A Tale of Two Faces
“He’s
a strange one. Started coming in here about a month ago. Don’t know much ‘bout
him, don’t really care. He comes in, sits in that seat over there,” the burly
landlord pointed to the corner of the room where there was a shady-looking,
middle-aged man sitting and smoking a pipe, uttering silent words, “smoking his
pipe and drinking ‘til the cows come home. He doesn’t talk much neither; don’t
get me wrong, he ain’t rude or nothing. Jus’ doesn’t talk. Wait a second, there
was one time that he spoke – nah, ‘spose it don’t matter”. The landlord paused,
gave a quick glance over to the mystery man, leaned in closer and lowered his
voice to a whisper. “’Bout a week ago there was another man that came in –
ne’er seen him before – walked over to…” he nodded over to the mystery man “and
handed him a piece of important-looking paper. The guy walked straight back
out, gave me a smile and left. ‘Bout a minute later, ol’ puffy over there stood
up, asked me to watch his ale and walked out the door. Looked like he was
fixin’ t’do a bad thing. He came back for his ale alright, came back with a
menacing grin on his face - scared the hell outta me. You ask Roger over there,
he was here the whole time”.
***
“You
come about him? I was wondering how
long it would take you people to get here. I haven’t anything to say to you and
my glass is nearly empty”. The well-spoken, middle-class Roger grinned with
triumph at his attempt at playful bribery. It worked. Roger laughed, “Atta boy,
the finest sherry money can buy…” he fell into a whisper “well, the finest Mr
Landlord over there will ever buy in.
I’ll get straight to it, shall I? It was early afternoon, last Tuesday – I’d
just come back from The Hunt and popped in for a sherry. Our friend over there was sitting in his
usual seat over by the fire and looking into the room with those beady,
calculating eyes of his. Those eyes always sends a chill right through me”.
Roger shuddered, and then continued in a very matter-of-fact way. “Yes, there
he was, smoking his pipe, drinking his ale and muttering to himself, as usual.
All of a sudden a stranger burst in. We don’t see many people we don’t know
come through here, you see – except you know who.” Roger moved his eyes in the
direction of our ‘friend’. “I can’t
remember the last time we had anyone new come through here… oh, listen to me
waffling on like an old goat. Anyway, this stranger burst in and handed to him
a piece of parchment, then walked straight back out. Sure, he was polite enough;
he smiled at Martin as he left. It was all just very odd. Then, our friend followed him out and came back
looking devilish about ten minutes later.” He shook his head in bewilderment.
“Good bye old chap and thank you for the drink,” he exclaimed as he gestured
with his glass.
***
“So
you’re the man that’s been poking his nose into business that’s not his. It’s
nice to finally make your
acquaintance, Mr…” he paused, waiting for a name, “not much of a talker, eh? I
already know what you’re here for anyway, I was just trying to be nice,” he
grinned like a tiger trying to lure his prey into his cage. He took a huge
guzzle of his ale and let out a small burp. While puffing on his pipe he
introduced himself, “the name’s Lance. Lance Gelder. You can call me sir.”
Then
he smiled and almost looked like a different man. “I moved into the area about
a month ago; I spend most of my time in here, minding my own business, drinking
ale and smoking on my pipe.” He paused, took a deep breath and scratched his
greying beard. “I can tell by the look on your face that you want to know my
involvement with the dead man they found last Friday. Very well, it greaves me
to say that he was my brother. Well, my step brother. He was the man that
Martin and Roger saw come in here last Tuesday” He re-lit his pipe and chugged
away on it before continuing. “Our… my mother recently died and left us a
respectably wealthy estate. Split everything – half and half. The woman was
rich, and I don’t mean sherry-drinking-Roger-rich,” he chuckled, “I mean so
rich she could’ve bought a factory. Unfortunately, my brother became greedy and
deceitful and had the will changed so that everything went to him. Don’t ask
how because I don’t know. I didn’t particularly care for him at the best of
times but I didn’t want him dead. He’s the only family I had left.”
Unexpectedly,
Lance’s face changed, becoming cold and manipulative. Then he started to laugh
with scornful malice. The tone of his voice was now tainted with venom. “He deserved
it. He deserved everything he had coming to him. He tried to weasel his way
into our family, MY FAMILY!” Lance found his feet in a fit of rage, causing
Martin to drop a glass in horror then the pub fell silent.
Lance was suddenly calm again, all signs of aggression dormant. He sat back
down and straightened out his jacket. “Oh, how did that get there?” confused,
he picked up his pipe from the floor where it had fallen during his rage. He
coolly concluded, “I don’t know who killed him but he’s still my brother and I
want to know who’s responsible for his murder.”
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