Free The Black Book of Secrets by F E Higgins

around
his head.
    ‘If you know this,’ asked the youngest tremulously, ‘how
come he’s not in jail with all the other murderers?’
    His brothers poured scorn on this ridiculous suggestion.
    ‘There’s no proof, stupid. You can’t put a man in prison
without proof.’
    ‘And the proof is in the pies,’ said the other. ‘By the time
the murder is discovered, it’s too late.’
    ‘Yeah, cos they’ve been eaten!’ shrieked the pair in
unison.
    As for Horatio Cleaver, the subject of this slander, as
soon as he saw their wet noses against the window he roared
at them and ran to the door and shook his knives violently
in their direction.
    ‘Get your filthy noses off my p-p-panes,’ he shouted.
    The trio ran away screaming and laughing, tripping and
skidding down the icy hill with their arms flailing.
    Ludlow and Joe arrived just in time to see the Sourdough
boys disappearing in the distance. Horatio was still
standing at the door of his shop, his fists clenched, when he
noticed them. They were a strange sight. Joe stood out
from the crowd and not only on account of his unusual
height. He strode with a confidence, despite his limp, that
was both disarming and enviable. Even people who had
lived in the village all their lives could not negotiate the
steep icy slope with such ease. Ludlow was always a fewsteps behind, no higher than Joe’s elbow, trotting to keep
up.
    Horatio quickly slipped back inside behind the counter.
Joe stood for some moments looking in the window, eyeing
the butcher’s wares. Today he had for sale a selection of
‘Prok Peyes’, a ‘Brayse of Fessants’, best ‘Lam Clutets’ and
‘Hole Pukled Chikins’. Horatio had not often seen the
inside of a schoolhouse.
    ‘I won’t be long,’ said Joe, and he went in, leaving
Ludlow outside, where he stood and watched.

    As a butcher, Horatio Cleaver was far from the best, but he
was the only one the village had so people made do. His
father, Stanton Cleaver, had been renowned near and far for
his meat-carving skills and was remembered fondly by all
his customers. He could butcher a whole cow, head to tail,
in under three minutes, a feat he performed annually to
wild applause at the county fair. Who could forget the sight
of Stanton holding up the Butcher’s Cup to deafening
cheers, his white apron sodden with blood and his hands
stained pink?
    Horatio certainly couldn’t and, unfortunately, he wasnever likely to take his father’s place on that stand. He was
reminded of this fact every day when he heard the disappointed
sighs of his customers and the ‘tut-tuts’ as he
hacked at their joints and their chops. But they always
took the rather roughly hewn cuts of meat he handed
them, for if they got more than they asked for, they certainly
paid less than it was worth. Horatio had never been
good with numbers and the complex relationship between
weight and price was one he hadn’t quite managed to
grasp.
    And if it wasn’t the customers sending him scornful
looks it was Stanton himself, for painted on the wall
behind the counter was a life-size portrait of the man complete
with a boning knife in his hand and a sneer on his
face. Horatio could feel his eyes boring into the back of
his head and he grew nervous and stammered – a legacy
of his time serving his father. It was only on his p’s, however,
and most noticeable when he was nervous or his
temper was roused.
    Stanton was not an easy man to forget. Despite the fact
that he had been in the grave nearly five years, he had a long
reach. Late at night Horatio would wake, gasping for breath
as if the master butcher’s hands were around his neck,suffocating him. Horatio had not had a happy apprenticeship
and his father had often been driven to violence by his
son’s poor butchering skills.
    Horatio had started in the shop as soon as he could
reach the counter and over the years the young butcher had
begun to take on the appearance of the meat with which
he worked all day. He had