The Storm Protocol

by Iain Cosgrove

  The answer surprised me.

  ‘She was the youngest of all the children, not just the girls,’ he said, ‘and quite considerably younger than the others. In fact she is not that much older than you. Ten, maybe fifteen years max.’

  We journeyed the rest of the way in silence. I knew what they were thinking and I didn’t blame them. I wasn't being entirely dishonest with them. I truly did believe that following this lead could possibly assist in our investigations, but there was that very small part of me, the tiny frightened boy with no family, that was desperate to seize on any connection, no matter how tenuous.

  As we neared our destination, I was glad that the Hertz rep had persuaded me to part with the extra cash for the Sat Nav. Like a lot of small provincial towns, Rosscarbery was the name for the town-land as well as the town itself. We traversed the main street, such as it was, and were directed out through the other side. We turned right down a typical country lane and were brought to a stop outside a plain whitewashed bungalow. It was set back a bit from the road, probably on at least an acre. The gates across the driveway were closed, so we couldn’t pull in. I told the other two to wait.

  As I approached the path to the front door of the house, I noticed a woman working in the garden. She was humming softly and tunefully. A small Jack Russell terrier was running around the lawn and into the flower beds. Every minute or so he would dash back to her, prompting a peal of laughter, soft and melodic, like water flowing through a mountain stream, until she threw his ball and sent him on his way again.

  I raised the latch on the wrought iron gate and pushed it gently inwards. The rusty hinges protested as it swung towards the house. She stood up, as I eased myself through the small opening. The sun was well and truly out and she had to hood her eyes with her hand to shield them from the glare. She moved onto the path as I approached.

  Suddenly the sun disappeared behind the fast moving clouds. She saw my face clearly for the first time, and her hand flew to her mouth and her face drained of colour.

  ‘I knew this day would come,’ she said, in the same soft melodic tone.

  It reminded me very much of my mother. I looked at her with a puzzled expression.

  ‘You’re Mary’s boy,’ she said.

  It was not a question.

  She turned and wordlessly headed for the open front door. She turned in the doorway. I stood stock still as she beckoned me impatiently inside. I turned to my companions.

  ‘Stay there,’ I mouthed, and then headed down the path to join her.

  In the hallway, I heard the unmistakeable clinking of someone busy in the kitchen.

  ‘Head into the sitting room, Thomas,’ she shouted, anticipating my indecision. ‘It’s the first door on your left.’

  She knew my name. It was a start at least.

  I opened the door into a typical rural front room. They were generally only used for special occasions; birthdays, religious holidays and of course Christmas. The kitchen was the living beating heart of most Irish rural houses.

  Instead of sitting, I gravitated to the sideboard, where there were a large collection of photographs on display. They were mostly old and black-and-white. Of the ones I recognised, it was generally the locations; very few of the people. There was one photo which appeared to take pride of place, right in the heart of the shelving unit. It was the largest and it was the centrepiece, a group photograph. I recognised my mother, she must have been about twenty, and yes there were two guys and two other girls in the frame; all smiling and laughing.

  I continued browsing and then; wham; I was stopped in my tracks. There it was, literally in black and white. Mother, Father, Son. I was amazed in one way; shocked at how closely my mental image matched the reality. I’d been carrying it for decades, but there was nothing about this photograph that surprised me.

  A noise behind me brought me back. I heard a rattle as the tray was put down on the small occasional table. I turned around.

  ‘They were a handsome couple, weren’t they?’ she said simply. ‘I’ll let you get your own tea if you don’t mind. I don't know how you like it.’

  The cups were delicate bone china with matching saucers. They displayed an intricate Chinese design in blue; no teabags whacked into mugs here. I sat in the armchair opposite her and we sipped politely for a couple of minutes, until I could take it no longer.

  ‘How did you know who I was?’ I asked.

