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Original Fiction

No More Mr Nice Guy - Chapter 1 On the Steps
By Bowser
Nov 30, 2003, 18:59

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A bit of introduction first. Below is the first chapter of a frantic novel written during November following the rules of nanowrimo 50,000 words in a month - that's 1667 every day for 30 days. So it's definitely not great literature :) Some will remember last November's attempt 'From Mayo with Love' that I inflicted on the people of Castlebar here during the last year. This is a kind of a follow-up but but hopefully you will quickly see that it is quite a different beast.

I just hope there's no such thing as method writing because this guy doesn't have very many redeeming features and I've been trying to get inside his head for the past month. Apologies to M for the bad language but this is really not Mr. Nice Guy no matter what the title says.

The usual disclaimers: Any similarities with names on the Castebar bulletin board are entirely intentional. If the truth be told most of the plot was posted on the Bulletin Board over the past year. So here goes nothing:


[Contents]

The Proof - the Icon from NanoWrimo.org awarded for producing 50,000 words in November 2003
Chapter 1. On the steps

"No more Mr Nice Guy!" I thought. That's for sure. That bastard nigger is going to pay - bigtime! Twice now he had been responsible for landing me in jail in the past six weeks. But more than that, he had ruined me financially, politically, personally… every way. I could see my long political career in the toilet. I would never be able to sell a plot of land in Mayo again. Ever since the first raid at the Round Tower Inn out at Turlough I had plotted revenge. He had been responsible for calling the cops that time. Revenge – a dish to serve cold? Not cold noo! Not the way I had it planned anyway. So sweet I could taste it. And it was as elegant a piece of revenge-getting as you are ever likely to see, even if I do say so myself. But I'm getting a bit ahead of myself I guess…..

My name is O'Ryan, Patrick James O'Ryan that is, or just PJ for short. And I guess my story starts at the end and is first of all about how I got my revenge on a man named Sean Forde. Later I’ll tell you about how I tied up a few other loose ends and set off for a new life – a brave new world for PJ O'Ryan you might say.

Forde’s final comeuppance started off on Castlebar Court House steps. There were only two cases scheduled for that day – just mine and Forde’s. Sean Forde’s case was a formality from his point of view at least. Judge Garavan evicted the ‘squatter’ that had been living in a house originally owned by a guy called John McHale who was Sean Forde’s uncle. The squatter had been in the house for some years now following the uncle McHale’s death. Forde was McHale’s only living heir it seems – even though he didn’t leave a will. The squatter was colourfully known as Joe ‘Shotgun’ Murphy and had been living in the house almost from the day that old McHale had died.

Watching the case proceed I was amazed at the fact that even though Forde was a black man this didn’t seem to count for any weight at all with the judge. He gave the bastard the house anyway and the solicitors handed over the deeds of the small Turlough cottage to a black man from Manhattan. This black bastard was actually masquerading as a Mayoman but he was as black as the ace of spades! Justice? My arse! How they even let a black man into the country with a name like Sean is totally beyond me. What are those immigration guys doing at Shannon?

My own case had been a little bit heavier of course and there was a fair old media circus on the way in and out trying to get the downfall of the ex cabinet minister on the six o’clock news. They were even camped out around the back of the Court House; probably expecting me to do a Charlie Haughey on it I suppose. Inevitably I guess, I was forced into resigning the very next day. The day after they arrested me the first time in Turlough. The boss wouldn’t even listen to me – just one short phone call –

‘O'Ryan I want your resignation on my desk at 9am tomorrow’

And that was it. They even kicked me out of the party – the bloody hypocrites! They had always come to me when they wanted something done that they didn’t have the guts to do themselves. None of them wanted to know either. Even Pee Flynn whom I had thought was a friend would not return my calls. I even rang Enda and it was as if we were from different planets. End of politics for me seemed to be the message.

Frankly though, I didn’t really givadamm at this stage. I had other plans. My last few days in the clink had allowed me to formulate the final solution and with the help of a few phone calls I had put some wheels in motion. I had also managed to round up a good legal team. Proof of their ability was the fact that here I was out on bail already – easy as pie it seemed to me.

Liam Lawlor had recommended one of barristers to me. I actually recognised his voice from the Vincent Brown reconstruction on the radio with Joe Taylor. Now, I must say I can’t stick LL myself – he’s stupid but thinks he’s soo clever while everyone laughs at him. I actually took great delight in hearing the way the radio guys brought out the worst of his mannerisms and arrogance even if you couldn’t help admiring the sheer neck. Not that neck is all bad of course. Nevertheless, I took his ‘legal advice’ and hired the super-expensive barrister. At the time I didn’t know that LL was going to end up conducting his own defence in the Tribunal in Dublin Castle. I mightn’t have been so quick to take on the radio-star barrister if I had known that LL was going to dump him. Would I end up on Vincent Brown’s nightly RTE radio charade myself? Who would do my voice I half wondered? No don’t go there I thought – You’ve more on your mind just right now – so no side-tracking. Revenge needs a clear cool mind.

Sean Forde was wholly responsible for my ‘unjust’ arrest. I was merely ‘having a drink’ in the Round Tower with a few constituents – a clinic if you will when he had phoned the cops. How was I to know that we were all going to end up in a paddywagon? Just like those American tourists you see in Galway www.paddywaggon tours.com - but all the way to the jail in Castlebar in my case. The Chief let me out pretty fast though that day when I reminded him of a few favours bestowed in the past! It pays to save up favours for a rainy day.

Of course I was guilty as sin but like Machiavelli says sometimes you have to do evil to achieve a good outcome. I always had the good of Castlebar and Mayo at heart and such an end surely justifies the means. You can’t make omelettes, etc….. So if bringing in a couple of ‘kees’ is what it took to provide the investment necessary to create 10 jobs then surely that was worthwhile? What about the guy working in the advance factory that I had succeeded in having built? He was now taking home a fine pay-cheque each week rather than queuing up on New Antrim Street for his dole. My efforts meant that he can now pay the mortgage on a nice little hacienda I sold him out the Westport Road instead of sponging on the council housing list. He’s not complaining; so why should anyone else? A bit of ‘pot’ hurt no one and cocaine is just a recreational drug – a lot less harmful than tobacco or booze.

I was re-arrested a month later again – there had been some enquiries from Garda headquarters about the procedures followed by the Chief and the DPP requested my re-arrest pending a hearing. This did my ego no good though – but at least I had had the few weeks of freedom before that to put some wheels in motion. Back in jail for that week, all it needed then was a few phone calls to complete my plans. They didn’t take my mobile away from me – I guess they reckoned I couldn’t hang myself with it - but it meant I had a cellphone, so to speak.

[Contents]


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