FEARLESS FINN'S MURDEROUS ADVENTURE Read Free Page A

ordinary-looking and perfect for a safe house.
    I’m a good bit over six feet in height and I weigh in at two hundred forty pounds, but that didn’t discourage a gang of little shites from fronting up to me demanding money. None of them looks over fifteen years of age, and they haven’t a decent pair of shoulders between them.
    “Give us yer odds mister, go on. Give ’em to us before we effing take ’em from yous!”
    “Tell me you support Man U, and you can have all me odds, me change, the lot. Go on,” I whispered real quiet, slowly like, emphasizing every word. That seemed to do the trick.
    “Fuck off ya Irish twat! Keep your fuckin’ money you dozy big git!”
    They swaggered off down the road yelling, “They’ll never walk alone…Liverpool FC. We’ll see yous in the Kop…Liverpool FC. Man U, the slimy wankers!”
    I knocked hard on number fifty-five. The paint-chipped door was flung open by a serious, almost aggressive-looking girl with sharp blue eyes and flaming red hair.
    “Yeah, and who are you?” she asked, with a disarming smile and an undisguised Mayo accent.
    “I’m Finn, from home. Here on the Chief's order. OK?”
    No response. To fill the silence I lied to her.
    “There'll be no heat brought on yous by my presence here. God willing, I'll be gone in twenty-four hours, tops.”
    Her smile is gone.
    “I’m Mary, Mary McManus. And you Finn, you have a family name?”
    A male voice yelled from inside the house. “Jaysus Mary, bring the man through will ya? I told ya I spotted him coming down the road….I said it was him now, didn’t I? They’ll never believe it, so they won’t.”
    Mary took me by the hand and led me into a small living-room where two young lads, probably no more than eighteen or nineteen years of age, are sitting on an old couch. I remember the couch well – the springs are shot in it. I stayed here back in 1972, when Mac, meself and two Donegal lads were detailed to meet a consignment of Semtex arriving in a ship from Vancouver, Canada. The house hasn’t changed much.
    “You’re a bit of a legend with us new volunteers, so you are,” said the lad who was doing the yelling. His voice is much quieter now, which pleases me greatly. “Sit yourself down there,” he smiled, pointing at a comfortable-looking armchair I’d not seen before. “Fuck a duck! Finn feckin’ Flynn! Jaysus!” he said, poking the lad seated beside him.
    I’m embarrassed at the adulation from these lads. They evidently have the guts to join an ASU, and are likely to be killed, tortured or imprisoned for life. And I’ve just lied to them – lied because I’ve no idea if I’ll be gone in twenty-four hours. I haven’t even a notion where to go to next. All I have is thirty quid in my pocket and an order to disappear in a hurry…because the guards have my nickname.
    I took my leave of the lads and climbed up the creaking stairs – left so to act as a last-minute warning in case anyone, like the police or Special Branch, tries to creep up to the bedrooms undetected. The two lads are using the front bedroom and the girl is in the box room. That leaves the back bedroom for me.
    “There’s a chippy van down the road! You want a single and a bitta cod?!” the lads yelled up the stairs.
    “I’ve feck all money!” I yelled back. Another small lie – the thirty pounds in my pocket could be more than they have between them.
    “Don’t bother your head! We can afford a few fish and chips for a man like yourself!” they called back.
    And that’s what I got, along with a pile of buttered bread and a mug of tea.
    After refilling my mug, the youngest of the three put down the teapot. “Can I ask you something Mister Flynn? Is it right that you’re descended from Fionn mac Cumhaill, is it?” he asked, with a shy kind of grin.
    “You’ve the right build and hair for him, so you have,” chipped in Mary.
    “So they tell me. Some professor in Trinity College traced me back to himself, the mad