If I had the money or if I were younger I would not
be here. I would be living in the most wonderfull country
on this planet. I mean England. I lived there for years from
my late teens onwards and even before that when still a
child my mother brought me there for holidays.
I wish I was there now. I can think of nothing finer
that to wake up every morning and find myself in Earls
Court or Fulham or Hammersmith or even Brixton where
my daughter lives. To go for a walk in Holland Park or
stroll around the shops in Knightsbridge and smell London
in the air. I only have one bad memory from there. I was
living in Shepherds Bush which is next door to Hammersmith
in south London and was sharing a flat with a fellow called
Bernard Roy Duggan. He was having company one night so
I decided to make myself scarce and went for a walk. At
some point during this walk I met a guy.....how I can't
remember but we got talking and we went for a drink. He
lived not to far away by bus so after the pub I went back
to his flat for coffee and a chat After being there for
a while I went to leave and that's when it all went sour.
Exactly what happened I will pass over but I did not get
out of the place until about five the next morning. He
was a violent man and for the time I spent there I was
terrified. I remember thinking that I was not going to get
out alive. He made it clear that he wanted my company
regardless how I felt about it.
When I did eventually leave I went home and wanted
to call the police but by that time I had no idea exactley
where he lived. It had been dark when I got to his place
and I had not really being paying attention to where he
lived so I just went home. In time I managed to forget
about the whole experience.
A couple of years later when I was back in Dublin I was
watching TV one night and the news was on. And out of
the blue his face came up on the screen. It was a report
about a man who had been arrested that day for murder
in London. But it wasn't just a regular murder.
His name was given as Denis Neilsen and he was charged
with the murder of something like sixteen young men.
Sometime after that I bought a book about him and I
couldn't help thinking that if things had been just a little
different I might have ended up like those poor souls.
You read about such people but you don't expect to
meet them in real life.