New Beginning 1056

Corbin Jones let the back door slam shut as he made his way into the servant’s kitchen of the vast Stately Stately House. “Mornin’ ladies” he called to the two women seated at the table.

Maid Helen grunted at him. “How many times have I told you not to slam that door? It’s bad form!” She sipped her breakfast tea.

“Now, luv, don’t be so hard on him,” said Cook Millie. “He’s just a boy.”

“Boy or not, he needn’t be going around, slamming doors.” Maid Helen snapped her newspaper open.

“Um, Miss Cook?” began Corbin timidly. “Could I maybe have a cuppa?”

“Of course. Help yourself.”

“Thanks. It’s mighty cold out in the stables today.” He let the steam roll over his face. “Oh, by the way, Miss Helen, Lord Stanhope’s body is still in the library.”

“What?” she shouted, dropping her paper with a bit more force than needed. “Lord Luvaduck, those damned Yanks never clean up after themselves!”

“You’d think a murder writer would be more careful with his characters,” sighed Cook Millie.

“Bloody Yanks,” snarled Maid Helen. “Well, I’m not going to clean this one up. He can rot there for all I care.”

And rot it did, along with many many others. The Stately Stately House strike of 2016 was a gruesome, gruesome scene. Bodies on top of bodies piled on top of bodies hacked, slashed, shot, poisoned and punctured by wild, imaginative means, until the Stately Stately House was in danger of becoming the writer in residence’s worst nightmare – a clichéd cliché! 
The background characters held fast to their demands of being brought to the fore. But alas, the strike was broken when the brilliant, brilliant writers of Stately Stately House killed off the striking labor with ropes and revolvers, knives and wrenches, lead pipes and candlesticks. Then the brilliant, brilliant writers created newer more eager background characters to clean up the mess and return Stately Stately house to its magnificent magnificence. 


Opening: Khazar-khum.....Continuation: JSF