  ‘You’ve had that same facial expression, almost since the day you were born,’ she said. ‘I always used to describe it as relentless determination. Also there’s the shape of your head. The features haven't really changed; you’ve always had a nice face. Deep down, I always felt you would grow up to be a decent man.’

  I smiled at the earnestness of her statement.

  ‘I’m not sure I'd agree with you on all of that,’ I said. ‘I would especially quibble with the part about me being a decent man.’

  ‘Bad deeds don't necessarily equal a bad person,’ she said enigmatically.

  ‘What else was it you said?’ I asked, becoming uncomfortable. ‘I knew this day would come.’

  ‘When you finally came to find me,’ she finished. ‘I knew you'd find out the truth eventually. I told Mary that. I begged her, but she didn’t listen. She refused to listen actually, she was blinded; they both were.’

  ‘Her and my father, you mean?’

  ‘Is that what he was?’

  She laughed abruptly.

  ‘So, is that why you've come? To try and find out the truth?’

  ‘I found out the truth in a solicitor's office about twenty four hours ago,’ I said grimly. ‘I don’t necessarily need the truth, what I need is the truth explained.’

  We digested that sentence for a while, with our cups occasionally chiming a crisp clean note, like a tuning fork, on the edge of our saucers as we sipped.

  ‘You’re my aunt,’ I blurted out suddenly.

  ‘I am,’ she said, ‘but I'd prefer it if you called me plain old Joan.’

  I smiled.

  ‘Sure.’

  I paused before rushing headlong in.

  ‘So why did I know nothing about you, Joan?’ I asked.

  ‘Are you sure you want to know?’

  ‘I’ve never been surer,’ I said.

  ‘All families have secrets,’ she said.

  I didn't say anything.

  ‘Mary and me were inseparable when I was growing up,’ she said. ‘In truth she was probably more a mother to me than our mother was. Even though she was the eldest, we always had a strange bond; one that transcended age or generational differences. Where the others left home, she stayed. She got a job and looked after the parents and me.’

  ‘Then what?’ I asked.

  ‘Everything was going okay for us. We weren't rich, but we were happy. James’s death was a setback; none of us were expecting that. I think that’s why Catherine left for Australia. They were all running away, but not your mother. You probably know that better than me. She was rock solid; a foundation for the rest of us to cling to. And then in the blink of an eye, everything changed. She met him.’

  ‘My father?’ I asked again.

  She nodded.

  ‘According to both of them, it was love at first sight. It was initially a one night stand; they literally bumped into each other in the street. They promised each other, or rather he made her promise him, that it would be the only time they would ever see each other. And that was it for both of them, or so they thought. You were born almost exactly nine months later.’

  ‘So, she was a single mother?’ I asked. ‘It must have been tough in those days.’

  ‘It was,’ she said flatly. ‘But even then, it wasn’t too late. Things could have gone back to the way they were before; in fact it was almost better. Our parents had accepted the situation with minimum fuss, and absolutely doted on you. I thought you were the most exquisite baby I had ever seen.’

  I smiled at the description.

  ‘But abo
ut two years after you were born, they bumped into each other again, completely by chance, and this time neither of them was prepared to say no to themselves or to each other.’

  ‘So what happened?’

  ‘She sat us down, my parents and me, and told us she was leaving, taking you with her. The way we interpreted it, and rightly so in our eyes, she was to become a kept woman. He bought them a big house on Merchants Quay that he registered in her name. The only proviso, and it seemed a big one to us at the time, was that she always be available. No, in fact, that both she and their child should always be available to play happy families whenever he wanted.’

  I could see the sadness cloud her expression.

  ‘Harsh words were exchanged between your mother and me. I said some things that I could never really take back. I loved your Mum, more than anyone I've ever loved; like I said, she was closer to me than our own mother. They say the line between love and hate is very thin; well I guess it is. She never spoke to me again; in point of fact, I never saw her again after that.’

  ‘This guy, was he like a playboy or something?’

