Read The Thief Who Couldn't Sleep for Free Online Page B

plotting? Who? What? Where? When? Why?
    I have never liked being questioned. In all my sessions with the Federal Bureau of Investigation I have never enjoyed myself at all. I don't like having some competent young man sit down in my apartment and ask questions about my friends and my associations and my ideas and all of the rest.
    But in each of these sessions—and there have been many of them—I have had one ultimate weapon. I have always told these officious oafs the truth. I have never lied to them. Since they cannot find any sense or logic in the way I live my life, and since I don't break their damned laws, they wind up going away and shaking their heads and clucking to themselves.
    How could I tell them the truth now? How could I tell those people about the Armenian hoard?
    No.
    I simply could not return to the United States. I simply could not land in Washington.
    I looked over at Mustafa. He had his earphones plugged into the wax in his ears and was listening, expressionless, to a medley of folk songs performed by the Norman Luboff Choir. If only there were a way of ridding myself of Mustafa, perhaps I had a chance to avoid returning to Washington. But how? Even if he dropped dead on the spot, if one of Norman Luboff's singers hit high C and burst a blood vessel in Mustafa's little brain, I was still stuck on the damned airplane. How could I pry him away from me, and how could I pry myself off the flight?
    Shannon—
    We would be landing at Shannon. Shannon Airport in Ireland. Not Turkey, not the United States of America. Ireland. And we would have two precious hours between planes. We would get off this plane, Mustafa and I, and we would wait in Shannon Airport for two hours before it was time to board our flight for Washington. I would have two hours to rid myself of Mustafa.
    I almost shouted at the beauty of it. I knew people in Ireland! I received mail from Ireland every month; almost every week. I was an active member of the Clann-na-Gaille and the Irish Republican Brotherhood. If I could find some of those people—any of them—I was safe. They would be my sort of people, my spiritual brothers. They would hide me, they would care for me, they would conspire with me!
    Shannon—
    I closed my eyes, tried to bring the map of Ireland into focus. Dublin in the center of the extreme right, Cork at the bottom, the Six Counties of Hibernia Irredenta at the top, Galway at the left. Below Galway, Shannon Airport. And near Shannon, what? Tralee? No, that was farther down and farther to the left. Now what was the city right near Shannon?
    Limerick.
    Of course, Limerick. And I knew someone in Limerick. I was sure I knew someone in Limerick. Who?
    Francis Geoghan and Thomas Murphy lived in Dublin. P. T. Clancy lived in Howth, which was just north of Dublin, and Padraic Fynn lived in Dun Laoghaire, which was just south of Dublin, but there was someone in Limerick, and I merely had to remember his name.
    Wait, now. Dolan? Nolan? I knew it, it was coming back, it only took thinking.
    It was Dolan, P. P. Dolan, Padraic Pearse Dolan, named for the greatest of the Easter Monday martyrs who had proclaimed the Irish Republic from the steps of the Post Office in O'Connell Street. And he didn't live in Limerick City but in County Limerick, and I remembered his whole address now: P. P. Dolan, Illan-oloo, Croom, Co. Limerick, Republic of Ireland.
    Where was Croom? It couldn't be far from Limerick itself. The whole county was not that large. If I reached him, he would hide me. He would welcome me and feed me and hide me.
    If only I could get rid of Mustafa.
    I looked at him, sitting contentedly while the music was piped into his ears. Dream on, I told him silently. You'll get yours, little man.
    Istanbul is about 1,500 miles from Shannon. We made the trip in about three hours, and the time zones canceled out the flying time almost exactly. It had been close to four o'clock when we left Istanbul and it was about that time when we