SCENE 5
The Headless Horseman!
(Later in the evening. A sitting room. Baltus, the Reverend, Notary, Magistrate and Doctor and their wives are there. Ichabod enters.)
Ichabod: Hello.
Baltus: Oh, it's you again. Come in. (To women) Piss off, the lot of you.
(Women exit)
Ichabod: So.
Baltus: So.
Ichabod: So.
Baltus: You can stop saying so now, you know.
Ichabod: You're a poet and you didn't know it. (laughs to himself) Anyway. Three murders.
Magistrate: Yes, we worked that out ourselves.
Ichabod: Shut it, fatty. ANYWAY, three murders. The old geezer Van Garrett. Then his son. Both of them found...decapitatitated.
Reverend: Is that a word?
Ichabod: SHHHH. A week later, the Widow Winshlip. Also found...decapitatitated.
Notary: I'm pretty sure it's not, you know.
Ichabod: Hey, I'm trying to tell a story here!
Notary: Sorry.
Ichabod: Their heads were found severed from their bodies...
Reverend: Their heads were not found severed.
Ichabod: So why the bloody hell am I here then?
Reverend: Their heads were not found at all.
(Ichabod makes a face)
Ichabod: Well, I have to ask this. Is anyone suspected?
Baltus: What the hell do you mean?
Ichabod: Well, sir, usually when there's a murder, someone has committed it. Is anyone suspected of doing this?
Doctor: The murderer is not a man of flesh and blood.
Ichabod: Whah...?
Baltus: Have you ever heard of the Headless Horseman?
Ichabod: Nope.
Baltus: Well then, shut up and listen!
Ichabod: If you're going to be like that...
Baltus: About twenty years ago, war raged in Sleepy Hollow. Mercenaries came from...where again?
Notary: Dunno. Germany?
Baltus: Germany it is. Anyway, one of them didn't come to sort out the war. He came to take part in it.
Ichabod: As you do in a war...
Baltus: Shuddup. Wherever there was battle, you'd find him there, chopping off people's heads. Now, the soldiers didn't lie this. A year later, this butcher finally met his end in the Western Woods. His horse fell and broke its leg. With soldiers chasing after him, the Horseman ran. Yet the soldiers caught up with him, and chopped off his head.
Ichabod: Hypocrites.
Baltus: Yet now, his ghost rises again.
Ichabod: Ugh. Gross. Anyway, somehow I think your ghost story is a little...childish.
Baltus: Whatever. Don't say we told you so.
Reverend: I hear you bring scientific ideas and instruments with you?
Ichabod: That's right.
Reverend: Well, I think you should just trust in God. Read this.
(He hands Ichabod a bible and Ichabod looks disgusted.)
Ichabod: No thanks.
Reverend: It's not an option. Read it.
Ichabod: Ooh. Touchy.