2It belonged to a forlorn little man, with tall legs and curly locks. Perhaps around forty, he had the essence of a paranoid little puppy, ready to skin an attacker alive.
"Name's Ned Allomy, pleasure." Said the caller, stretching out his hand to good-naturedly shake his hand.
"Earl Callonblots…" The victim said suspiciously.
Earl pushed the door towards his visitor.
"I'm not interested."
"Oh - on the contrary, I think you are."
Cedric suddenly gathered an eerie amount of strength and stopped the door from slamming into his face. He stepped inside.
"Lovely place.."
It was a strange hunk of bricks and lattice, I can tell you. Strange and austere, the walls were green, with gold trimming. Portraits of lordly ladies and lady - like lords were hung in every spot that could be sparred. Bizarre portraits of lordly ladies and lady - like lords were hung in every spot that could be sparred. It seemed almost like a carnival funhouse. Cedric certainly would not have been surprised to see staircases that lead to the ceiling, doors in the floor, and secret passages behind the mirrors, holding sights that should never be seen.
"Again I'll ask you, what do you want?"
"Why, you make it sound like I'm a murderer! I'm an investor for heaven's sake!"
"An investor?"
"Yes, yes yes yes! But…let's talk business shall we?"
He lead him down a narrow hallway, lit by dim oil lamps, giving it an even more stuffy feeling. From one of the benches in the hallway, Cedric snatched an elegant pillow.
At last, they reached the kitchen. It was like a sudden blast of light. Nearly everything was white. He had the latest Fridgidaire, a beautiful sink, orderly cabinets and a spotless table.
"W-would you like some tea?" asked Earl, quite uncomfortably.
"Oh yes, I'd love some."
He got up to retrieve the kettle and was stopped by the solicitor.
"No - you're doing me a supreme favor by letting me into your beautiful home. Please, do me the honor. In fact, I cannot believe you are condemned to moving one finger at all! Such a talented businessman, it's a shame." He said, fake and awful, swiping the kettle.
"Tea's in the cabinet next to the refrigerator."
The cabinet was crammed with dozens - perhaps hundreds of tea packages. All of them the colour grey.
"You like the taste of King, don't you?" The brand was a regular tea, nearly tasteless, in fact - totally tasteless. Of course - this was unbenownst to Cedric. It would make you scratch your head and wonder why one wouldn't just boil water for himself to savor.
Doing all the necessary and tiresome preparations for tea, he set the pot to boil. Cedric engaged him in as much petty conversation as he could muster always failing to answer what firm he worked for.
The kettle hissed. He swiped it off the stove and turned his back while he put the packet...and the other surprise in.
When the cups were placed on the table, Earl took a little swig. A bewildered expression stretched onto his pug face.
"This tastes strange..."
"Oh...well I'm sure it was merely a typo of the tea - world so to speak..." Cedric retorted, managing to add an unatural - sounding forced giggle.
"No, no. It tastes like...some kind of - kind of chemical or something..." He suddenly starred at him with the most incredulous gazes ever recorded. I find that the more psychologically unstable people are, the more wary their gaze.
"Who are you?" he asked, his tone becoming heated.
"An investor." Cedric insisted coolly.
He had his hand in his coat pocket. His suspicion was correct. His little victim did keenly suspected something. "A case of hostile paranoia." he thought. It was disappointing, regular neurotics (like myself, I must say) are far easier to fool, because we - or perhaps just I - wish to find any type of comfort. Simple coaxing was all that was needed, Toller knew.
Slowly, he pulled the pistol from his front coat pocket as the aggressive man advanced, obviously intending to infringe..in his case try to infringe some major pain on his attacker.
Taking in the scenery, the tea - connoisseur stopped with a jolt. His mind quaked with cold fear
When Callonblots saw the pillow being placed neatly on his temple and felt the gun atop it, he looked like a turtle who had just withdrawn into his shell. He started to plead.
Cedric laughed. "Oh no, no, no! You're not getting out of this that easy!"
The cagey man looked as if in his mind, he was kicking himself.
