The Marching Season

Na Fianna Eirean—a sort of Republican Boy Scouts—and his father had insisted he stay in despite the kneecapping. When he was twenty-two he volunteered for the IRA. He took the IRA's secret oath during a ceremony in the living room of his parents' house in the Ballymurphy. Maguire never would forget the look on his father's face, the strange mixture of pride and humiliation that his son was now a member of the organization that had taken his legs. He was assigned to the Belfast Brigade and eventually became part of an elite active service unit in Britain. Maguire developed good contacts inside the Army Council, the IRA's military command, and the IRA's Belfast Intelligence Unit, which proved invaluable when he crossed over and became a spy.
    The event that pushed Maguire into betrayal was the IRA bombing of a Remembrance Day parade at Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, on November 8, 1987. Eleven people were killed and sixty-three wounded when a massive bomb exploded with no warning. The IRA tried to defuse public outrage over the massacre by saying it was a mistake. Maguire knew the truth; he had been part of the unit that carried out the attack.
    Maguire was furious with the Army Council for attacking a "soft" civilian target. He privately vowed he would prevent the IRA from carrying out similar attacks in the future. His hatred and mistrust of the British ruled out working for British Intelligence or the RUC's Special Branch, so on his next trip to London he contacted the CIA. Michael was sent to Belfast to establish contact with him. Maguire refused to take money—"your thirty pieces of silver," as he called it—and despite the fact he was an IRA terrorist, Michael came to regard him as a decent man.
    The CIA and its British counterparts have an implicit agreement: The Agency does not "collect" on British soil, meaning it does not attempt to penetrate the IRA or recruit assets
    156 Daniel Silva
    inside British Intelligence. After Michael had established contact with Maguire, the Agency went to the British. MI5 was dubious at first, but it agreed to allow Michael to continue meeting with Maguire as long as it received the intelligence simultaneously with Langley. Over the next several years, Maguire fed Michael a steady stream of information on IRA operations, giving the Agency and the British a window on the high command of the organization. Maguire became the most important IRA informer in the history of the conflict. When Michael was pulled from the field, a new American case officer was assigned to Maguire, a man named Jack Buchanan from London Station. Michael had not seen or spoken to Maguire since.
    Michael drove south on the Ormeau Road. The second rendezvous point was the Botanic Gardens, at the intersection of the Stranmills Road and the University Road. Once again, Michael felt confident he was not being followed. But once again Maguire didn't make the rendezvous.
    The last site was a rugby pitch in a section of Belfast known as Newtownbreda, and it was there, an hour later, that Michael found Kevin Maguire, standing beneath a goal.
    "Why did you pass on the first two?" Michael asked, as Maguire climbed in and closed the door.
    "Nothing I could see—just bad vibes." Maguire lit a cigarette. He looked more like a coffeehouse revolutionary than the real thing. He wore a dark raincoat, black sweater, and black jeans. Belfast had aged Maguire since Michael had seen him last. His short-cropped black hair was shot with gray, and there were lines around his eyes. He wore fashionable European eyeglasses now, round metal-rimmed spectacles, too small for his face.
    "Where'd you get the car?" Maguire asked.
    "The concierge at the Europa. I pulled the engine cables on the first one, and they sent this twenty minutes later. It's clean."
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    "I don't talk in closed rooms or cars, or have you forgotten
    everything since they brought you inside?"
    "I haven't forgotten. Where do you want to go?"
    "How about the mountain, just like the old days? Pull over so
    I can get us some beer."
    Michael drove north through Belfast, then followed a narrow road up the side of Black Mountain. The rain had ended by the time he pulled into a turnout and killed the engine. They climbed out and sat on the hood of the Vauxhall, drinking warm beer, listening to the ticking of the engine. Belfast spread below them. Clouds lay over the city like a silk scarf thrown over a lampshade. It was a dark city at night. Yellow