“Roger, Ten-Twenty, copy your emergency. Keep your same transponder code for now and make your turn. I copy flight level three six zero. Report reaching.”

Craig had already turned the heading knob on the autoflight panel, bringing the Boeing back to an easterly heading as he moved the altitude selector and began the descent. He stopped the magnetic heading at 085 degrees as Shanwick Control formally approved the new course and altitude.

“Alastair, are we okay to Dublin?”

“I’m looking. We’re going to be tight, but if the tailwind holds… we’re okay.”

“Dammit! It was looking so good!”

“I’ve seldom seen a reversal this severe, or I screwed up the figures, or both. The headwinds we calculated were a minus forty maximum, and the average was minus thirty-two. Suddenly with that new information, it would have been a minus one hundred thirty!”

“We screwed something up! They can’t change that fast!”

“They did. But you’re right, somewhere in our figuring…”

“Damn!”

“I know it. I’m sorry, Craig.”

“Forget it. We’re human. Now let’s just get this old girl on the ground safely.”

“Should I tell Jillian?”

Craig nodded. “Yes. And make sure she tells the President. It looks like we’re bringing him right back to the frying pan.”

“And this would be the lion’s den,” Michael Garrity said, leaning close to Jay’s ear as they walked into courtroom three.

Only one of the court staff – the registrar – was in position beneath the bench at the head of the courtroom, arranging papers and fussing with her files. Stuart Campbell was still outside the courtroom in the Round Hall in animated discussion with no fewer than seven other support solicitors, barristers, and staff.

Jay looked at his watch with eyes rendered bleary by less than four hours of sleep. 9:50 A.M . I’ve got to focus.

“Now, Jay,” Michael was saying, “Judge O’Connell is well known for temper tantrums when people talk in his courtroom. You’ll be sitting just behind me, so you can lean forward and whisper in my ear, but two warnings, if you please.”

“Sure.”

“First, make absolutely certain no living soul can hear any sound from the whisper beyond the radius of a foot or two, or he’ll surely bellow at us.”

“Okay.”

“Second, please don’t knock my wig off.”

Jay laughed. “That happens?”

“Oh, it’s very embarrassing to have a client lean over to whisper something to you, and pull back, taking your wig along with him, or leave it at an odd angle on your head. The judge will definitely comment.”

“I’ll be careful.”

“He won’t let you speak, as we’ve discussed, although Campbell will be a full participant, since he’s already been called before our bar at least once in the past.”

“I understand.”

“Also, I am what we call an SC, or senior counsel, so I’ll be assisted by another barrister from my office, Tom Duggan, who had better be here pretty soon. I’ll introduce you.”

“SC is like QC, Queen’s counsel?”

Michael smiled wryly. “We have no queen, lad. This is the Republic of Ireland.”

“Sorry.”

“Mind you, we think Liz is a dandy old girl, we just have no allegiance to her, let alone any desire to be her lawyers.”

A male staff member wheeled a large television set on a metal stand into the courtroom and placed it near the end of the jury box, plugging in the TV and the video equipment below it. Both Michael and Jay watched the adjustments without comment, knowing full well what Stuart Campbell would be using it to show. The ominous presence of the TV left a cold, black feeling of apprehension in Jay’s gut.

“How are the winds holding, Alastair?” Craig asked.

The copilot had been chewing his lip as he scribbled calculations and used a pocket flight calculator to double-check the aircraft’s flight management computer.

“The tailwind’s almost gone, Craig, and the latest weather report has that low really galloping south.”

“Should we consider Reykjavík, Iceland?”

Alastair shook his head no. “We’d be right into another monstrous headwind at this altitude, and we don’t dare descend into higher fuel consumption rates.”

“We’re right on maximum endurance?”

“Right on. It’s all a function of winds right now, but…” He looked up at Craig and sighed. “I have to tell you, Craig, I’m not showing us arriving in Dublin with much fuel. We may want to consider Galway.”

Craig shook his head and laughed ruefully. “You had to go and tempt Murphy a while ago by mentioning Galway, didn’t you?”

“I’m sorry,” Alastair said, lowering his head into his calculations again. Craig realized with a small jolt of adrenaline that Alastair had met a joking comment with a sincere apology. That wasn’t like Alastair, which meant, Craig decided, that the copilot was really scared.

And that fact alone raised Craig’s apprehension to a new level.

“Better get Galway weather just in case,” Craig suggested.

Alastair nodded. “I am. In the meantime, don’t change those throttles from maximum endurance. We need to stretch every drop of fuel we have.”

Jay glanced nervously at his watch again and tried to force himself to calm down. He looked around, recording the details of the ornate old courtroom that had obviously seen much wear and tear over the years.

The rug, to begin with, intrigued him. It was a heavily faded green with white dots, or what might have been meant to resemble small flowers. There were no pathways worn into the fabric, but the rug was at least a decade beyond its useful life.

The shape of the courtroom was generally rectangular and approximately fifty feet in depth from the back doors to the bench. The woodwork in the chamber was ornate, but worn as well, with heavy use of molding known as dental work on the many layers and courses of crown molding overhead. The bench, as well as all the other fixtures and furniture in the room, was stained a dark fruitwood. The judge’s seat was elevated above the registrar and stenographer, backed by a faded burgundy curtain that cascaded down from an elaborate paneled header some twenty feet above the bench crowned with a harp in carved relief, the symbol of the Irish Republic.

The witness stand was a simple chair to the judge’s right, more in keeping with an American court than a British one, and the jury box ran along the wall to the judge’s left, with benches provided behind the tables used by the instructing solicitors. Opposing counsel – the barristers – sat opposite their respective solicitors. The bench for the public was in the back.

The courtroom was heated with old-style radiators, and a recessed series of glass panels, some artificially lighted from above, adorned the middle of the ceiling twenty-five or thirty feet overhead.

A door opened loudly in the rear of the court, and Jay turned to see Sir William Stuart Campbell and his entourage enter, Campbell already wearing his barrister’s robe and wig, accompanied by two other barristers among his group. He moved to his chair and turned briefly to smile and nod at Jay and Michael as more people trooped in the back and took their places on the various benches.

And suddenly the clerk was calling the case, and Judge O’Connell had swept in from his chambers to convene the court.

“Mr. Campbell, I recognize you, sir, with pleasure,” Justice O’Connell said as he sat down. “I have been continuously impressed with your tireless efforts on behalf of international jurisprudence and the writing and acceptance of the Treaty Against Torture over the years.”