“Long day?” he asked as she refilled his cup with coffee.

“Just beginning.”

She smiled wearily. She had hair the color of a raven’s wing, pale skin, and large blue eyes over wide cheekbones. She had been pretty once, but her face had taken on a hard edge. He supposed Belfast had aged her. Or perhaps, he thought, it was Quinn who had ruined her looks.

“You’re from here?” he asked.

“Everyone’s from here.”

“East or West?”

“You ask a lot of questions.”

“I’m just curious.”

“About what?”

“Belfast,” he said.

“Is that why you came here? Because you’re curious?”

“Work, I’m afraid. But I have the rest of the day to myself, so I thought I’d see a bit of the city.”

“Why don’t you hire a tour guide? They’re very knowledgeable.”

“I’d rather slit my wrists.”

“I know how you feel.” Her irony seemed to bounce off him like a pebble thrown at a bullet train. “Is there anything else I can do for you?”

“You can take the rest of the day off and show me around the city.”

“Can’t,” was all she said.

“What time do you get off work?”

“Eight.”

“I’ll stop by for a drink and tell you about my day.”

She smiled sadly and said, “I’ll be here.”

He paid the bill in cash and headed out to Great Victoria Street, where Keller waited behind the wheel of the Škoda. Lying on the backseat, wrapped in clear cellophane, was a bouquet of flowers. The small envelope was neatly addressed MAGGIE DONAHUE.

“What time does she get off work?” asked Keller.

“She said eight o’clock, but she might have been trying to avoid me.”

“I told you to play nice.”

“It’s not in my DNA to be nice to the wife of a terrorist.”

“It’s possible she doesn’t know.”

“Where did her husband get a hundred thousand pounds in used bills?”

Keller had no answer.

“What about the girl?” asked Gabriel.

“She’s in class until three.”

“And then?”

“A field hockey game against Belfast Model School.”

“Protestant?”

“Mostly.”

“Should be interesting.”

Keller was silent.

“So what do we do?”

“We deliver some flowers to Eight Stratford Gardens.”

“And then?”

“We have a look inside.”

But first they decided to take a detour through Keller’s violent past. There was the old Divis Tower, where he had lived among the IRA as Michael Connelly, and the abandoned cleaning service on the Falls Road, where the same Michael Connelly had tested the household laundry of the IRA for evidence of explosives. Farther down the Road was the iron gate of Milltown Cemetery, where Elizabeth Conlin, the woman Keller had loved in secret, lay buried in a grave that Eamon Quinn had dug for her.

“You’ve never been?” asked Gabriel.

“It’s too dangerous,” said Keller, shaking his head. “The IRA keep watch over the graves.”

From Milltown they drove past the Ballymurphy housing estates to Springfield Road. Along its northern flank rose a barricade separating a Protestant enclave from a neighboring Catholic district. The first of the so-called peace lines appeared in Belfast in 1969 as a temporary solution to the city’s sectarian bloodletting. Now they were a permanent feature of its geography—indeed, their number, length, and scale had actually increased since the signing of the Good Friday accords. On Springfield Road the barricade was a transparent green fence about ten meters in height. But on Cupar Way, a particularly tense part of the Ardoyne, it was a Berlin Wall–like structure topped by razor wire. Residents on both sides had covered it in murals. One likened it to the separation fence between Israel and the West Bank.

“Does this look like peace to you?” asked Keller.

“No,” answered Gabriel. “It looks like home.”

Finally, at half past one, Keller turned into Stratford Gardens. Number 8, like its neighbors, was a two-level redbrick house with a white door and a single window on each floor. Weeds flourished in the forecourt; a green rubbish bin lay toppled by the wind. Keller pulled to the curb and switched off the engine.

“One wonders,” said Gabriel, “why Quinn decided to live in a luxury villa in Venezuela instead of here.”

“Did you get a look at the door?”

“A single lock, no deadbolt.”

“How long will it take you to unbutton it?”

“Thirty seconds,” said Gabriel. “Less than that if you let me leave those stupid flowers behind.”

“You have to take the flowers.”

“I’d rather take the gun.”

“I’ll keep the gun.”

“What happens if I run into a couple of Quinn’s friends in there?”

“Pretend to be a Catholic from West Belfast.”

“I’m not sure they’ll believe me.”

“They’d better,” said Keller. “Otherwise, you’re dead.”

“Any other helpful advice?”

“Five minutes, and not a minute more.”

Gabriel opened the door and stepped into the street. Keller swore softly. The flowers were still in the backseat.

21

THE ARDOYNE, WEST BELFAST

A SMALL IRISH TRICOLOR HUNG LIMPLY from an oxidized mount in the door frame. Like the dream of a united Ireland, it was faded and tattered. Gabriel tried the latch and, as expected, found it was locked. Then he drew a thin metal tool from his pocket and, using the technique taught to him in his youth, worked it carefully in the mechanism. A few seconds was all it took for the lock to surrender. When he tried the latch a second time, it invited him to enter. He stepped inside and closed the door quietly behind him. No alarm sounded, no dog barked.

The morning post lay scattered across the bare floor. He gathered up the various envelopes, fliers, magazines, and advertising supplements and leafed quickly through them. Each was addressed to Maggie Donahue, except for a teen-oriented fashion magazine, which was addressed to her daughter. There appeared to be no private correspondence of any sort, only the customary commercial debris that clogs mail services the world over. Gabriel pocketed a credit card bill and returned the rest to the floor. Then he entered the sitting room.

It was a small room, a few meters square, scarcely enough space for the couch, the television console, and the pair of floral matching armchairs. On the coffee table was a stack of old magazines and Belfast newspapers, along with additional post, opened and unopened. One of the items was a newsletter and fund-raising appeal from the 32 County Sovereignty Movement, the political wing of the Real IRA. Gabriel wondered whether its senders realized the addressee was the secret spouse of the group’s most accomplished maker of bombs and explosives.

He returned the letter to its envelope and the envelope to its place on the table. The walls of the room were bare except for a violent Irish seascape of flea-market quality hanging above the couch. On one of the end tables stood a framed photograph of a mother and child on the occasion of the child’s First Communion at Holy Cross Church. Gabriel could find no trace of Quinn in the child’s face. In that, if nothing else, she was fortunate.

He glanced at his wristwatch. Ninety seconds had elapsed since he had entered the house. He parted the thin curtains and peered out as a car rolled slowly past in the street. Inside were two men. They appeared to take careful note of Keller as they passed the parked Škoda. Then the car continued along Stratford Gardens and disappeared around the corner. Gabriel looked at the Škoda. The lights were still doused. Next he looked at his BlackBerry. No warning texts, no missed calls.

He released the curtain and entered the kitchen. A lipsticked coffee cup stood on the counter; dishes soaked in a pool of soapy water in the basin. He opened the refrigerator. It was packaged fare mainly, nothing green, no fruit, no beer, only a half-drunk bottle of supermarket Italian white from Tesco.