Bloke shortly ducks out of country (8)
I believe the answer is:
maldives
'country' is the definition.
(I know that Maldives is a country)
'bloke shortly ducks out' is the wordplay.
'bloke' becomes 'male' (bloke means a man).
'shortly' means to remove the last letter.
'ducks out' becomes 'dives' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'male' with its final letter taken off is 'mal'.
'mal'+'dives'='MALDIVES'
'of' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for maldives that I've seen before include "Indian Ocean island country" , "Indian Ocean country, capital Male" , "Mad Elvis found in the islands" , "Mad Elvis is here in the Indian ocean" , "Indian Ocean archipelago and republic" .)