"Now...Earl are you enjoying this? Hm?"
He shook his head. The feeling of utter helplessness consumed him. It was terrible just to stand there, waiting your imminent death while his murderer taunted and teased him.
"Neither did those poor animals you tested and shot. This will be in their memory. Lest we forget, yes? Now hold still now and this should be fairly quick and painless. Well, mind you, most people don't give me a report after..." These almost reassuring words made the tiny hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. This man made his skin positively crawl with fear. The murderer shot his piercing grin right in Earl's face.
The victim's heart pounded, it felt like rapid gunfire to his ribs. His head began to throb and cloud. The only image he could decipher was that daunting grin. It pierced with more fervor than any pistol could ever hope to.
He fired. Blood immediately shot out. The thumping that was seen through his shirt slowed and then stopped cold. "Aww! My new coat! Ugh.." He shook his hand wildly in the air, his senses a tad frayed by the globs of blood that flew onto him. One arm holding the corpse, the other clutching the weapon, he called. "Leland! Leland get in here right now!"
His slithery companion popped his head in the door.
"Oh. I see everything went well. A little messier than I'd like...but nothing a good scrub could get out. Nice work though - I could barely hear a thing, and I was upstairs. You've got a nice quite one."
"Yes. Could you take him?" Cedric was slowly toppling over, his arm being stretched to unbelievable lengths.
"Sure. Sure. Now get out of here. I don't want you messing anymore than you already have."
"Let's just have a look around before we leave, shall we? If anything tickles your fancy feel free to grab it." Leland tossed him another large bag.
Just outside the kitchen was one other hall. it sprouted into at least a dozen others. At the very end, was a spiral staircase leading to the bedroom. He trudged up, around in circles until he reached the top. The chamber was positively extravagant. Earl may have been deranged, but he certainly knew the importance of furniture positioning.
Cedric entered, hands behind his back, clutching the drooping duffel bag. Immediately, he turned to the bureau. The mirror upon it was huge, and covered with black paint.
"Must consider himself a DiVinci." he thought.
Digging through the drawers, he saw only useless junk. The undergarments were places where little trinkets would be kept. He assumed that his general enmity caused him to hide his precious things.
He was right. Through the hoards of crumpled shirts and pants, there was a large bottle of wine, dated France, 1799. Cologne, also from France, several pocket watches, a large wad of money, and a few small Victorian portraits all found their way into the sack.
He paused. A small picture frame featuring the photo of a family, all of them smiling. He recognized Charles' shy face at once. It was surrounded by laughing children, and a smiling Callonblots.
"Aww... what a quaint photo." he said.
"Oh - but a what a beautiful frame!" He tore the image out and threw it on the floor.
"Done?" asked Leland, on his hands and knees, madly scrubbing blood out of the wooden floors.
"Yes...I didn't manage to find much, but the things could probably earn some money at a pawn shop. Did you find anything that tickled your fancy?"
"Booze mostly. C'mon we better leave, we're losin' time. If a neighbor gets suspicious the police will be here like moths to the fire. Little help?" he asked motioning towards the carcass.
"How do you expect to get that into the car?"
"I've already taken care of that. We're department store gophers on a package errand."
"A package that looks like there's a dead body in it."
"Look it was short notice! Anyway, I smuggled these from Norrington's. He tossed him one faded blue cap.
Heaving the body up they tramped backwards out the door. Rain continued to pour, every drop sounding like a cinderblock on the leather. The bottom of the sack dripped with blood. Luck was with them. The fluid was being washed away almost immediately as it touched the ground.
"I heard the whole thing." said Leland.
"Anybody ever tell you you're a bloody bad actor?"
"I won't gratify that with a retort."
At last, the monster stairs were persevered. The body was thrown into the back of the car. Leland wiped the beads of sweat from his head, and bid him farewell.
It was almost too easy! Police would not investigate for at least a day, perhaps more because of the hermit lifestyle of Earl.
As soon as Cedric entered the room, he was flooded with questions. However, he had one question himself.
"What did you do with Finn?"