Getaway - Part 12

I was forced to spend a lot more time with the IRA lads in the days and weeks that followed. On one occasion, Fionn informed me that there was a couple of fellas higher up the food chain that wanted to meet me. Most of these cloak-and-dagger rendezvous took place in cafes, at bus stops or in pub toilets but the set up was a bit different on this occassion. An envelope dropped through my door and when I opened it, it contained a slip of paper. On it were instructions consisting of a date, a time, and a house address, which was about half an hour away by bus.

I found the house without much trouble and when I rapped on the door, Fionn’s sombre head popped out of a lane way that ran along the side of the property. He turned back down in the direction he had come, gesturing for me to follow as he went. The laneway ended in a large garden and Fionn walked through the open door of a shed that stood at the end of it. It was getting dark by that time and the lights in the building showed up a number of figures standing around inside. I was petrified every time I had to meet these people but I was reassured by the fact that I had proved to have the ability to set that shit aside for long enough to keep them with me. But on that occasion, when I saw those dodgy looking bastards pacing back and forth through the windows of that grubby shed, I struggled to dredge up much confidence. It was only the total absence of anything remotely resembling a viable alternative that made me follow Fionn inside. As soon as I did, I regretted it.

Fionn shut the door when I got in, and this made the people standing in front of me all the more horrifying. Including Fionn and me there were six people in the dingy room – two were seated with their backs to me on small school-like plastic chairs. Fionn stood behind me in front of the door and the other two stood facing me at the far end with a table in front of them. These two wore black balaclavas, white boiler suits and surgical gloves. In Ireland, the grim reaper doesn’t wear a black hood; he wears a bally. When you’re confronted by some cunt wearing one your chances of walking away are generally nil. The image of thick-necked fuckers glaring out from under black woollen masks, that I had only ever seen on propaganda posters around Belfast or on Sky News clips from time-to-time, were alive and standing in front of me. This horribly iconic image had me so shit scared that I failed to take in what was going on. I just thought I was going to be shot.

I only came to my senses when one of the masked men said, “Here Fionn, you’re boy here looks like he’s going to have a fucking heart attack!”

I snapped out of my little puzzled vibe when the rest of the room started pissing themselves laughing. Then I noticed an Irish tricolour on the table and realised what was going on. I was about to get sworn in.

The two main lads, senior men, told us to stand in a line with our hands on the flag. He said a sentence in Irish and told us to repeat it. I wasn’t 100 per cent sure about exactly what it meant, but it was something to do with swearing allegiance to the people of Ireland and the IRA and pledging ourselves to the fight to remove the British presence from the North.

The two lads beside me didn’t look long out of school but it was obvious that this meant a lot to them. Their wide-eyed enthusiasm threw my own motivations into stark relief. I didn’t agree with what they were going to be doing but at least the two lads were taking this oath because the fight they were signing themselves up to was something they believed in. I was swearing an oath because I was a thief and it was going to help me steal money.

The two other boys, as it turned out, were the ones I was to take with me to Cambodia. One was a small, dark, stubby-featured, stoutish-type called Chullain. He didn’t say an awful lot but he didn’t look the type to cross. He had a head that looked like it could take a hammering. The other one, Deano, was a thin, fair-haired and animated lad who seemed way too into his looks. He was cocky and over-confident and while his motivations might have been genuine, he also seemed the type of boy who would be happy to brag to some thick schoolgirl about how he was a Brit-plugging ‘Ra man in order to get his end away. Chullain seemed reasonably solid but they were scrapping the barrel with Deano. I knew straight away the little fucker would be trouble.

To be continued.

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