Thomas Brantley was sitting at his
desk, looking for a piece of paper. Great, he thought, which
desk did I leave it on now? It
could have been anywhere, anywhere between one side of the town and
the other. Just when he was about to worry more, the door opened.
“Alice!
Nice to see you again.” He got up, walking towards her.
“Likewise,
hopefully I wasn't intterupting something.” she looked at the desk,
paper littering every corner.
“No,
no- I needed a distraction. So, you're here for the job?”
“Yes,
wasn't this when I was supposed to be here?”
“Yes,
right on time. I'll show you to where you'll be working, what you'll
be doing...” he led her to another room. “Here we are- you'll be
typing things here, here's your desk, and- Where's James... James?”
he called, and a boy around seventeen opened another door from what
looked like a closet.
“Here
Mr. Brantley, is this...”
“Alice
Ivring. Alice, this is James Parker. He's an apprentice, he usually
operates the printing press, and will be your assistant.”
“Nice
to meet you, James.” she extended her hand, and he shook it.
“You
too, Ms. Ivring.” he nodded, smiling.
“Now,
today-” Thomas was interrupted by the obnoxious ringing of a
telephone in the other room. “Sorry- I'll have to get that- tell
Alice what she'll be working on.” he left into the other room and
shut the door behind him. James cleared his throat and spoke.
“Recently
The Hooded One has been at it again, got some spices, usual stuff...
Except for this time there's been a sighting, so, kind of a big
deal.”
“The
Hooded One?” Alice asked, puzzled.
“Oh,
you don't know- Sorry.” James, walked up to a table and grabed an
article and handed it to her. “The Hooded One. He- well, it could
be a she, but we don't know- He's some person who wears a cloak and a
dark hood that takes things. Things like food, clothing, furniture,
that kind of stuff. For the last fifty years this person has been
showing up in the dead of night to take these things and in return
leaves gold.”
“Gold?”
Alice asked, intregued.
“Yes-
or other things of value, he leaves all kinds of gems and precious
metals, jewlery, in return for items that are usually worth much
less. The problem is, he sometimes takes things that are scarse, hard
to find at the time, or takes things so often from people's homes
that it becomes a real nuissance, no matter how valuble the items are
in return. This happens quite frequently, it has been since it
started around fifty or sixty years ago, but no one ever sees him- or
her- or even them, it could be multiple people, we don't know. Even
though people report him taking things about once, twice a week or
once every two weeks, it really depends on the season, we usually
only get sightings every couple of months. All they see is someone
running from the scene in a black cloak with a hood shading their
face. They don't even run very fast- just stealthilly enough to not
get caught. They almost did a couple times, but got away.”
“Wow-
And you say they saw him-or her- running off with some spices?”
Alice looked at the article in her hand, looking at the latest
reports of theft by 'The Hooded One'.
“Yeah,
we finally got some imported again and he runs off with about a third
of it. Spices, peppers, tea- All kinds of stuff.”
Yes, just a short selection of something I was writing... I better get to sleep, PEACE AND LOVE, PEACE AND LOVE, AND I AM NOW 5177 DAYS OLD!!! =D
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