Ossian's Ride by Fred Hoyle Read Free Book Online

from you. I’d like it now, with as little delay as possible.”
    Colquhoun allowed his anger to settle a little. “How much do you want?”
    “Seven hundred.”
    “That’s a powerful lot.”
    “Which is my business, not yours. Let me have it without any more foolishness, please.”
    With ill grace Colquhoun left the room. A few minutes later he came back with a bundle of notes. I counted them, and then stowed the roll away carefully in a specially made inner trouser pocket.
    “One thing more. I’d like a list of our agents on the Clare and Galway coasts.”
    “Oh, you would, would you? Isn’t that a fine thing to ask?”
    “It’s a very practical thing to ask, and I’ll trouble you for the information. You needn’t fear that I’m going to carry a lot of names on a piece of paper around with me, but I want to carry them in my bead. I have a pretty good memory, Mr. Colquhoun.”
    “I’ll bet you have, Mr. Sure-sure. Maybe you’d learn a great lesson if I gave you that list. Maybe you’d soon be cooling your heels in jail, or maybe pushing up the green grass of Ireland if you weren’t so lucky.”
    “Is it possible for you to tell me in a simple way what you’re driving at?”
    There was a glint in Colquhoun’s eye as he stared into my face.
    “This is the way of it, me fine cock sparrer. There’s no list of agents any more, not to mean anything. We’ve been cleaned out, broken apart. That’s what I mean.”
    “How did it happen?”
    “P:S.D.” was Colquhoun’s cryptic reply. The anger had now subsided. He drank the remaining whiskey at a gulp and slumped down in a chair before the fire. Although I was curious to hear more, it would be wise to move before the fellow launched himself into some new rambling exposition.
    “No, you shall not go until you hear the rest of it,” he exclaimed—when I sought to leave. “Besides, there is something you must do.”
    “Who or what is P.S.D.?”
    “The divil pour me another glass,” exclaimed Colquhoun in some surprise. “For a feller who fancies himself as much as you do, you’re shockingly ignorant. Or maybe it’s a bad joke you’re trying to make?”
    “Look, Mr. Colquhoun, I’m here on a solitary mission. You are my only contact. When I leave this house I shall have absolutely nothing to do with any of this business you’re talking about.”
    “And that’s where you’re in for a great surprise, me lad.”
    “Every minute we spend talking this nonsense increases the risk of my being picked up. So if you have anything really important to say, please stick to the point.”
    Very deliberately he got up from the chair, fetched an extra glass and poured two overgenerous drinks.
    “There’s no question of your leaving here tonight. By a miracle you managed to avoid the guards on your way in, but you wouldn’t be so lucky the second time.”
    In this he was probably right. Once morning came and people were in the streets, it would be easier to slip away from Marrowbone Lane. My absence from Trinity would cause no comment either, since I had been intending to leave for the mountains anyway.
    “We should have been warned by the experience of the French. They were smashed last year, and P.S.D. were certainly at the back of that. P.S.D. is an organization that started under the cover of a solicitor’s business right here in Dublin. Porson, Shilleto and Dobree were the names. Purveyors of Sudden Death, that’s what they’re known as nowadays.”
    “Is it some form of Irish counterespionage?”
    Colquhoun’s laughter was a little hysterical. “Counterespionage eh? It’s a great pity the lads aren’t around to hear that. Counterespionage!” He sipped his whiskey. “No, me young friend, P.S.D. is espionage pure and clear. The only couriering that’s done is the counting of profit. What’s going on in the west there is worth thousands of millions to the industries of the world.” .
    “You mean that P.S.D. steals and sells trade