Dead Village by Gerry Tate Page A

boundaries of imagination just a little too far, he believed.
    Still, he had a few contacts in Dublin, and he would make his business to try and track Brian down.
    He would let this selfish guttersnipe of a man know that his mother really needs him now, more than ever.
    Why, if found, he would personally go drag Brian Casey half way back across Ireland if he had to, return him to his mother, and to hell with the consequences.
    For now though, he would try and put the matter out of his mind, because now he had other things to worry about.
    Jo and the baby growing inside her would be waiting for him. Loving tender Jo, he though, a woman in a million.
    They had been mulling over the names just the previous night, as to what they would call the baby, and he remembered Jo stating that if it was a boy, she would like to call him Brian.
    Now Jeremiah had made a mental note that for now, Brian was definitely out of the equation.

CHAPTER 5
    Tully put on his heavy coat, and removed the shotgun from the black metal box. He picked up a handful of shells and shoved them deep inside his coat pocket.
    He would catch the badger baiter’s this time, because this time he was ready.
    Tully loved nature and everything that went with it. It was man’s cruelty that tore at his insides. Some of the things he had witnessed had caused him to lose most of his faith in his fellow man. To catch and kill an animal to eat was one thing, Tully felt. But to kill or maybe torture the creature for some sort of twisted pleasure in the guise of sport, well that was something he would never understand. One thing was certain about it though. Tully didn’t believe in the justice system for these sorts of people.
    On most occasions these lower than life scum would be enforced with a small fine, or they would not be permitted to keep animals for a period of time, he knew. To him the punishment didn’t fit the crime by a long chalk. So when Tully caught one of the Flynn brothers badger baiting, he meted out his own form of justice, and sent him home with a good hiding, and his tail between his legs. Tully had told the police that he had acted in self defence when Flynn attacked him, and the self inflicted bruise on his cheek confirmed to the questioning officer that Flynn had indeed attacked Tully first. So Tully was not charged, and the word soon spread that Tully was not a man to be messed with. Now someone else was doing the badger baiting. The Kavanagh’s, he believed.
    He had received reports of them coming and going across the forest, but he knew that this alone, proved nothing.
    But whoever they were, they would never look at life the same way again. Once he caught up with them that is.
    â€œBe careful Tully,” Francis shouted from the top of the stairs.
    â€œDon’t worry Fra, I will.”
    He left the house with a half smile.
    A thought came to Tully’s mind. Francis had asked him to be careful because she loved and cared for him. This was something new for him.
    Because during all of his years with Madge, she had never once asked him to be careful. Never encouraged or praised him for anything, and in their last troublesome years together, never once told him she loved him.
    Francis was a different kettle of fish though. Francis would constantly tell him how much she felt about him, and in her eyes he could do no wrong. Tully though, was a different sort of breed. Tully acknowledged to himself that he could be strange and distant at times, and he knew that there was some undermining reason, deep in his brain, that made him dislike sentiment and loving toward him. He was constantly fighting this feeling, and for Francis’s sake he would go on fighting it. Beating the condition was another matter though.
    Maybe I’ve spent much too much time in the forest, he thought.
    Most men would gladly give up their right arm to have a loving woman like Francis, he felt. But somehow, he still seemed drawn like a magnet, to the