
“Why should we believe you?” Ashley asked, sipping at his whiskey. Both men kept their voices low and level, though neither man had the slightest doubt as to what they thought of each other.
“Because we are not as crazy as that,” Murphy replied. The waiter came, and both men ordered. Ashley chose the wine, a promising Bordeaux. The meal was on his expense account. He was only forty minutes off the flight from London’s Gatwick airport. The request for a meeting had been made before dawn in a telephone call to the British Ambassador in Dublin.
“Is that a fact?” Ashley said after the waiter left, staring into the cold blue eyes across the table.
“The Royal Family are strictly off limits. As marvelous a political target as they all are” — Murphy smiled — “we’ve known for some time that an attack on them would be counterproductive.”
“Really?” Ashley pronounced the word as only an Englishman can do it. Murphy flushed angrily at this most elegant of insults.
“Mr. Ashley, we are enemies. I would as soon kill you as have dinner with you. But even enemies can negotiate, can’t they, now?”
“Go on.”
“We had no part of it. You have my word.”
“Your word as a Marxist-Leninist?” Ashley inquired with a smile.
“You are very good at provoking people, Mr. Ashley.” Murphy ventured his own smile. “But not today. I am here on a mission of peace and understanding.”
Ashley nearly laughed out loud, but caught himself and grinned into his drink.
“Mr. Murphy, I would not shed a single tear if our lads were to catch up with you, but you are a worthy adversary, I’ll say that. And a charming bastard.”
Ah, the English sense of fair play. Murphy reflected. That’s why we’ll win eventually, Mr. Ashley.
No, you won’t. Ashley had seen that look before.
“How can I make you believe me?” Murphy asked reasonably.
“Names and addresses,” Ashley answered quietly.
“No. We cannot do that and you know it.”
“If you wish to establish some sort of quid pro quo, that’s how you must go about it.”
Murphy sighed. “Surely you know how we are organized. Do you think we can punch up a bloody computer command and print out our roster? We’re not even sure ourselves who they are. Some men, they just drop out. Many come south and simply vanish, more afraid of us than of you, they are — and with reason,” Murphy added. “The one you have alive, Sean Miller — we’ve never even heard the name.”