Still plugging away on the sequel....

Fanahan was down, depressed some would call it, but since he did not believe depression existed: for him: he was just down.

He was wearing his dark funeral suit. In fact it was also his best suit, a recent purchase that fitted him. Not a fitted, bespoke suit – an off-the-peg selection. He always considered he was lucky that his build was fairly average, if anything can be fairly average, and he could buy a suit that either fitted him, or fitted him with minimum free alterations. Free alterations? Bullshit! When he called back to collect this suit pants that had been reduced, tucked in, at the waist, he threw his eye on a nice slim fit jeans and a smart looking shirt, and a white under-shirt and a pair of slip-on shoes. The ensemble was charged to his card and the free alterations call-back added three hundred lids or so to his bill. All in all, suit and ensemble, he dropped nearly a grand with Humphrey his personal shopper. That was how he introduced himself – a bloody new title for an uppity shop assistant.

Milo had died. Or to be precise Milo had drank himself to death. This time, in this establishment, with booze left on the shelves. In other words: he failed to drink his Dublin Pub dry, as he had with the other ones. He previously got big money for selling land at hefty prices, to developers. He than went into the Vintner business, buying pubs, and becoming his own best and long time customer. “I was right,” Fanahan muttered, when he got the news,“this time the liver packed up before the supply ran out.”

Cremation was not a real funeral, a real internment. Putting a small box into a grave was the norm now. Six by four that was what a man deserved, and six down as well. This undertaker had just bent down and placed the wooden box covering the urn of ashes, a couple of feet deep.

Give me a better send off, Fanahan thought. Scatter my ashes over twenty virgins! Jees! Where would you get twenty virgins today? Primary School? Grade School? All jail bait? Convents? No not any more!

“Gerry, give me another pint and a large brandy chaser. Those photographs on the wall of the football match. Milo said I could have them after he was finished with them, For sure that time is now. Take them down and I'll bring them with me.”

“He didn't say you could have them, he used them to annoy you – remind you that Cavan beat Galway, in a bleedin' All Ireland Final, but I don't like them either. So take them out of my sight. This is a changed Pub from now on. I might even consider barring some of the customers!”

Grate Pictures, just great for starting a nice fire in a grate! Bloody Bob Tyrell, Superintendent Tyrell, the player who won the match. He fell on his feet! Retired, wrote a memoir and is now a security expert on the radio and TV spouting on criminal issues. SHITE.

Detective Inspector Shamus Fanahan! Stuck in a policing rut and not going anywhere fast. No woman, no kids, no prospects and now – God help us all no best pal. Milo a best pal? Well OK. No pal at all.