Ichabod Crowley - series 1 Life and Legacy

Chapter 11

15 years ago

Ichabod stared at the old house, a dilapidated old cottage covered in rot and spider-webs. Even ugly as it was, he couldn't hold back a whiff of nostalgia, or, at the very least, imagination as he moved towards the front door.

"Must've been something when it was new," he muttered to himself.

A nervous tremor shook his hand as he reached out for the doorbell and he quietly berated himself for it. Looking into the picture window on the door as the musical chime played, he quickly removed his hat and did the best he could to fix his hair. After a minute or two he pressed the door bell again and listened to the calming musical notes while a shadow appeared inside the house.

"Hold on!" she shouted back at him with a thick Yorkshire accent, "You'll break the damn thing you keep jabbin' at it."

She came to the door and opened it, a sneer painted across her weathered and wrinkled face, not that he noticed, all Ichabod could think was that she had his mother's blue eyes, and, for a moment, he couldn't say anything at all.

"Well what the Hell do you want?" she snapped, looking over his formal dress, "You the tax man, or a preacher?"

"U-uh, no, no ma'am, I'm sorry," he coughed, trying desperately to regain some composure, "I, um, I'm, well, my name is Ichabod Crowley, I'm your grandson."

"Oh," she nodded, running a disturbingly red tongue over the rim of her half rotten teeth, "Crowley, and I take it that Phillip didn't just have a boy and never told me?"

"Uh, no," Ichabod said cautiously, "I'm related through, um, through your daughter, Rosamund?"

"Rosamund," she rolled the name around in her mouth like a curse word, "And I suppose you'll be wanting pictures or something, tea, a chat?"

"I'm good with either," he shrugged uncomfortably.

"Hmm," she tapped a finger against the door frame, then stepped back to let him in, "You're lucky then, I was just goin' over the old photo albums."

Ichabod gave a warm and genuine smile, following her in while she continued to stare at him with that same sour expression.

"Wipe your feet," she ordered, turning away and moving to the kitchen, "And don't sit on anything."

Ichabod did as he was told, and found the interior, if anything, far more depressing than the outside, though, much cleaner. There were a fair few pictures on the wall, many faded from time and dust, while others had scorch marks on them.

"Was there a fire?" Ichabod wondered aloud.

"A few years back, after my husband died," she responded, "Oil lamp."

Nodding to that, Ichabod continued studying the room and finding a photo album open on the coffee table. He riffled through the pages and finally felt his whimsy start to dissipate, as many of the photos had been defaced with a black marker, the most recent being a full-face portrait with a series of black lines just barely showing a familiar Celtic Cross necklace.