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one night when he came to a weapons hide at a farm. But one of the group was the IUC's best informer, so the head-shed wouldn't let us fire.'

I stopped because I could see Mac's eyeballs rotating.

The things I was saying shouldn't have been heard by anyone outside the Regiment; not even the police

should know what had gone on across the water.

'Where were you stationed?' Bates asked.

'Classified information!' snapped the ops officer. 'He can't tell you that.'

I looked from one to the other before going on.

'Anyway, Jhat was when I decided to go after Farrell on my own. I thought I could take him out single-handed.

I was going to shoot him at the place where he was living. Highly irregular, of course, but it seemed the only way. It turned out that some other security organisation already had him under surveillance, and they picked me up…'

'So?' the sergeant prompted.

'I came back to Hereford, never finished my tour.

But the Regiment were very good: they could have ITU'd me but they let me off with a caution. I tried to call it a day and forget the whole thing. But then it started again.'

I finished my tea and paused before continuing. 'In November a team of our lads went out from here to train the President of Colombia's bodyguard. I was in command. We were half-way through the course at a military camp down country, everything going well, when we travelled up to the capital one weekend for a bit of 12. and tL. And suddenly there the bastard was: Farrell, can you believe it, in a Colombian restaurant, with a couple of other Paddies and some natives.

'Obviously the PI1LA was into drug-running and arms-dealing, big time. Anyway, two of the embassy staff were stupid enough to go down to the restaurant to get a look at them. The next thing was, the pair was lifted, along with one of our ruperts who'd been doing liaison.'

'Ruperts?' Bates frowned.

'Officers. Well, that caused a big panic. We got clearance from DAS - the Colombian secret police - to bust the operation. We followed the kidnappers down into the Amazon jungle, and things ended up with a fire-fight at a coke-manufacturing plant miles from anywhere. Farrell got wounded and captured.'

'So you think this kidnap is a vendetta by Farrell?'

Bates asked.

'Not directly. It can't be, because he never knew who it was that had come after him. Before that last

moment, when we picked him up, he'd never seen me, ' hadn't a clue who I was. For all he knew I might have

been Colombian. He couldn't have equated me with any problem he'd had in Ulster, and in the jungle he was just shot by some strange soldier and taken into custody. Someone else in the PI1LA must have ordered the lift - somebody at this end, when news came back that Farrell had been nicked.'

'Unless he's already escaped,' the sergeant suggested.

Jimmy, the int officer, suddenly came to. 'No. No, he's still inside.' Blinking through his spectacles, he turned back to the most recent sheet of paper in his file and said, 'At least, he was yesterday evening. The British and Colombian governments are negotiating about his extradition.'

'In that case,' the sergeant persisted, 'how did the IRA know who to come after?'
     
    'My fault,' I admitted. 'I blew it. After Christmas I took local leave in Ulster. I told my people in the Regiment I'd gone back to the mainland, but in fact I stayed put. I got Tracy across and we took a holiday cottage on the north coast. I'd been told it was a safe area, used by tourists, so one night I went to the pub in the village and got talking to a local about fishing. That was all, but it was enough to give them a line on
me .
'

'This guy Farrell,' said the ops officer. 'What is he in the PII :& ?'

Jimmy flicked through his file. 'At the time of the supermarket bomb incident he was adjutant of the Belfast Brigade. But since then we believe he's taken charge of what they call “international liaison”. That means drug-running, arms-dealing - anything that raises funds and