"No, nothing like that. Nothing flashy."

"I'll go to the side street, better chance of an unlocked wee job," the kid said.

"How long will it take?" Killian asked.

"No time at all."

"Meet me back here in ten minutes?"

"Aye, nay probs."

"One more thing," Killian said.

"Aye?"

"I am not a man to be f.u.c.ked with."

"I can tell," the kid said a bit cheekily and sloped off into the shadows.

The car park had one CCTV camera on a pole near the emergency exit of the hotel. Killian walked back to the water's edge, fished out a shopping bag, dandered to the hotel wall and made his way behind the pole. He shinnied up without difficulty and put the shopping bag over the camera.

He dropped to the ground and ran to Ivan's white Range Rover and took out his skeleton key. He was lucky this was an old model. The new ones sometimes confounded him. Stealing cars was a young man's game. He put the key in, toggled it, pressed on the tines and heard a click.

It was all about the alarm now. He opened the hood and disabled the battery.

He tugged on the door handle and flinched but no alarm sounded.

He looked inside the Range Rover just to give it a once-over but there was no guard dog or f.u.c.king b.o.o.by trap, just a dense, expensive aftershave smell.

He sat on the driver's seat and tried a couple of the skeleton keys on his key ring until he found one that turned the ignition. He reconnected the battery, flinched, turned the key and the Range Rover roared into life. No alarm sounded this time either.

The put the car in neutral and turned on the satnav.

He thumbed through the menu until he found the last programmed address: 3 The Holiday Cottages Dervish Island Fermanagh He wrote it down in his notebook and then cleared the satnav's memory just on the off chance that Ivan hadn't written it down somewhere else. He rummaged in the glove compartment for money or IDs but Ivan had been scrupulous about taking everything to his room. That was okay. This was already a good night's work. He shut down the satnav, turned off the engine and pressed the bonnet release b.u.t.ton.

The hood popped up.

He got out of the car, closed the pa.s.senger door and locked it again. He took out a penknife and mini flashlight he'd bought on the road.

He held the flashlight between his teeth.

He lifted the hood and propped it on its stand and then leaning carefully over the engine cut the spark-plug wires with his penknife where they went into the cylinder heads.

He stood back and examined his work with the flashlight. If you took a casual look you wouldn't see anything wrong. Even an experienced mechanic might not twig it for an hour or so.

He closed the hood just as the kid was pulling into the car park with a black Mercedes W112, which wasn't exactly the most discreet vehicle in the world with all that chrome, tail jets and lacquered bodywork.

"What do you think?" the kid asked.

Joyriders and professional car thieves had completely different sensibilities, Killian reflected.

"Well, it's a bit f.u.c.king shiny and there's no satnav," he said.

The kid's face fell. "You want me to get something else?"

"Nah, it'll do. Where's there a garage I can get a map of Fermanagh?"

"Twenty-four-hour garage just down the road," the kid said.

"Aye well, a deal's a deal," Killian said and gave him two hundred quid. He was secretly pleased. His uncle Garbhan had had a W112 for years, stolen of course. He was much less of a drunk than his da and Garbhan had taught him to drive in that car, which was nerve-racking because it was an attention getter - not only nicked and a b.l.o.o.d.y cla.s.sic but Garbhan regularly painted it with green gloss house paint so that it stood out a mile.

Finally Uncle G traded it for a couple of horses who were supposed to be goers on the flat but both of them failed miserably at Down Royal. And Garbhan himself had died in an infirmary in Glasgow at the ripe old age of forty-four. Poor b.a.s.t.a.r.d.

"Here's another fifty for doing it quick," Killian said and counted out two twenties and a ten.

"Thanks!" the kid said, beaming, the sleekit gone from his face. He wouldn't make a serious player. Too big a heart that wee mucker, Killian reckoned, but thought of another task the wee mucker might be able to handle.

"You want to double your money?" he asked.

"Maybe," the kid said.

"You'll need to get a few hours sleep and come back here early. Can you do that?"

"Aye, I think so."

"I'll want to know when the owner of this here Range Rover finally gets his car going. I've slowed him a wee bit and he'll need to call a mechanic."

