Soldier E: Sniper Fire in Belfast

by Shaun Clarke

  ‘It’s no use pretending to read, Norman, I know damned well you can’t.’

  The man looked up, glanced at his wristwatch, then said without a trace of irony: ‘Have you arrived?’

  ‘I have.’ Lovelock took the chair beside the man, which meant he could keep his eyes on the entrance. He nodded for Ricketts to take the seat at the other side of him, which placed him in view of the toilets and, possibly, the back door. ‘This is an English friend, Phil Ricketts. We used to work together in London, before I saw sense and came home. Phil, this is Norman Reid.’

  Ricketts nodded.

  ‘Nice to meet ya, Phil. First time in Belfast?’

  ‘Yes,’ Ricketts said.

  ‘A queer wee place, right?’

  ‘It takes some getting used to.’

  ‘What’s that you’re drinking?’ Lovelock asked, still using his Ulster accent, but more softly now.

  ‘Bushmills.’

  ‘A dangerous brew.’

  ‘Ach, well, sure it warms the stomach on a winter’s evening.’ He had another sip, then glanced at the man sitting at the bar near the entrance. ‘Now mind what yer sayin’. That one at the end of the bar is from Sandy Row. Be natural, but keep yer voice low, and he won’t hear from here.’

  ‘UDA?’

  Reid nodded. ‘He’s an ijit, but he lives for the cause and is here for the money.’

  ‘Protection?’

  ‘Aye. But he’s also here to check out who comes in and he can be right nasty. A dunderhead, but dangerous.’

  ‘Anything to tell me?’

  ‘You heard about the shootin’ up near Divis?’

  ‘News travels fast.’

  ‘It does in this wee city. They say the Mick was shot by men in plain clothes and now the Army are sweeping the area for the other lads involved.’

  ‘The men in plain clothes weren’t identified?’

  ‘Na. But no doubt you have yer own ideas.’

  ‘Not so far,’ Lovelock said.

  ‘So how’d ya hear about it so quickly, like?’

  ‘We heard it over our car radio. So what’s happening down Sandy Row way?’

  ‘They’re tickled pink over the fact that another Mick has been killed by the Army.’

  ‘Unidentified,’ Lovelock reminded him.

  ‘Aye, unidentified – like an Army Q car’s unidentified. They all know it was Army. They think it’ll lead to Provisional IRA retaliation, which will give them an excuse for another bloodbath. They’re all sittin’ down there oilin’ their guns with big grins on their mugs. It’s as good as the killin’ of O’Halloran, they say, so you can expect a wee comeback for that.’

  ‘What kind of comeback?’

  ‘Comeback in kind. I’d say the Micks will go for Lieutenant Cranfield, so he’d best watch his wee English arse. He’s done youse all some damage, like.’

  Reid talked for another twenty or minutes or so, giving Lovelock an update on what was happening in the pubs of Sandy Row between the members of the UDA and other Protestant paramilitary groups. He passed no written information to Lovelock, but dropped a few names for him to place watches on, with details of where they were most likely to be found. When he had finished, Lovelock thanked him, finished his beer, then left the pub with Ricketts, walking past the UDA man sitting at the bar and keeping his eye on the door. The man studied them carefully as they left, but was distracted when another customer entered, allowing Lovelock and Ricketts to leave without questioning.

  The Q car was still parked outside, with Gumboot and Martin, having finished their sandwiches and tea, studying the busy road in a bored manner. Darkness had fallen and the street lights were on, as were the headlights of the many cars and buses of the rush-hour traffic. Across the road, the lights of the Europa Hotel burned brightly, beaming down over the fenced-in courtyard and the huts of the private security guards.

  Lovelock knocked on the side window of the car with his knuckles, then jerked his thumb towards the rear. ‘OK,’ he said, ‘out!’ Gumboot opened the door, clambered out and got in the back as Lovelock took his place in the driver’s seat. Martin did likewise, allowing Ricketts to sit beside Lovelock. ‘Any problems?’ Lovelock asked, turning on the ignition.

  ‘No problems,’ Gumboot said, ‘but we were questioned by RUC and Army patrols every ten or fifteen minutes. In fact, every patrol that passed stopped to question us.’

