Stephen Leather - The Bombmaker

Andy wanted to say more but she didn't want to risk antagonising Green-eyes. Green-eyes hadn't known that Andy had phoned Martin from London. That meant the phone in Dublin wasn't tapped. There had to be a way that she could make use of that knowledge. Green-eyes looked across at her and Andy forced herself to smile.

Green-eyes went over to a table and picked up her mobile phone. 'What's the number?'

Andy gave her the number and Green-eyes tapped it in. She listened to check that it was ringing, then handed it to Andrea. 'Any tricks, any at all, and it'll be Katie who'll suffer. And I want you to ask him if he's gone to the police.'

'Okay. Okay.' Andy couldn't believe that Green-eyes was letting her use the phone. Part of her was convinced that she was going to snatch the handset away at the last moment.

Martin answered and Andy's heart pounded. 'Martin? It's me.'

'Oh, sweet Jesus, thank God. How are you? Where are you?'

'Martin, did you go to the police?'

'Where are you? Are you okay? Andy, what's happening?'

'Martin, listen to me. Did you go to the police?'

'No. No I didn't.'

Andy put her hand over the receiver. 'It's okay. He hasn't spoken to the police.' Green-eyes nodded and motioned for Andy to continue with the call.

Martin panicked. 'Andy, Andy, don't go. Talk to me, don't go…'

'It's okay,' said Andy. 'I'm here. But you have to listen to me. love. I'm okay, and they say that Katie's okay. I'm fine, too. They're not hurting me. Look, Martin, there's something they want me to do for them. It's not going to take long, then they say they'll let me come home. Katie, too.'

'I've got the money ready,' said Martin. 'Almost four hundred thousand pounds. Tell them I've got the money.'

'They don't want money, Martin. Listen to me, love. They don't want the money. They just want me to…'

Green-eyes stepped forward and tried to take the phone from Andy. Andy took a step back, trying to keep the phone away from her. 'No details,' Green-eyes hissed.

'Okay, okay,' said Andy. 'Sorry. I'm sorry.' She held the phone to her face again. 'Martin, they don't want money. That's all I can tell you. But they've assured me that so long as you don't go to the police, they won't hurt me or Katie. You have to promise me that you won't go to the police.'

'I promise,' said Martin. 'But what's happening? What do they want?'

Andy ignored his question.

'Just wait there and we'll be back with you soon. We'll all be together again, just like we were before. You can take us to Venice. Like you promised. It'll be so great to go back. You and me, and Katie. It's going to happen, Martin. Just don't do anything to rock the boat, okay?'

Andy was rambling; the words were tumbling out and running into each other as if she were scared that he might interrupt.

'Okay, love. I promise. Swear to God. I won't go to the police. Tell them, I won't go to the police.'

Green-eyes grabbed the phone and pulled it away from Andy. 'That's enough,' she said.

'Thank you,' Andy said. 'Thanks for letting me talk to him. He was frantic'

Green-eyes switched the phone off. She went over to the table and put the phone in her briefcase and locked it. 'What did you mean about Venice?'

'That's where we went on our honeymoon. He's been promising to take Katie there for ages. She saw the honeymoon pictures and wanted to know why she wasn't there. You know how kids are.'

Green-eyes turned to look at Andy, scowling. 'You weren't trying to be clever, were you, Andrea?'

'What do you mean?'

Green-eyes didn't reply. She sat down, steepled her fingers under her chin and stared at Andy with unblinking eyes.

'He hasn't gone to the police, and now he won't,' said Andy. 'Now he knows that I'm okay.' She dropped down on to one of the chairs. 'Are you really going to use it? The bomb?'

'Does it matter?'

'Of course it matters. Are you building it as a threat, or are you going to set it off?'

'Would it make you feel better if I said we weren't going to use it?'

'Of course.'

Green-eyes smiled thinly. 'Is that what you used to do in the IRA? Build bombs and not use them?'

'Sometimes you can get the same effect by just putting a bomb in place, if disruption's your aim. That's the purpose of coded warnings. You want civilians out of the way and you want to tie up the authorities. You make your point but you don't actually kill anyone.'

'Maybe that's what we're going to do, then. Does that make you feel better?'

'Now you're humouring me.'

'What do you expect me to do, Andrea? Do you think I'm going to tell you what we're planning to do? Why would I do that?'

'Have you thought this through? Have you thought through what'll happen if you explode a four-thousand-pound bomb in the City of London? Whatever it is you think you're going to achieve, the backlash will destroy you. Look at what happened when the bomb went off in Omagh. It finished the Real IRA. Everyone turned against them.'

Green-eyes picked up her briefcase. 'We've got work to do. Come on.'

– «»-«»-«»Martin absent-mindedly patted Dermott's chest and the dog panted happily. 'She's okay,' Martin said, and the dog's grin widened as if he understood and was as overjoyed as his owner. 'She's okay and Katie's okay.'

Martin felt light-headed, almost drunk. Part of him wanted to jump around and shout with relief. Andy was alive. So was his Katie. Over the past few days his imagination had run riot, and he'd come close to convincing himself that his wife and daughter were dead, that the only option he had left was to go to the police. He thanked God that he hadn't. He'd done the right thing by waiting. Andy was safe. And if what she'd said was true, she and Katie would be back home soon. They'd be a family again. His heart had almost stopped when she'd asked him if he'd spoken to the police. He realised that the kidnappers were monitoring the conversation, and he'd decided on the spur of the moment that he had to lie. If he'd told Andy that the police had turned up on his doorstep the kidnappers might think that he'd called them. Best not to mention it and hope that Sergeant O'Brien believed his story.

Martin's sense of relief was tempered by the realisation that he still didn't know what the kidnappers wanted. She'd made it clear that they didn't want money. So what did they want? What was so important that they needed Andy? It didn't make any sense at all. Andy was a housewife. A homemaker. She took care of him and she raised Katie and she did occasional freelance work for the Irish Independent and some Dublin magazines. She had been a journalist for a couple of years before Katie was born, a feature writer with a growing reputation, before she'd decided that she didn't want to miss out on Katie's childhood. Once Katie had been old enough to go to school, she'd tried to restart her career, but only in a half-hearted way. Her family was her main concern, and it wasn't as if they needed the money.

So what was it that the kidnappers wanted from her? It couldn't have been her journalistic skills. So what else did she have that they wanted? It was a mystery, and it was driving Martin crazy.

He stopped patting Dermott and lay back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. And what had Andy meant by taking her to Venice? They'd never discussed going there. He'd never been to Venice. Neither had she. Hell, they'd never even been to Italy.

– «»-«»-«»McEvoy looked up from the portable television set. 'It's almost noon,' he said. 'The flight's at two-thirty.'

'Yeah, I know,' said Canning.

'So we'll need the fucking tapes. All seven of them.'

'For fuck's sake, George, I'll take care of it.'

'So take care of it.'

'Look, the wee girl's sick. Her throat's swollen up like I don't know what.'