Al’s partner in the meat business (3)
I believe the answer is:
hal
'partner in the meat business' is the definition.
The definition suggests a singular noun which matches the answer.
'al's' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'al' is present in the answer.
A single letter 'h' remains which might be clued in a way I don't see.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for hal that I've seen before include "Henry, in short" , "Shakespeare's Prince_with Falstaff" , "Shakespeare's prince" , "Henry (abbrev.)" , "Henry (diminutive)" .)