  ‘They would. You can’t sit in a parked car in Belfast without being questioned. They were OK when you showed them your ID?’

  ‘Yeah, no bother. They just tipped their peaked caps and moved on. All very polite, like.’

  ‘You’re beginning to sound Irish already, like.’

  Gumboot grinned. ‘It’s contagious, like.’

  Glancing constantly back over his shoulder, Lovelock edged into the dense traffic, cut through to Bedford Street, then drove down Dublin Road. At Shaftesbury Square he turned into Donegal Road and drove from there, through Broadway, to the Falls Road, which, in the darkness, illuminated by the street lights, looked even more dangerous than it had during the day.

  The gangs of men, young and old, standing on street corners seemed larger, with many drinking from cans or bottles and clearly aggressive. The bricked-up doorways and boarded-up windows were only rendered more ominous by the light-streaked darkness. Children smashing parked cars without reprimand from frightened passers-by seemed like scavenging animals. The RUC officers in their flak jackets and the heavily armed soldiers at the sandbagged barracks and barricaded streets, all watchful, never smiling, seemed like faceless men in a bad dream.

  Even before the tower block came into view, the crimson glow of flames was illuminating the dark, cloudy sky and the sound of sporadic gunfire could be heard. When Lovelock finally turned off the Falls Road and reached the spot where they had almost been hijacked, they saw mobiles and foot patrols trawling the flats, which were being swept eerily by spotlights. The red glow in the sky came from a series of bonfires deliberately started to block the paths of the mobiles and Saracens, as well as frustrate the charges of the soldiers in flak jackets, perspex-visored riot helmets and reinforced leg and arm shields.

  Other fires were caused by the Molotov cocktails being thrown by gangs of teenage dickers. People were screaming when struck by rubber bullets. Others were racing out of clouds of CS gas with eyes streaming. Housewives were drumming bin lids on the concrete floors and balconies, children and youths were throwing stones and dropping bricks on the mobiles thwarted by the bonfires, and unseen men were sniping on the soldiers keeping watch while their mates smashed in doors with sledgehammers and dragged out kicking, punching youths for transportation to the detention block at Castlereagh.

  ‘It’s a fucking nightmare,’ Gumboot said in the back of the parked car as they watched the distant soldiers drag struggling youths from the walkways of the tower block to the waiting RUC vans. By now, however, the youths’ ankles were chained together to prevent them from kicking out or running away.

  This is just another night in Belfast,’ Lovelock corrected him sardonically. ‘See that,’ he added, pointing to where the youths were being practically dragged to the waiting vans. ‘The housewives here talk about how they’ve been handcuffed by the feet. It’s a wonderful language.’

  ‘We’d better get to Castlereagh,’ Ricketts said.

  ‘I think you’re right, Sarge.’

  Lovelock turned the car around and drove away from the hellish scene, out of the Falls, back through the city centre, across the Albert Bridge, then along the A23 to Castlereagh.

  Arriving at the detention barracks just before 8 p.m., they were directed to the rear of the building by an armed, uniformed RUC guard. Lovelock parked the car in what looked like an enormous yard, like an empty car park, with a high brick wall running along one end. He turned the ignition off, then the headlights, leaving them in almost total darkness.

  ‘Now we wait,’ he said, checking his watch. ‘It should start any minute now.’


  Suddenly, a series of arc lights flared into life along the top of the wall the car was facing, bathing the wall and the ground in front in a dazzling white light. Less than a minute later, a couple of armed RUC officers emerged from a door at one end of the wall to take up positions at both ends of the wall, about twenty feet away, covering it with their 5.56mm Ruger Mini-14 assault rifles. When they were in position, first one, then two, then a whole group of dishevelled youths were coaxed out through the door and along the base of the wall by another RUC officer. When some of the youths, either blinded by the light or frightened, took a step back, the RUC officer prodded them forward with his baton. If this failed, he gave them a light blow with it, and this always worked. Eventually the youths, nearly a dozen, were standing along the whole length of the wall, an equal distance apart, figures in an eerily dreamlike chiaroscuro.

