The Blue Last (32 page)

Jury was quiet, waiting for her to go on. That she needed to talk was painfully obvious. It must be like a punishment, the tragedy you couldn't talk about.

Liza leaned closer and said, “I'm worried about him, Richard. That must sound ridiculous—of course I'd be worried—but I mean the toll this is taking on him emotionally.”

“But, of course—”

She raised her hand, palm out, as if to push away some easy comfort. “I know what you're going to say: it's natural he'd be having emotional swings, but he's become so involved with this case—it wasn't even a case when it started, just identifying old bones. And then the murder of this Croft and now it
is
a case.” Her hand went up to her mouth, to cover it, to try to keep from crying. She took a deep breath and went on. “The thing is, Mickey can't seem to focus on anything else. What is it about this damned case, Richard? Now, of course, it's in the City, and the City means Mickey.

It's devastating to find him mentally elsewhere all of the time, all of the time elsewhere, knowing that in a little while he won't be anywhere. When I think of a world without Mickey in it—” She stopped. Her fisted hand was over her mouth, denial shaking her head from side to side, sending the tears flying instead of falling.

“Liza, listen. I think I can answer your question. This case, he needs it; he needs to be engulfed by it; he needs something larger than life. It isn't just this case. It could have been any case. When I talked to him in his office he needed a case that would make him think because he didn't want to think about himself.”

“He's taking the case so personally, though.”

“His father was a good friend of Francis Croft. In that way, it is personal.”

“God, what the hell difference does it make if this woman is or isn't who she says she is? He's probably wrong anyway.”

“I don't think so.”

Liza looked surprised. “You mean you think the woman isn't this man's daughter?”

“Granddaughter. I don't think she is, no.”

She sat back, drank the brandy. “It's just so consuming . . .” Her voice trailed off.

“So is the disease. Maybe he needs something outside of himself to match it.” It was what he'd said before, different words. He wasn't convincing Liza, that was plain. He wasn't convincing himself.

T
o the frustration of the mini-cab driver, Boring's, in its narrow Mayfair street, was identifiable only by its number and an old street lamp at the bottom of the steps. Its members apparently felt that if you didn't know where Boring's was, you probably shouldn't be going to it.

Melrose paid the driver a monstrous sum for carting them all over the West End searching for the club and added a monstrous tip because he, Melrose, did not speak Senegalese; he had been quite obliging, at least, from what Melrose could make out.

It was by now a little after seven o'clock. He had his room on the first floor and took the stairs two at a time, feeling quite youthfully athletic after his afternoon in the open air. While he was slamming drawers around looking for his silver cufflinks, he reminded himself the afternoon hadn't been entirely given over to exercise. There were the intervals around the pond and the beech tree.

In the Members' Room, several elderly men sat in various stages of predinner expectancy, with their predinner whiskeys or gins. Melrose spotted Colonel Neame in his usual chair by the fire. The feet jutting out from the other wing chair undoubtedly belonged to Major Champs, Colonel Neame's lifelong friend. He had met both of them last year at about this time; it had been in November. They were fixtures. But then all of the members were pretty much fixtures. A thin blade of fear creased Melrose's heart as he wondered if he too would become one.

The old men were gazing dreamily into the blazing fire when Melrose walked up and said, “Colonel Neame,” and smiled down at the white-haired man with the rubicund face. “Major Champs,” he said to the other.

Both of them started and began their slow acceleration into speech: “Um . . . uh . . . wha . . . well . . . um . . . um. My boy!”

Colonel Neame, his monocle falling from his eye and suspended by its black cord, was the first to utter actual words: “I say—will you look who's here, Champs! Delighted, delighted!”

Both of them rose to insist Melrose join them. Melrose, on his part, insisted on buying the drinks. This was met with happy-sounding
umphs, ums, lovely.
Melrose beckoned the young porter over, young by Boring's standards, all of whose staff were fairly over the hill. His name was Barney and he had bright ginger hair.

Melrose took the club chair on the other side of Major Champs as Barney went off to fetch the drinks. While they waited, they settled down to talk about something or nothing as to health and well-being; it mattered little just as long as drinks were on their way and pipes and cigars were to hand and lighted. Then the drinks came and approval rose from the chairs like smoke signals. Thought need not play much of a role in all of this, but Melrose was about to do it when a familiar voice sounded at his back.

“Good evening, Colonel Neame, Major Champs, Lord Ardry.”

“Ah! Superintendent Jury!” Neame rose and Champs almost did, stopped in midrise by a laborious wheeze.

Neame went on. “We're relieved it's only dinner that brings you here tonight and not police business.”

“My presence reminds you of Mr. Pitt, I expect. I'm sorry.”

“Ah, don't apologize, Superintendent. Everything reminds me.”

 

 

 

“Must you go through that ‘Lord Ardry' business?”

Jury drank the wine Plant had ordered, a bottle of Puligny-Montrachet which was open and breathing on their table when they walked in. “That's how those two know you. You're the one introduced yourself as Lord Ardry. You don't want to disillusion them, do you?”

Young Higgins tacked their way with a tray of soup.

“Oxblood.”

“No surprise.”

And they didn't discuss the case until their bowls were empty, Jury ladling up his in less than a minute.

“I'm starving,” he said, then looked at Melrose, who was rummaging in his pockets. “You're not going to smoke, are you?” His tone was vexed as a teacher's on having discovered graffiti on her blackboard.

“No-o,” Melrose said, acerbically. “One doesn't smoke between courses. It's bad manners. But you always said somebody else smoking didn't bother you.”

Jury frowned. “Well, it does. For some reason.” He was quite gloomy tonight.

“It's your friend.”

“What?”

