Act Two...

Dear friends,
for some, a fog is hindrance only, for these soulless ants unmoved by Nature’s upkeep of Creation, it’s one hour more in an endless grind. The oak-hearted sailor fears and loathes it, as he strains to hear the skerry bell, yet that same deadening is a gift to some, a respite given from clamour and din, for others more, of a lonesome kidney, fond memories come wrapped within its damp embrace.

But for some, a few, (thankful praise a blessed few), their hearts rotted by malignant grubs of evil, laid in childhood by unknown wasps, a fog is their friend, a cloaking ally, to be greeted with silent salutation upon the field of unspoken filthy deed…

Reserve Officer Mally feels his pleasure mount as each step of Sergeant O’Shea’s stiff gait takes him further into the fog towards the house. The thickening vapours now close behind him with vault door finality.

In the course of his Duty, Mally makes a point of removing the little squares of coloured paper which adorn phone booths, advertising the services of ladies and working girls. You know the thing. Of course you do. These he keeps like a schoolboy pack of cards. And now like a game of patience perverted in its carnal turpitude, he lays them out, every one, on the passenger seat, keeping one hand free.
Like some low, inverted liturgy, he starts to read them out:
Smell the glove - Afterwards!
Backdoor Girl. I likes it HARD I does.
New in town, Be my butt plug.
Bored Housewife, tit-wank a specialty.
French lessons,

“French less…how did that get there?”
Damnation! his strokes now dropped he spies a number closer to his heart.
With frantic button pressing, he hears the rings,
“Come on come on come on.”
“Well hello,” says the husky voice…


Outside our inn, under the sodium street lamp, two American lady tourists are studying a brief volume called, ‘The Joys of Olde Dublin Town‘. It was written by a crook who never got further east than Boston, but some would say “Well, near enough”.
Let’s eavesdrop while they stand there in the glare.

“Book of Kells."
“Yep, I think we saw the letter “F” or something, hard to say.”
“Bullet holes in O’Connell Street Post Office.”
“Check.”
“Pea green Liffey.”
“What?”
“The Godamn river.”
“Right. Seen it. Check.”
“Well that’s it.”
“That’s it? You sure? There’s no appendix, addendum, second fucking volume?”
“Nope. Look it’s getting thicker, and my feet hurt, let’s go in here for a Guinness or ten.”
“Check.”


Mally’s hand is shaking now as he grips the phone checking every syllable.
“Wud yi’ like to buy me panties? Up the arse is extra so it is.”
“Mam! Yi promised me. Yi said yi would stop and go back to the betting shop. I believed you I did.”
“Oh it’s you is it? Listen, 10 euros an hour? Did yi never stop and think? Where in the worrald did yi think your plasma screen came from? Now get off the line yi little bollix, yir bad fir trade.”

In tearful fury the phone is flung, but wait, up the road, just discernable through the grey, comes a man, what’s more he’s singing and he’s had a few!
Mally’s lizard grin grows with every step poor Binty takes towards that van…