  ‘Well?’ Lovelock asked. ‘Who do we recognize?’

  ‘That little bastard who punched me,’ Gumboot said. ‘Fifth from the left.’

  ‘Good,’ Lovelock said. ‘Anyone else?’

  ‘Yes,’ Ricketts said. ‘I recognize two of the bunch we fired at.’

  ‘Any more?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Right,’ Lovelock said. ‘When they step forward, tap me on the shoulder and I’ll toot my horn.’

  At a barked command from the RUC officer with the baton, the youth who had been first out of the doorway and was now standing at the far left of the line, stepped forward, where he could be seen more clearly. The RUC officer glanced at the car parked in darkness, outside the range of the arc lights. He heard no toot, and ordered the first youth back against the wall, before calling out the second youth. When there was still no response, he ordered the third youth to step forward. When Lovelock tooted his horn, the youth was dragged out of the line-up and led through the doorway by another armed guard. This process continued until Lovelock tooted his horn again and another youth was pulled out of the line-up and taken away. When the third youth was identified and led away, the parade continued until the last youth had stepped forward and been ordered back. Then the remaining members of the line-up were marched back through the doorway for release and return to Belfast.

  When the last of the RUC officers had followed the young men through the door, the arc lights blinked out, plunging the wall back into pitch darkness.

  ‘I think we’ve all earned a beer,’ Lovelock said. ‘Your first day is finished, lads.’

  He turned the car around and drove them back through the dark, stormy night to the camp at Bessbrook.

  Chapter 6

  Wearing civilian clothing, but with two different sets of ID papers – one genuine, the other false ones for a fictitious Ulster resident – and with his Browning holstered in the cross-draw position under his coat, Lieutenant Cranfield drove halfway along the Falls Road in a car with Belfast number plates. He parked near the Broadway, checked his watch and waited patiently for his tout to arrive.

  The Falls was a lot quieter than it had been yesterday when, after the shooting, the commander of the Springfield Road Barracks had instigated a cordon-and-search sweep of the area, thus sparking off another riot on the block of flats on the Divis estate, with the usual bonfires, hurled stones and drumming bin lids. As the dead youth was only sixteen years old, the republican papers had been filled with the usual sanctimonious outrage, including demands for the boy’s ‘murderer’ to be brought to justice. That so-called ‘murderer’, as Cranfield knew, was the excellent Sergeant Phil Ricketts.

  Well, Cranfield thought with a grin, young Martin Renshaw certainly had an interesting first day in Belfast.

  As was customary, when the various Q-car teams had returned to the camp, they had first signed in their weapons, then reported to Captain Dubois and Lieutnant Cranfield in the briefing room. The meeting with Lovelock, Ricketts, Gumboot and young Renshaw had been more tense than most, particularly when Ricketts confessed that he was the unidentified man who had shot and killed the youth on the Divis estate.

  Luckily, by the time of that meeting, Dubois had already received identification of the victim, passed it on to Intelligence, and learnt from them that he was an active member of the IRA youth wing. Naturally, this fact would be denied by the IRA, who would want to use the kid’s ‘murder’ for all the propaganda value they could wring from it. Ricketts, a smart man, had been concerned about that possibility, but Cranfield had put him at his ease, accepting that he’d had no choice in the matter and noting in his report that Sergeant Lovelock and the others present had confirmed that this was indeed the case.

  Now, gazing across the Falls Road to see the usual sorry mixture of armed soldiers, sullen or taunting youths, screeching children, and wearily shopping housewives, all rendered more depressing in the grey afternoon light, Cranfield, though vigilant and wary, was at ease with himself. His men, he felt, had behaved impeccably in a bad situation. Contrary to the concern expressed by the overly concerned Captain Dubois, the SAS men had done what was necessary.

  Five minutes later, dead on time, Cranfield’s tout, Michael O’Leary, slipped into the car and said tersely: ‘OK, take off.’ Cranfield pulled out into the traffic and headed along the Falls Road, away from the Broadway. ‘No camera,’ O’Leary said. ‘No notebook. Drive slowly, but steadily. Don’t slow down when I point anything out. Understood?’

  ‘Yes,’ Cranfield said.