  ‘If I could spit, I’d do it right now on the ground,’ she said. ‘I know he was your father, but he was a weak, vain and selfish excuse for a man. Believed himself in love, when the only thing he was in love with was the idea of being in love; oh, and himself, of course.’

  ‘I remember him being around,’ I responded, almost defensively.

  I’d also noticed the tense she had used to describe him. Did she mean anything by that?

  She looked at me kindly.

  ‘Oh, he was the model husband and father early on,’ she said. ‘The problem was; he was eventually found out by his wife.’

  ‘He was married?’ I exclaimed, although I wasn’t really surprised.

  Joan had been leading up to it in a roundabout kind of way.

  ‘They say hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, and boy did she unleash the fury big time. He’d left her you see, to be with his love.’

  The sarcasm was literally dripping off the word love.

  ‘He lasted about a week. His in-laws cut him off, the majority of the money was provided from her family fortune, and he discovered that financial security was more important to him than you and your mother. The only thing his wife’s family didn't find out about was the house he’d bought for Mary and you; maybe because it was in your mum’s name. When he died, she was able to sell it. She managed to live off the proceeds, almost to the day that she too passed away.’

  ‘Were you there?’ I asked. ‘At the funeral?’

  She turned to me and I saw the tears welling up in her eyes; more than I had managed when I had first heard of my mum’s passing.

  ‘It was the least I could do,’ she said.

  She looked at me and guessed my thoughts.

  ‘At least one member of her family was there at the end. It was a good send off; she had a lot of good friends and there was a lot of goodwill.’

  ‘We didn't have a bad life,’ I acknowledged.

  ‘No you didn’t,’ she said.

  ‘So, do you know who he was?’ I asked, reverting to the same tense that she had used. The word died was pretty final when referring to a person.

  She looked at me then; those cool grey eyes in the tanned and pleasant face that reminded me so much of my mother, only less tense and more relaxed.

  ‘I'll never forget that name till the day I die,’ she said. ‘Michael Morrison.’

  Chapter 46 – Clandestine

  22nd May 2011 – Twelve days after the Storm.

  If we could read the secret history of our enemies we should find in each man’s life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility. – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

  ‘Hey Boss!’

  Dodds nudged Ray and continued whispering.

  ‘I knew it was called the Pentagon, but I didn't realise it was in the actual shape of a pentagon. Does that sound stupid?’

  ‘It does a bit,’ whispered Ray, trying not to laugh.

  They were in a taxi in Washington DC, heading out of the airport complex. Both of them had been summoned to see the director, a journey that would take them directly to the middle of the spider’s web.

  ‘Why are we whispering?’ asked Dodds finally.

  ‘I don't know,’ said Ray in a normal voice. ‘Probably makes fuck all difference. Most of these taxi drivers barely speak English, certainly in New York anyway; not sure about DC.’

  As he finished what he was saying, they caught their first glimpse of the massive building up close. Ray had seen it before, in television programmes and on the news. There had been a lot of coverage over the years, especially around the nine eleven attacks, but when you saw it in the flesh for the first time, you realised just how big it really was. The taxi driver dropped them as close as he could to their designated entrance. They both smiled at his garbled and barely comprehensible effort to tell them the fare. It looked like they were not wide of the mark where DC taxi drivers were concerned.

  Even though they were both federal employees, Ray was amazed and more than a little bit heartened by how forensically his identification was studied. There was certainly no complacency on show that he could see; nine eleven had taught all the agencies a valuable security lesson.

  They were escorted into one of the main lobbies, all gleaming marble, chrome and stainless steel. They were asked to wait, and wait they were made to do.

  Ray was just about to refill his paper cup for the third time at the mirrored metal water cooler, when an impassive looking man in his early twenties approached, wearing a dark suit and Ray Ban Aviator sunglasses. Ray and Dodds looked away from each other; they wouldn’t have been able to keep a straight face otherwise.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ he said formally, ‘if you'd like to follow me please.’

