Third Try w/POV and one of the MC's name change:

I hobbled painfully to the door and opened it for my lawyer. He looked so young, so fresh. For a split second I was tempted to flame him right there and inhale his soul, but restrained myself as I had so many times for the last fifty years.

“Mr. Brittania? Aloysius Brittania? I’m Tim Reston from Abernathy, Wilson & Trumbull.” I waved him in and pointed to a chair.

“Sit down. Timmy isn’t it?” He sat down on my ratty old chair. All my chairs were ratty. I was fed up taking this human form, but I was also sick and tired of the croven body that lurked within. Both were pretty much worn out. I was ready to move on after twelve hundred years on this old Earth.

Second Try:
The elderly man painfully lowered himself down into the chair opposite Reston’s. His thin blue-veined hands opened a box sitting on an old maple coffee table to reveal a four-inch high jade frog. “This is for you.”

“I’m just your lawyer." Reston said, leaning over and getting an odd shock when he touched the figurine.

“No, Mr. Norwood. You are more than my lawyer. You are my protector. You are going to make sure my desire to be cremated is carried out.” A fit of coughing racked his frail body. “I purposely didn’t mention this box in my will and it’s vital to you and to me, its existence is kept secret.”

First Try:

Reston didn’t see a doorbell and thought twice about knocking on the dirty splintered wood of the front door. He didn’t have to think again as the knob turned and it opened revealing the hunched over Aloysius Britannia. His scraggly white hair hung to his shoulders. “Come in, Come in, Mr. Norwood.” The old man beckoned him in with a frail, blue-veined hand.

Reston was starting to regret taking Mr. Britannia on as a client, but the firm hadn't given him an option. He sat down in the proffered chair.

The old man painfully lowered himself into his chair. He opened a box sitting on an old maple coffee table revealing a four-inch high jade frog. “This frog will light your way to riches or death or both.”

[This message has been edited by Owasm (edited June 21, 2009).]

“Come in, Come in, Mr. Norwood.” Don't need the caps on the second C.

So why does Reston regret taking the guy on as a client? All we have so far is he's old and might be having a tough time keeping up with his chores.

Using "old" to describe both the man and the coffee table in the last paragraph is probably one too many.

I think this is an opening we've seen lots of before, where the MC meets an old person with a fantastic object. I think you need to make the character of AB more interesting to have a real hook here.

Good luck with it.

Update: New version is up... the Second Try. I tried to lower the drama and raise the stakes.

I'll agree with Snapper, the third attempt looks nice. Voice is strong and the hook is there. The only real nit I'll pick is the word "croven". It is a description (in which case, I couldn't find a defintion of the word) or is it a type of creature?

In the opening, I'd say that "hobbled" does enough work to signify his age. Hobbling is almost always painful unless his legs are tied or something.

The dialogue *to me* would sound better if it started off with "Mr Aloysius Brittania?..." It seemed odd to repeat his surname, though that might just be me.

You could probably cut "pretty much" and still retain the meaning.

Anyway, send it through.

Nick