Episode 20: Dark Green Eyes

“You don’t look like your father.”

Conrad, more well known as “Connor,” has heard of that quite a lot of times to the point that he gave up count. He himself often wondered if he wasn’t actually related to his father. It was not just the disparity between their physical appearances but how he has left his mother and his three sisters the same way he has abandoned his previous two wives and their daughters. But he remember his father being especially fond of him because he was the only son, encouraging him to take over the meat business. When he heard him recite the benefits of the vocation as he chopped mutton, he thought but didn’t dare speak out his sardonic remark, ‘Yeah, right.’

 

Unlike his blond, stocky father, he had dark chestnut brown hair that often looked like jet black in gloomy days. His skin was so pale that his father drunkenly and soberly demeaned as “sickly,” but later became a “fashionable” trait that couldn’t be imitated through talc or lead. But what really distinguished him from his cold, squinty eyed father were his large, idyllic eyes that shone like green glass when reflected in sunlight. He used to hate his dark eyes because he thought they made his already translucent skin look ghostly. But he later learned that his eyes made people, especially women, to just assume that he had an untainted innocence and magnetic sensibility, traits that were not within his capacity to possess. And over his past two years as a butcher helping his mother, he has grown into a lad at the height of his health and charms.

The one who has brought news of his father that his family is eternally bereaved of was a stranger. It wasn’t the news of her husband’s death but rather the stranger’s title that shocked his mother to an extent that she almost dropped her tea. He didn’t bother to take heed of the stranger’s social station, thinking that all the bluff was cheap buffoonery. The stranger cordially introduced himself as the future magistrate of Fullgreens who will take his office as soon as Connor takes his father’s place.

When his mother sat him down in their small but charmingly polished dining room, the stranger glanced at Connor, complimenting, “What a fine lad you are. I am sure your father must be proud to leave behind such splendid legacy.” At this, Connor slightly smiled but he couldn’t shake off his sense of discomfort at how the magistrate seemed to scrutinize him like a piece of ruby lamb chop on a scale.

He had a refined way of speaking but he looked more like a scholar with his silver spectacles and slightly nervous looking long hands than a mayor. Also, Connor could tell that he was not a native New Englander but he clearly wasn’t British either. He spoke English with a strangely thickly accent, making his words sound choppy but breathy at the same time–anxious and drawling.

“Now, Mr–”

“Connor. Just call me Connor” he replied, adding a belated “please” at the look of his mother’s look of reproof and consternation at his informality. However, the magistrate himself didn’t look so ruffled, instead he seemed to delight in his lack of social graces.

“Connor, you have completely understood your father’s will?”

“Yes, sir,” he answered, looking at the relief washing over his mother’s face. To her, he was always her little boy who she worried would commit a social blunder that earns him a smug look of recognition as an “upstart.”

“But I am not just here to inform you of his dying wish to have you inherit his business in Fullgreens. I am afraid I bear far more egregious news. It is not news, per say, but rather a very probable scenario…that somebody in Fullgreens has orchestrated your father’s death.”

It took a moment of pause for his words to deliver its expected register upon the two people. Wondering if he misheard the magistrates’s words, Connor frowned and asked,

“Pardon, sir, but can you say it again?”

Looking both tentative and apologetic, the magistrate combed back his long dark hair back over his head and raised his spectacles with his gloved hand.

“I believe that your father’s death by wolves wasn’t an accident. There is even proof that your father had an idea of the person who murdered him. It is not uncommon for those who on the brink of death decide to leave cryptic notes about the culprit’s identity.”

“I…don’t understand,” Connor said, “he…I mean, my father, he is too blunt for that. If he was really killed and if he knew who the killer was, he would just call him out on the spot. He wouldn’t do something like that. He’s too–”

“Connor,” his mother reprimanded him and soon made a soft, wheedling smile to the magistrate, “My dear sir, even if my son can be a bit too…frank, there is some truth. My deceased husband…he wasn’t exactly the most subtle man.”

