The Marching Season

torture."
    Michael knew it was impossible to win this argument. Jack Buchanan worked for London Station. He was one of Wheaton's men, and Wheaton would go to the mat to protect him.
    "Obviously, one of you fucked up, and fucked up badly," Wheaton said. "We've lost one of our most valuable assets, our British cousins are in a tizzy, and you're lucky to be alive."
    "What about Devlin's information?"
    "It's all been passed on to Headquarters and MI5, in accordance with our original arrangement on the Maguire matter. Obviously, we can't put a site under watch in Northern Ireland. The British will have to make that decision, and they need to weigh
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    it against other operational priorities. Quite frankly, it's out of our hands at this point."
    "That information cost the life of my agent."
    "Maguire wasn't your agent. He was our agent, the British and ours. We ran him jointly, and we shared in the take, remember? We're all upset he was blown."
    "I don't want to lose an opportunity to crack the Ulster Freedom Brigade because we're jittery about the way we got the information."
    "You must admit the whole thing was a bit unorthodox. What if the information from Devlin is smoke?"
    "Why would the IRA do that?"
    "To murder a few British intelligence officers and SAS men. We give the information to the British, the British put a team in place, and the IRA sneaks up on them in the middle of the night and slits their throats."
    "The IRA is abiding by the cease-fire and the peace accords. They have no reason to set up the British."
    "I still don't trust them."
    "The information is good. We need to act on it quickly."
    "It's a British matter, Michael, and therefore it's a British decision. If I try to lean on them they won't like it, just as we wouldn't like it if the roles were reversed."
    "So let me do it quietly."
    "Graham Seymour?"
    Michael nodded. Wheaton made a show of careful deliberation.
    "All right, arrange a meeting with him tomorrow, then get the fuck out of here. I want you stateside." Wheaton paused a moment and examined Michael's face. "It's probably better that you stay here another day anyway. I wouldn't want your wife to see you like this."
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    Michael went to bed early but couldn't sleep. Each time he closed his eyes the whole thing played out inside his head: the beating in the back of the car, Devlin's Cheshire-cat smile, Maguire's dead eyes. He pictured his agent, strapped to the chair, beaten beyond recognition, beaten until there was nothing left of his face. Twice he stumbled into the bathroom and was violently sick.
    He remembered Devlin's words.
    I didn't kill Kevin Maguire. . . . You killed him.
    His body ached every place they had hit him. No position was comfortable enough to sleep. Whenever he felt sorry for himself he thought of Maguire and his miserable, humiliating death.
    Michael took pills for the pain and finally pills to make him sleep. He dreamed about it all night, except in his dreams it was Michael who beat Kevin Maguire and Michael who put a bullet in the back of his head.
    "That's some eye," Graham Seymour said, the next morning.
    "Beautiful, isn't it?"
    Michael put his sunglasses back on even though the skies were overcast. They were walking side by side along a footpath on Parliament Hill in Hampstead Heath. Michael needed to rest, so they sat down on a bench. To their left, Highgate Hill rose into the mist. In front of them, beyond the heath, spread central London. Michael could make out the dome of St. Paul's Cathedral in the distance. Children flew colorful kites around them as they spoke.
    "I still can't believe you actually punched Seamus Devlin."
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    "Neither can I, but goddammit, it felt good."
    "Do you know how many people would love to smack him oner
    "I suspect it would be a long line."
    "A very long line, darling. Did it hurt?"
    "Him or me?"
    "You," Graham said, reflexively rubbing one long bony hand with the other.
    "A little."
    "I'm sorry about Maguire."
    "He was a damned good agent." Michael lit a cigarette. The smoke grabbed at the back of his throat, and when he coughed he clutched his broken ribs in pain. "What's the thinking inside Thames House? Are you going to put the site under watch?"
    "The top floor is a bit incredulous, to be honest," Graham said. "They're also quite miffed over the loss of Maguire."
    " Wheaton thinks it's a trap—that the IRA wants to kill a few intelligence officers."
    "Wheaton would think