The White House Connection Read Online Free PDF

blackmailed Dillon into working for him.
     
     
She went back to the Sons of Erin and finally came to Tim Pat Ryan. His record was foul. Drugs, prostitution, protection. Suspected of supplying arms and explosives to IRA active service units in London, but nothing proved. He had a pub in Wapping called the Sailor by the river on China Wharf. She took a London street guide from a shelf, leafed through it and located China Wharf on the relevant map.
     
     
She lit a cigarette and sat back. He was an animal, Ryan, just like Barry and the others, guilty at least by association, and the thought of what had happened to her son wouldn't go away. She stubbed out her cigarette, went to the couch and lay down.
     
     
The great psychologist Carl Jung spoke of a thing called synchron-icity, the suggestion that certain happenings are so profound that
     
     
they go beyond mere coincidence and argue a deeper meaning and possibly a hidden agenda. Such a thing was happening at that very moment at Charles Ferguson's flat in Cavendish Square. The Brigadier sat beside the fireplace in his elegant drawing room. Chief Inspector Hannah Bernstein was opposite, a file open on her knees. Dillon was helping himself to a Bushmills at the sideboard. He wore a black leather bomber jacket, a white scarf at his neck.
     
     
'Feel free with my whiskey,' Ferguson told him.
     
     
'And don't I always,' Dillon grinned. 'I wouldn't want to disappoint you, Brigadier.'
     
     
Hannah Bernstein closed the file. 'That's it, then, sir. No IRA active service units operating in London at the present time.'
     
     
'I accept that with reluctance,' he told her. 'And of course our political masters want us to play it all down anyway.' He sighed. 'I sometimes long for the old days before this damn peace process made things so difficult.' Hannah frowned and he smiled. 'Yes, my dear, I know that offends that fine morality of yours. Anyway, I accept your findings and will so report to the Prime Minister. No active service units in London.'
     
     
Dillon poured another Bushmills. 'Not as far as we know.'
     
     
'You don't agree?'
     
     
'Just because we can't see them doesn't mean they're not there. On the Loyalist side, we have the paramilitaries like the UVF, and then the LVF, who've been responsible for all those attacks and assassinations, we know that.'
     
     
'Murders,' Hannah said.
     
     
'A point of view. They see themselves as gallant freedom fighters, just like the Stern Gang in Jerusalem in forty-eight,' Dillon reminded her. 'And then on the Republican side, we have the INLA and Jack Barry's Sons of Erin.'
     
     
'That bastard again,' Ferguson nodded. 'I'd give my pension to put my hands on him.'
     
     
'Splinter groups on both sides. God knows how many,' Dillon told them.
     
     
'And not much we can do about it at the moment,' Hannah Bernstein said. 'As the Brigadier says, the powers that be say hands off.'
     
     
Dillon went to the terrace window and peered out. It was raining hard. 'Well, in spite of all that, there are bastards out there waiting to create bloody mayhem. Tim Pat Ryan, for example.'
     
     
'How many times have we turned that one over,' Hannah reminded him. 'He's got the best lawyers in London. We'd have difficulty getting a result even if we caught him with a block of Semtex in his hand.'
     
     
'Oh, sure,' Dillon said. 'But he's definitely supplied active service units with material in the past, we know that.'
     
     
'And can't prove it.'
     
     
Ferguson said, 'You'd like to play executioner again, wouldn't you?'
     
     
Dillon shrugged. 'He wouldn't be missed. Scotland Yard would break out the champagne.'
     
     
'You can forget it.' Ferguson stood up. 'I feel like an early night. Off you go, children. My driver's waiting for you in the Daimler, Chief Inspector. Good night to you.'
     
     
When they opened the door, it was raining hard. Dillon took an umbrella from the hall stand, opened it and took her down to the Daimler. She