"You've knackered his car?" the kid said. "Why didn't you just drive it in the lough?"

"I don't want him to catch on straight away. If you nick his car he just hires another one, doesn't he? But f.u.c.k with it a bit and he'll spend hours trying to sort it, see?"

The wean nodded. "Ohhh, aye," he said.

Killian and the kid were both enjoying the pedagogical aspect of this relationship. But it couldn't last. Killian had to get moving. "I'll give you a phone number and you'll need to tell my a.s.sociate the exact moment he gets back on the road, okay? Have you a mobile?"

"Aye."

"And you think you can handle it?"

"Aye. I can do that," the kid said.

Killian give him five more fifties.

"And in case you're thinking about just sleeping in and giving my mate any old s.h.i.te, remember what I said before: I am not someone to be f.u.c.ked with," Killian added.

In Ulster there were at least two or three hundred convicted murderers walking the streets these days - paramilitaries who had been released under the Good Friday Agreement. Killian wasn't one of them but the kid didn't know that.

"Look, I'm in it for the money, and maybe if you're down this way again, you could use me?" the kid said.

"Maybe," Killian nodded and gave him Sean's number.

"Name's Bobby," the kid said. Killian shook his hand but did not offer his own name.

He got in the Mercedes.

Everything was familiar.

He put it in first, wound down the window and said thanks to the wean.

He drove to the BP garage and bought a map of Fermanagh and some smokes.

"Can you tell me where Dervish Island is on this?" he asked the man behind the desk.

"Dervish Island?" the man said and rubbed his chin. "I think that's down on the upper lough."

The man got out his gla.s.ses, took the map and showed him. It was an actual island island - which might prove interesting - on upper Lough Erne almost over the border in the Republic.

It looked miles away on the map, but that was only because the scale was ma.s.sive on a county map.

"How far of a drive is that?" Killian asked.

The man considered.

"Well now, hard to say, maybe a two-hour drive depending on the state of the roads." Killian nodded. Unless he completely f.u.c.ked up he could certainly be there by first light.

He didn't f.u.c.k up.

He was there by 4.00 a.m.

Or at least the car park at the ferry.

The island itself was a mile out into the lough. A sign said "Ferry Operational from 8 till 8".

Killian parked the Mercedes, got out and looked across the water. He lit himself a cigarette.

She must have thought that that would give her security.

Being on an island.

An island on an island.

But it wouldn't do her any good.

Not from Ivan. Not from him.

He smoked the Marlboro Light. Sean had told him to call any time day or night when he had solid info.

The poor b.u.g.g.e.r would get a thumping from Mary but he called him anyway.

"I found her," he said.

"Jesus! That was good. It was on Ivan's satnav?"

"Aye, just like I thought."

It was the hire-car company's satnav tracker that had told them where the Range Rover was in the first place, after a few pennies had greased the wheels; now Ivan's programming had told them where to go next.

"And Ivan himself, did you have to get heavy?'

"No, no, I just let him sleep."

"Good work, mate. So where is she?"

"Place called Dervish Island on Fermanagh. I'll go over there when the ferry starts running in the morning."

"Great. Unless you want to go over there now. You know, middle of the night, element of surprise and all that."

"What? f.u.c.king swim it?"

"No, no, there must be a rowing boat around somewhere."

"I'm not going out there in the dark."

"So what are you going to do now?" Sean asked.

"Probably just have a smoke."

"Get some kip," Sean suggested.

"Oh, I paid a wee mucker to keep an eye on Ivan's car, he'll call you when he gets moving and you'll call me."

"Can you trust him?"

"Aye. Wee joyrider s.h.i.te. Oh and one more thing."

"What?"

"I f.u.c.ked with Ivan's Range Rover. Cut the sparks."

Sean was impressed. "You've done a good night's work, mate. Get some kip. And remember she's no b.l.o.o.d.y picnic either. Just confirm that she's there and I'll tell Tom and we'll get further instructions. Half a million! Jesus, what a week!"

"I'm hanging up. Apologies to the missus."

"None necessary if this pans out."

Killian threw his cigarette b.u.t.t into the water.

He got back in the Merc and leaned the driver's seat back as far as it would go.