The Quiet Man

The following is a short work that I thought up whilst sipping coffee in a café the other day. It's really just a writing exercise, designed to evoke as much as possible with as few words as possible, and much of it through negatives. Do let me know what you think...


The Quiet Man

The man in the black coat sat in the coffee shop, sipping his tea and reading a newspaper. Every so often he flicked a glance out of the window to the bookshop across the street. Eventually a lady in a red coat left the bookshop, and the man stood, tucked his newspaper under his arm and left.

He followed the lady down the street, slowly closing the distance between them. When she turned into a quiet side street, the man in the black coat followed and walked briskly up behind her, then slid a thin knife into her back between the third and fourth vertebrae. The blade went in and out so quickly that there was no blood.

The lady gasped once and stumbled, but the man in the black coat caught her neatly under the arms and eased her down onto a nearby bench. As her eyes fluttered and closed, he placed the newspaper on her lap, turned, and walked back to the bookshop.

He spent a pleasant half-hour there, browsing the classics and fiction sections before choosing a novel by an author he hadn't read before. He paid for the book, making sure to smile at the bookseller as he did so, then caught the next bus home.

The house was still and dark as he entered and perfectly neat. Everything was meticulously dusted and carefully squared away as though placed with a ruler. There were no pictures on the walls. There were no messages on the answering machine. The only letters lying in the hall were bills.

He replaced the food in the cat's bowl and gave it fresh water, then he made a cup of tea and settled into his favourite armchair with the new book, reading until it became dark outside. At 9pm he picked up the telephone and dialled a number from memory. The answering machine on the other end beeped without preamble.

"It's done." he said, then hung up.

The cat slipped back into the house half an hour later. The man smiled and called to it, patting his lap in invitation. It ignored him, ate its food, drank its water and then left again. Half an hour after that, the man set aside the book and rose. He checked the answering machine again even though be had not heard the phone ring. There were still no messages.

He ate a grilled cheese sandwich for dinner, chewing slowly in the silence of the kitchen. Then he went upstairs and brushed his teeth. He did not look at the mirror. Then he changed into grey flannel pyjamas, switched off the light and got into bed. He did not sleep.