  It annoyed him that O’Leary should give him this redundant advice when they’d done this so many times. On the other hand, the Irishman was probably more nervous than usual.

  Still a member of the provisional IRA, O’Leary had been the bookkeeper for his local wing and started fiddling the books when he became involved with an exceptionally attractive, financially demanding lady named Margaret Dogherty. O’Leary was a sexually inexperienced bachelor who couldn’t believe his luck when he met Margaret in his favourite Republican club and ended up in her bed. Margaret was not only beautiful, but superb in bed. O’Leary was soon head-over-heels in love and half out of his mind with desire.

  Margaret, however, liked the good life and O’Leary had to pay for it, which led to his borrowing’ from the funds of his local PIRA branch. When he found he couldn’t replace the money, he ‘borrowed’ more and tried to recoup his loss at the bookie’s. When this didn’t work, he kept borrowing until he was in so deep, he was desperate. Finally, when it was time for an audit of the books and he knew his thefts would be revealed to his PIRA superiors, he tearfully confided in Margaret, who introduced him to a man who could help him.

  This man turned out to be a member of British Intelligence, MI5, who had put Margaret on to O’Leary in the first place. MI5 agreed to repay O’Leary before the audit and also finance him on a regular basis in the future on the grounds that he ‘turn’ and become their tout. Terrified of being punished by PIRA – which for his offence could have been terminal after torture – and also still besotted with Margaret, who was in fact a high-class prostitute operating out of Dublin, O’Leary agreed.

  Nevertheless, he was still a troubled man, knowing that the longer he touted, the greater were his chances of being discovered. When the affair with Margaret abruptly ended – having done her job, she returned to Dublin – O’Leary, no longer blinded by love, had become even more frightened. As he had told Cranfield over the phone, he wanted to be ‘lifted out’ and given a new identity, in return for which he would give Cranfield a ‘big one’. He was going to do so today, which is why he was nervous.

  ‘Has it been arranged?’ he asked as they drove up the Falls Road.

  ‘It’s been agreed,’ Cranfield replied. ‘We just need to know your final destination and when you want it to be.’

  ‘Australia.’

  ‘Whereabouts?’

  ‘Anywhere.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Two weeks, like.’

  ‘Why wait that long?’

  ‘I have to have a yarn with someone in Dublin.’

  Cranfie
ld smiled. How wondrous is love, he thought. ‘That could be leaving it too long,’ he said, ‘if you’re as concerned as you sounded on the phone. Are you that concerned?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I think they suspect me. I’ve been seen in too many places with m’girlfriend, spending the kind of loot I shouldn’t have. Sooner or later, they’ll want t’know where I got it.’

  ‘If that’s true, you better leave next week.’

  ‘I have to have m’wee yarn first.’

  Cranfield shrugged. ‘As you wish. Two weeks from today?’

  ‘Aye,’ O’Leary said, scanning the busy pavements on both sides of the road. ‘That’ll do a treat.’

  They were silent for a moment, then Cranfield asked: ‘So, what’s the big one?’

  ‘You,’ O’Leary replied without the slightest trace of irony. ‘They believe you’re the one who copped O’Halloran and they’re goin’ t’get ya.’

  ‘What makes them think I did it?’

  ‘Ach, come on, man! They know you and Dubois have often crossed the border to snatch men and bring ’em back t’the RUC. Knowing that, they figured it had t’be you who did O’Halloran in. If it wasn’t you, it doesn’t matter a damn. They want a high profile and you’ve got it; so it’s you they’ll be gunnin’ for. It’s also retaliation fer that lad shot dead yesterday.’

  ‘Do they have a suspect for that?’

  ‘Na,’ O’Leary said. ‘They just talk about the British bastard and say he was one of yours – SAS, like.’

  The car had stopped at traffic lights and Cranfield glanced out at a group of men and youths loitering threateningly on the street corner, outside a betting shop that had windows caged in heavy-duty wire netting. When Cranfield noticed that one of the men was on crutches, he felt distinctly uneasy and was glad when the car moved on through the lights. ‘So what are you offering?’

  ‘The gits chosen t’hit ya.’

  ‘All of them?’