  The trio walked over to the phalanx of elevators. There were no buttons, just security proximity readers. The unsmiling young man flicked his badge over the black square of plastic and the doors glided open.

  Inside the lift, he hit the button for the top floor; the fifth floor no less. It may have been a huge building, but it was not a tall one. Ray felt no sensation of movement, but within seconds the light for the fifth floor illuminated with a ping. Before the automaton could badge them out, Ray flicked his DEA badge across the card reader. It beeped, but the red light in the centre of the pad stayed stubbornly red.

  ‘Just checking,’ said Ray with a smile.

  ‘Please don't do that again,’ stated the young man brusquely.

  Even though Ray outranked him by a considerable number of grades, it was definitely a dressing down. They had a real bigwig about themselves, these CIA types.

  They exited the lift in silence and were escorted for what seemed like a mile along the featureless corridor. Everyone they met seemed to be equally as unfriendly and unsmiling as their host.

  They were eventually escorted into a small and spartan ante room. It was like a doctor or dentist's waiting area, only without the tattered and outdated magazines. Dodds and Ray sat down on the hard plastic chairs. Their escort nodded briefly before turning on his heel and briskly walking out. Ray wouldn't have been surprised to have heard the sound of a key turning in the lock.

  ‘Well, he was a bundle of laughs, wasn’t he?’ said Dodds.

  Ray smiled.

  ‘Paranoid delusions are us, with a little bit of arsehole thrown in.’

  They both laughed.

  ‘And he’s definitely seen the men in black too.’

  They laughed until their sides ached. They both knew what it was; release of tension. Eventually, they calmed down; sitting and fidgeting inside that small room for what seemed like an eternity, but in truth was probably no more than twenty minutes.

  The door to the main office suddenly burst open, causing Ray and Dodds to jump. A man seemed to suddenly materialise in the middle of the room. Maybe it was because of his size; he dwarfed both Ray and Dodds, neither of who
m were small men. It might also have been because of his presence, but there was an aura around him that Ray recognised immediately. It was the essence of power.

  He looked from one of them to the other and raised his eyebrows.

  ‘Agent Fox?’ he asked.

  ‘I’m Ray Fox,’ said Ray.

  The lines on his face cleared.

  ‘CIA Director Nicholson,’ he said. ‘Winston Nicholson’

  His handshake was as large and overwhelming as he was. Ray could almost feel the bones splintering in his hand, as his arm was pumped enthusiastically.

  ‘And you must be Agent Dodds,’ he said, subjecting Dodds to the same treatment.

  He motioned them towards his office and stepped aside to allow them in first. There were two chairs set up facing an enormous desk, but instead, he motioned them to the far corner, where two leather couches faced each other across a large square coffee table. Whether by accident or design, they ended up facing each other like adversaries, Winston on one side with Ray and Dodds on the other.

  ‘Coffee or something stronger?’ asked Winston.

  Both Ray and Dodds attention had been immediately drawn to the large drinks cabinet in the corner. Rank very definitely had its privilege still.

  ‘Coffee would be fine,’ said Dodds.

  ‘Same here,’ replied Ray.

  The director pushed a button on an intercom beside him.

  ‘Three coffees when you’re ready,’ he said brightly.

  He turned back to the two guys.

  ‘Glad you could make it over,’ he said.

  ‘Did we have a choice?’ asked Ray, echoing what Dodds was thinking.

  ‘Probably not,’ acknowledged the director. ‘But I'd like to think that the natural curiosity inherent in all investigators would have brought you here, even if I hadn‘t told you that you had no alternative.’

  Ray inclined his head.

  ‘Touché,’ he said.

  Ray and Dodds glanced down at the table, and noticed there were two forms facing them with pens placed diagonally across the pages.

  ‘What are these?’ asked Ray.

  ‘Non-disclosure agreements,’ said the director.