"Peripherals?" Blundell echoed, eyes widening in uncertain surprise. "What d'you mean?"
"Cleaning crews, groundskeepers, maintenance men, what have you. Peripheral staff."
A look of utter chagrin stole a march across the liaison's boyish face. "Hadn't thought of that."
Stirling held back a sigh. "How many?"
"Let's see... Four—no, five. A charwoman, she comes every day for the cleaning; the groundsman and his assistant, they come round weekly; the equipment technician, he comes every five days or so for adjustments and spot checks. Then there's the lady who runs the concession, she comes in every couple of days to fill the machines. Oh, make it six, some days she sends her eldest daughter. Girl's sharp as a razor, but a sweet little thing. Completely wasted filling machines with candy bars and suchlike. Ought to be at college, someplace, but they haven't the funds and her father's that sick, her mother needs her at home."
A good candidate for bribe money, then, from any IRA mole wanting access or information. "Any of them housed on site?"
"Not the peripherals, as you call them. Not all the staff, for that matter. Team's grown, these last few months, and we haven't enough space in the cottages to accommodate everyone. McEgan lives off site, so do Banning and Mylonas, from the senior group, and most of the assistants rent rooms, as well."
"There's a gatekeeper, surely, acting as a security checkpoint?"
Blundell's chagrin deepened visibly. "Well, actually, we haven't needed any such precautions. Until now." He cleared his throat. "We're accustomed to civilian status, y'see. It's only recently, with the Home Office's interest, that we've realized there might be military or terrorist applications to our work."
Stirling sighed aloud this time. Blundell was right. If this were their notion of security, it was a joke. Civilian scientists, too myopic to comprehend realities like Belfast... It'd been too long since the IRA had bombed London or Manchester. Riots and bombings in Clonard notwithstanding, people outside Ireland—with the exception of the London ministries—were beginning to forget the dangers of civil disturbances spiraling out of control.
It was nearly dark by the time they turned off the main road, several kilometers short of Stirling, with its century-spanning history of warfare and its high cliff where Stirling Castle sat—if legend was correct—atop the remains of a Dark Ages stronghold that had been named as one of King Arthur's fortresses, possibly even ranking as a "second Camelot." Caerleon and Carlisle, down in the border counties, vied for the honor of "first Camelot."
The familiar, much loved countryside stirred long-forgotten memories, adventures with schoolmates, playing rough-and-tumble war games up the slopes surrounding Stirling Castle, pretending he and his mates were knights of the Round Table. No remains had been found, of course, but neither he nor his mates had cared one whit for archaeological evidence. It was the romance of it that mattered.
As he glanced out the Land Rover's windows at the rain-darkened slopes, Trevor Stirling allowed himself a slightly bitter smile. What fools they'd been, playing at war in these hills. Warfare in the sixth century had doubtless been a bloody business, as grimly devastating to civilian populations as it was in the twenty-first century. Stirling was no longer interested in the tales which both his grandfathers—Scots and Welsh—had recounted, of brave British chieftains holding back incursions of barbarians from Saxony, from Jutland in Denmark, from Ireland and the Pictish Highlands.
Fighting a sixth-century war would've been bloody hard business, even against more favorable odds than the Britons had faced. When all was said and done, what had Arthur really accomplished? A delay of the inevitable for a few decades? Stirling closed his eyes. God, he was tired of the fighting... Which was exactly why Ogilvie had sent him up here, rather than posting him back to Belfast. He wasn't fit for duty any longer.
As the Land Rover's headlamps picked out the rough asphalt track Blundell followed up into the mountains, Stirling's low opinion of security dropped even further. There was a fence, but no one guarded either its perimeter or its gate, which stood wide open. He didn't see so much as a watchdog. No cameras, either. Maybe the Home Office thought the project was as loony as he did? In which case, why bother to fund it?
A row of cottages stood along the access road, prefab affairs lacking any remotely attractive features, just dull little buildings of concrete where some of the on-site staff lived. "That largest cottage, there," Blundell pointed, "is Terrance Beckett's. You couldn't pry him away from here with all the whiskey in Whitechapel."
"What, he never goes into town at all? Doesn't he fancy a night at the pub now and again?"
Blundell grinned. "Oh, aye, now and again. But with the Falkland Arms just a few hundred meters down the road, why go all the way to Stirling? The Falklands run a nice pub, the local girls are pretty enough to suit, and the fish and chips better than any you'll find in Stirling proper."
"Yes, I know the Falklands, by reputation at least. We didn't move in the same circles. Where do your people stay, then? Surely not Stirling?" he added, eying the map.
"No, the Falklands rent rooms in some cottages that were put in last year, catering to summer tourists, birders and fishermen and the like. Everyone who lives off site stays in the Falklands' cots. We'll settle you there, as well."
"Huh." Stirling wondered just how friendly the local girls were and what sort of security risks they might pose. He probably knew a fair number of them by sight. Stirling found himself hoping the Falklands' cottages, at least, were a bit more picturesque than these drab concrete huts.
They swung round a final bend and Stirling got his first good look at the main facility. It was a larger version of the squat concrete cottages, but windowless, with steel security doors and a sizeable power plant visible off to one side. Rain squalls slashed across ugly walls and rooftops, racing past with a storm-lashed rhythm before writhing across the mountain slopes beyond.
He knew the valley, from childhood summer excursions. High, cloud-shrouded ridgelines, all but invisible in the rainy twilight, fenced the facility in, with only one access road leading out. If they'd bothered setting a gate guard, the place might have been virtually impregnable, by dint of sheer isolation. It was at least two kilometers from the nearest major huddle of farm cottages, a fair distance to hike through mountainous terrain with a load of unpleasantness strapped to one's back, but not far at all to come by car bomb. He wondered how amenable the researchers would be to the changes he intended imposing.
Not that he thought much additional security would prove necessary, but having come all this way, he might as well do a proper job of it. The Land Rover halted near the main doors and Stirling sighed, extricating himself gingerly with crutch-cane and compressed lips. There was, at least, a card reader at the front door, so no one could simply stroll straight in. Blundell swiped his identity card through it and the heavy steel door clicked open. "We'll get you a card, first thing," Blundell assured him as they stepped through.
"Second thing. Where's the bog? It's been a long drive and I drank most of that coffee."
Blundell grinned and pointed the way to the men's room, where Stirling took advantage of the sink and mirror to repair the worst of the travel damage and wash grit and sleepiness from his eyes. Ten minutes later Stirling was in the project director's office, with Blundell making introductions.
Terrance Beckett was a stringy sort of fellow one might have called rangy, had he possessed any decent physical conditioning. He glanced around at their entry, a scowl flickering into existence beneath a hawksbill nose. He glared down the long length of that nose, clearly resenting Stirling's intrusive presence in the lab's affairs as much as his more famous namesake, the Archbishop of Canterbury, had resented the intrusive presence of Henry II in the church. Come to think of it, Henry II was directly responsible for the present mess in Ireland, since he was the English king who'd first invaded the Irish.