Shadows

1. Long Shadows

He arrived at the country house at five in the evening. It was near the edge of the scenic cliffs which gave it a ethereal view, and was a classic wooden cabin you would expect to find in the lush green moores of the Yorkshire. It overlooked a barn and stables which housed four horses. It was a prosperous old farmer and his wife who lived in these peaceful holdings. They had a dozen workers who laboured for the farm, and did get fairly paid for it. All in all, it was quite an uneventful setting. but trouble brewed close when the old man neared death, and decided to sell his estate rather than pass it on to his deranged brother, who had been distanced quite early in their lives due to their differences of opinion. The old man himself had inherited the property from his father, and had refused to share any of it as per his father's wishes. the conflict had resulted in the split between brothers which lasted for a solid thirty five years, and each hadn't heard from the other since then.

The old man was notorious for having a flashy and expensive disposition. Him growing old had been quite a public event, with all the rival farmers in the surrounding areas smelling the blood in the water. The vultures circled low overhead, forcing the proud farmer to take measures to protect his land after his death. Even in this ripened age, he detested his brother and wanted to prevent the land from passing on to him, as it would after his death, as he was the only living family. He didn't trust his wife with the land, being sure that it would become a part of her family's properties in no time. This left the farmer with no choice but to sell it off.

He had called upon the first buyer that had come on his doorstep, a man of thirty-odd years, who, the farmer had found out, was his cousin twice removed. This seemed the best option to finally rest the fiery cravings of his ego, as this way the land would still stay in the family, but without passing into his brother's hands. That buyer now stood on his doorstep, brooding over the green surroundings.

"You must be Mr. Cassings! Welcome to our humble stay." Their was an edge of challenging pride to the farmer's booming voice, as if daring him to call out any flaws. The buyer was to stay for the night, as the lawyer was to come the following morning to look into the paperwork.

The formalities and dinner were had over a rich spread of game, which was cooked deliciously. The farmer being the loud mouth he was, immediately began boasting over his third glass of ale.

"Not an inch he got,  Ha! Not one blithering inch! He played his most desperate card at the end, trying to convince ma' old man, but I had done the magic already, hadn't I. The will was already written, he never got to even read it, my poor brother." He laughed a heartily, enjoying the recollection after a long time. Dinner went long into the night, with both men drinking generously, growing redder and redder in the face.

"I imagine he's dead by now, I ain't never heard his name aroun' here." The sense of lightness in his tone further confirmed his purple sanity.

It was all a very festive affair, with the tales getting long, and the shadows growing longer. The night wore darker, and stars shyly peeked from behind dense clouds. When they finally retired for the night, it had started raining softly outside. 

As the clock struck midnight, a shadow fell across the front yard which was lit by an exclusive yellow bulb, which hung from a nearby low branch of a dried up tree. The hay was glistening with the drops of the rain. The horses in the stables shifted around nervously, sensing the oncoming storm.  The rain had made the moores very slippery all around the house, right up to the cliffs. The shadow belonged to a masked figure, who held a long and rusted fire poker in his hands.

The farmer and his wife were woken up after mere minutes of them turning in that night. The door to their room lay down shattered in two powerful strikes from the masked figure. The farmer quickly made a grab for the gun which usually rested  on his bedside. In sheer terror, he realized that the gun was still by the dinner table, where it had been taken to be show the buyer the fine vintage piece, when the buyer had somehow turned to be a vintage firearms collector. He had seemed terribly impressed by the artifact. 

"Look here mister, you shall do us no harm, or you shall suffer!" The threat seemed bland, but the rich tone of the old farmer made the stranger hesitate.

"I know you have been sent by that upstart brother of mine, who gods forbid, is still alive apparently. But begone! I will pay you double the price he has offered you, and you shall  instead go finish him, once and for all. Name your price!"

"My price?" The voice seemed vaguely familiar. He let the the hand carrying the weapon go limp on his side, though he still held on to it. "You will give me the double of it, will you?" There was an coldly humorous tone to his voice, something not quite right about the way he said it, nor did the inexplicable smile on his face seem right. He seemed to be enjoying some unsaid joke.

But the farmer was too relieved to notice this, he thought he had scored the victory.

"Yes", his eyes had a mad shine as he talked,"the double of what he gave you!"

All this while, he had hoped that Mr. Cassings, who had probably heard all the commotion, would be smart enough to get help. He wasn't disappointed when he dared to look across the barn through the broken down door of his room. The outhouse door was open, and he could make out a light shining there.

"Very well, I will name my price now.", the stranger said, as the clouds outside finally burst open completely, and rain struck down so hard it made the whole cabin shudder.

"He gave me the most precious gift anyone could ever give anyone."

                                                                                 ****************  

The next day, the sun shined triumphantly in the clear blue sky, which had been cleaned out by last night's storm. That morning, the locals discovered two bodies down by the cliff. The farmer and his wife had been found dead by the legs of the tall cliffs.

A cattle grazer claimed he had seen them going out for a morning stroll by the cliffs while taking his sheep , which clearly hadn't gone well for them, as they had slipped off the treacherous landscape which was a result of the previous night's showers. The very next day, the cattle grazer had claimed to have inherited a huge fortune from some distant relative and moved out to the nearest town.

As for the property of the farmer, it had legally passed on to his brother, who was a man of his late fifties now. His family, consisting only of his son, who was a man of thirty-odd years and an old but gracious wife, moved to the farmhouse two weeks later. The mother was a wise old dame who had stood by her husband's side through thick and thin. The son was devoted to his aged father. 

The buyer who had come that day was never heard of by anyone after that day, as the select few who had known about his arrival had forgotten about it in the course of events. The old man's brother who moved there had some resistance from the farm workers at his arrival, seeing that he had shed the family name of the Pendoltons, and had taken on a new name. This was short-lived as the workers seemed overjoyed to work for a better pay. 

Stories about how the farmer was cruel and unjust spread like wildfire soon after his death. No one looked very deep into these deaths, because no one seemed to have a particular affinity towards the old couple. The Shirefolk seemed more than happy to welcome their new neighbors, the Cassings.