The tipstaff

When I read the entrepreneur died,

I thought of the tall bluff man with a moustache, face reddened by the sun.

He said he hadn’t been to the City before.

He took his Akubra off before the judge.

I led him to the witness box, and swore him in.

His hands were big and blunt. Round and round, he wrung that hat.

“They owe me twenty thousand,” said the big man.

The hat was a life preserver in rough seas, the way he held it.
“That’s a lot for a man like me. They never paid for the stuff they bought.”

His eyes shone, but his spine was straight. “We haven’t recovered still.”

Later, the entrepreneur scoffed at the debts he’d owed.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked the judge.

Decades on,

I read the glowing obituaries for the entrepreneur.

The hat turned in the farmer’s hands, still.