“Of his character, I am also enlightened, but do believe me when I say this, I do not speak out of idle speculation. The people who were at his deathbed were a priest and the village clerk. When they asked if he had any dying wish, he asked them to send a special item to a certain lady through package.”

“A…woman?” The look of bewilderment evolved into a wry smile in his face, “Ever the romantic, isn’t he, mother.”

But his mother kept her thin lips in a tight line, waiting for her guest to continue.

“Well, Connor, I do believe that in contrary, your father harbored deep animosity toward the mentioned lady. His testimony was that he was looking for his cow Martha the ill fated night.”

Connor couldn’t barely contain his scoff. Of course, his father went off in the dark woodlands in pursuit of his one and only dear muse, Martha, the cow. He couldn’t get over her over his own dead body, was what he thought.

“In his death bed, he took out a collar,” the magistrate took a piece of folded paper from the inside of his coat and unfurled it on the table, “Do you recognize this?”

Connor and his mother both bent to look at the detailed sketch of a collar with a star engraved bell. The person who sketched the collar didn’t forget to mention the collar having red, blue, and white stripes.

In short, the magistrate told him that it is probable that his father sent the collar of his lost cow, the cause of his self destructive excursion, to someone implicated in his death–the woman working as an apprentice in a rather popular apothecary.

“But how can I tell her right away?”

“Oh, Connor. You will. You will know right away” the magistrate nodded.

So there he was, standing in the stall his father had erected in this village that looked like a haven from colonial oppression and war between the settlers and Indians, wearing an apron and holding the butcher’s knife his father used. The memory of the magistrate’s last words before he left passed in his mind like a glinting edge of a knife sawing through red pulpy flesh.

“I shall follow you shortly after you settle in your rightful place. It is my duty to investigate the matters of your father, so I do request your patience. I do understand how much you must grieve for him. But to see not just ‘if,’ but ‘how’ this frail she-dwarf became a murderess takes someone like you.”

“What do you need me for?” Connor’s question deterred the man who placed his hand on his cap to momentarily halt. He made a smile that had an uncanny effect of changing his entire features–he looked too proper and soft at first, but a look of slyness transformed his eyes and shape of his mouth in a way that kept him aback. The transition was like a light blue sky clad with pink wisps to a precariously short-timed dusk that promises un-perishable light–he looked deceptive and cruel.

“Please do anything, anything that could provide crucial evidence of her crime and possibly her superior’s guilt. That is all I have to say.”

Feeling a slight shudder at the memory of his contemptuous smirk, he had an inkling of worry about whether the magistrate will hold his attitude against him once he grabs power in this village. But first thing’s first. He wanted to show his family that he was old and “man” enough to avenge his father–a genuine bugger, but still his father.

When he arrived at the town, he right away tried to find her.

‘I want to find her without attracting anyone’s unnecessary attention,’ he thought.

And luckily he was able to see her right away from about six yards away–she was wandering the periphery of the flea market, a village attraction to peddlers, merchants, hunters, or local farmers. He never saw an Orient in his life, so at first he found himself just staring at her. His friends back at home used to mock how the so-called ‘beasts’ and ‘dwarves’ looked by pulling back their eyes into beady slits and push back their nose. He never participated–not because he believed in equality, but he thought that was all “make-belief.” And to be honest, she didn’t look like that. Indeed, he never seen eyes shaped like hers and her hair was a lot darker than his if that was ever possible, her body looking even tinier because of her petite shape.

Despite her calm impression, her shuffling feet and maintained distance from stalls and hungry but guarded eyes betrayed her–her nervousness shined through and he hated it when girls bowed their heads or acted timid like that. It reminded him of his mother when his father still lived with them.

‘She looks like…she is holding something.’ he noticed a rather unnatural bulge underneath her bodice, ‘a wallet? bundle of clothes?’ he wondered at what she could be holding so dear next to her heart–his posture reminded him of his youngest older sister Caroline who always carried her doll.

