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the standby chopper now, as in five minutes ago. We have an op Kuttuc . . . That’s right. One of our guys has been lifted.’
    He pushed down the cradle, released it to get the dial tone, took a deep breath, and keyed a number he was hoping would not be answered. Mike was a captain in the Hussars, his parent unit, and had had to put up with comments about his baby-face his entire career. His looks may not have changed much since he left university but he had matured a great deal during the last three years in this job. When nothing exceptional was taking place he appeared introvert and retiring. None of those characteristics were remotely evident when work got suddenly serious. He had the arrogance one might expect to find in a captain of the Hussars and would go toe to toe with anyone, even superiors, when his blood was up. Two things were guaranteed to bring out the demon in him: incompetence, and anyone trying to screw with his detachment, enemy or otherwise. He had never had an op Kuttuc before. In fact there had only been one Special Forces kidnapping since Nairac, an SAS liaison officer who was lifted, beaten and killed in the mid-seventies. The only det operative ever kidnapped, a couple of years before Mike joined the unit, was from the North Province undercover detachment. He was rescued in the nick of time by sheer luck not long after he had been snatched by the Provos. The main lesson learned from both kidnappings was that every passing second increased the odds against Spinks being rescued.
    ‘Lisburn ops here,’ the upper-class voice on the other end of the phone muttered.
    ‘This is Mike at south det, sir. I need to speak to the chief right away.’
    ‘Sounds urgent, old boy,’ said the officer.
    ‘It’s very urgent,’ said Mike, this time adding the emphasis that was lacking in his initial delivery.
    ‘One second,’ said the officer, reading the urgency.
    Mike kept the phone to his ear while his eyes moved to the map and looked at the international border, specifically where it turned closest to the marker that indicated the point where Spinks was kidnapped. The distance was not very great at all.
     
    Graham jogged along the corridor. ‘Of course I’m going to get Stratton. Who else?’ he muttered to himself in answer to Mike’s question as he left the ops room.
    Bleeps like Graham ruled the operations room. Naturally, all major decisions had to be made by the boss, but in reality, Graham could handle just about any emergency situation that might arise, and in most cases quicker and more efficiently. Not only was he very proficient, he was aided by a phenomenal memory.Apart from knowing practically every call-sign and frequency the British army used in Northern Ireland, he could remember details of players, their vehicles and number plates, addresses, names, associates . . . the kind of questions operatives asked the intelligence cell over the air all the time and needed quick answers to. It was usually faster to track Graham down and ask him the question first before wading through the database or calling the intelligence cell.
    Graham’s footsteps echoed on the old tiled floor in the narrow, flaking plastered corridor of the former Second World War Royal Air Force administration building that would have been condemned had the secret unit not taken it over. He turned a corner, arrived at a door, and pushed it open. The room was just large enough to cram in twenty assorted grubby old armchairs all facing a television set on a table at one end, a sagging bookshelf stacked with well-thumbed paperbacks, and at the opposite end to the television, a table covered in a selection of current newspapers. Hunched over a broadsheet on strong, lean arms was a man with long, mousy, unwashed hair wearing an old rugby shirt, his neck sunk between sturdy shoulders.
    ‘Stratton?’ Graham said. There was no trace of the familiarity he used when talking to anyone else in the detachment, even Mike the boss, and