‘What is she looking at anyways? Probably something like velvet. If she is going to be that nervous, she might just leave and ask her superior for a favor,’ his mood was sour and generally apathetic ever since he came here. Everything in the town seemed to haunt him with the question, ‘So he left us for this, for this?‘

He turned his view from her to the object of her intent focus– a merchant wearing a grey cap and a dark brown vest and boots, smoking a pipe, was sitting crouched in front of six rectangular cages full of rabbits, varying in size and color.

Connor opened his mouth slightly, his large dark olive green eyes reflecting a knowing, studying look, ‘Aww, so she is that type huh? Feeling endeared to animals that provide meat and fur–calling them pets. I’ll see how long they’ll keep those ‘pets.’ Probably not long enough once they want new mittens.’

He decided to just watch for now, just observe her character–is she dependent on those who will come to resolve her social ineptitude around people, will she be unexpectedly pushy? She didn’t realize him standing right next to her, observing her from the corner of his eye–her entire attention and being seemed transfixed to a singular target–a dark beige spotted black rabbit with long drooping ears that occupied a cage that was at the far left. While other three or four rabbits sniffed their noses and frantically pattered about in a cage, this one just laid down in its own cage, its paws buried under its fur, as if it was asleep. She didn’t pay attention to the prettier ones with silky fur and large pleading eyes–she chose to look at the big, ugly, and lethargic creature that lacked energy to even chew at the cage door in protest. It looked like it gave up and relinquished its fate to whomever will drop the copper on the merchant’s palm.

Thinking that Connor might be interested to purchase, the merchant stood up and refastened his belt,

“You got a good eye. This boy is a rare breed. He’s old for a wild rabbit, but he’ll make a fine accessory. Winter comes fast here, you know.”

Then he heard large sounds of barking and before he can really do anything, the woman, who looked too young to be called a ‘woman,’ dashed away from his side. He stared at the direction she was leaving but regained his interest in the particular rabbit she was looking at.

‘Even if she loses interest in this thing…I can still sell it, and if not, I’ll make rabbit stew.’

Soon he came back home with the cage in his arms, not caring if he is attracting odd glances. He opened the shed that was behind his butcher stall where he would store his commodities as the town’s salt supplier and pushed the cage in with the sole of his feet. Before he left his shed, he tossed some alfaalfa and dandelion leaves and placed a small dish of water in the cage, but the rabbit didn’t even flinch or make any sign of interest. The sniffling nose and shuddering lashes and whiskers were the only indication of life.

He came out of the shed and went in front of his stall, and in a few minutes, a couple of young people his age approached him, briefly giving him their condolences before introducing themselves in high spirit. Then the couple of young people became five and the number became larger as he was relatively an easy person to be with in a youthful crowd. His looks and smile that let people drop their guard and suspicions gave him easy access in such moments.

He was talking with a girl who was especially keen on figuring out who he was, but then out of the corner of his eye, he saw the woman-girl, as he liked to put it, actually standing about three yards away, staring at him.

‘I shouldn’t miss this chance! It’s perfect. I must make an indelible impression,’ the ephiphany shot through him like electricity and he assumed his most becoming smile and raised his hand, motioning her lightheartedly to approach him.

As he expected, she looked startled, not knowing exactly how to react. What he didn’t expect was her flight from the scene, shooting him a look as if he was a ghoul or a Royalist or a Continental.

The fact that he assumed with smug satisfaction that the ugly woman should be flattered crushed him like a heap of boulders as much as her refusal to join his company.

‘I mean, even if she doesn’t fancy my sort, she should, she should…at least want to enjoy the attention, right?’

But no matter how he tried to bring clarity to the situation, he couldn’t avoid the hard cold truth–she said ‘no’ in the most blatant way possible.

Mortified, he couldn’t close his mouth and the embarrassment caused him to feel a sharp pang of rejection that he hasn’t felt in a long time since he grew tall and his shoulders became developed