“Your friend, in the City police, this DCI Haggerty. You're thinking about his smoking and his cancer, even if it is isn't specifically lung cancer.”

Jury was silent, looking at Melrose. “You're right. Why didn't I work that out?”

“Because he's your friend.” They both took a swallow of wine. “Boring's wine cellar is up to snuff, I'll say that.”

Young Higgins was back with their dinners, which he set before them. Roast chicken, peas, potatoes, cauliflower, the vegetables in a silver serving dish. They thanked him appreciatively.

Jury said, “I just had a drink with Liza—that's his wife. She's in a bad way.”

“Because of him.”

“Because of him, yes. Not just the cancer itself, but his emotional balance. She says it's changed.”

“I expect mine would change too if I knew I was going to die in a few months.”

“That's what I told her.” Jury swallowed the rest of his wine and set the glass down. “I don't think it's even going to be a ‘few' months. I don't think it'll be that long.”

Melrose looked at him. “That's—I'm sorry.”

Jury took a deep breath. “How did you get on at the Lodge?”

“Lovely. Spent a lot of my time with Gemma Trimm. She's clearly taken with you. As usual.” Melrose sighed.

Jury laughed. “What the hell does that mean? ‘As usual'?”

“Nothing. Listen, little Gemma told me how she could get into the cottage—you know, Kitty Riordin's—whenever our Kitty comes to Oxford Street for a spot of shopping. She offered to get me in there.”

“I hope you took her up on it.”

Melrose made a face. “No, not right then, at least.”

“You're a poor candidate for a B and E.”

Smugly, Melrose said, “That's just what I told her.”

“I see you started out on the right foot with a child. As usual.”

“What's that mean? ‘As usual'?”

Jury smiled. “Nothing.”

Melrose speared a new potato. “Do you think it's remotely possible that she could be related? I'm thinking of—”

“Great-granddaughter?” Jury sat back. “The thing is, Oliver Tynedale's not the sort of man who'd hide the fact this little girl is his great-granddaughter. Whatever the reason for her abandonment—that she was illegitimate, or whatever—it wouldn't bother him; he'd tell the world.”

“He couldn't tell the world if he didn't know it himself.”

“You mean someone maneuvered Gemma into the household?”

“To surprise him in the end; to make him so grateful for this belated piece of knowledge he'd change his will. Remember Kitty Riordin.”

“And now another little child comes along, Gemma Trimm, and the scenario's basically the same? I just think it unlikely there would be two cases of hidden identity in that house. And in the case of Gemma, Tynedale wouldn't have to be kept in the dark in order for the interested party to rake in a lot of money. He'd leave it to her in any event.”

“But
if
there's truth in this, what if Simon Croft knew it? Wouldn't that be a reason to get him out of the way?”

“Could be, yes.”

“Speaking of children, did you meet Benny?”

Jury laughed. “I did, yes.”

“And did you speak with his nemesis, the butcher, Gyp? Horrible person.” Melrose told him the story of the birthday cake. “He enjoys making young Benny's life a misery.”

“Real sadist, it sounds like. I must remember to pay him a visit.”

Melrose surveyed the table. “You've eaten everything, even the butter.”

“I was hungry. Maybe I'll have some more.” Jury craned his neck, looking for Young Higgins.

“Are you putting on weight?”

Jury shrugged. “How would I know? I can't see myself.”

“There
are
mirrors.”

“I don't look in them. Anyway, if I'm getting fat, you-know-who would let me know
tout de suite.
”

“I don't know you-know-who.”

“Take my word for it. What's for dessert?”

W
hen Jury returned to his flat, you-know-who was cooking a fry-up in his kitchen. The mingled scents of sausage, fried bread and Samsura made the air on the first floor landing positively seductive.

Carole-anne was frying away and humming a tune Jury thought he had heard. He tossed his keys in the large glass ashtray that had served him well and was now starved for ashes. He looked at the Christmas tree over in the corner, also starved, but for decorations, and assumed these metaphors were inspired by the action in his kitchen.

“Hey, Super! I'm out here!” called Carole-anne, as if the kitchen hovered somewhere between Islington and the moon. “My cooker quit working again.”

This happened periodically. The landlord, Mr. Moshegiian, had promised her a new cooker, but it hadn't materialized. Jury assumed there was an honest difficulty here, as Mr. Mosh did not make empty promises to Carole-anne. Few did.

The kitchen swam in the mingled scents of sausage and perfume. He leaned against the doorjamb and said, “It's nearly eleven; isn't that kind of late for one of your fry-ups?”

“I was hungry. I've been dancing.” She went on humming.

“At the Nine-One-Nine? Stan Keeler doesn't play dance music.”

“He does sometimes.” She sang a few bars of what she'd been humming. “ ‘My baby don't care for furs and laces—' ”

A little hip action here.

“ ‘My baby don't care for
high
-toned plaaa-ces!' ”

Some more hip action.

“That might be danceable coming from U-2, but not from Stan Keeler.” Dancing to Stan's music would be like trying to glide over shards of glass. He wished she'd sing another couple of lines, though, with a little more hip action.

Carole-anne sighed. “You shouldn't always be talking about things you don't know about.”

Always?
“And just what else do I not know about besides ‘My baby don't care for sausage fry-ups'?”

Ignoring him, her humming became a sort of whispered singing as she flipped eggs—four, Jury noticed—“ ‘My baby don't care for rings . . . da da de da da da daaaah.' ”

The fry-up, he had to admit, was beautiful—sausages succulent, fried bread crisp and golden, eggs smooth as silk. It was sort of the taste equivalent of Carole-anne's looks. Tonight she wore a turquoise blue tank top the color of her eyes and a sequined peachy miniskirt close to the color of her hair. This outfit on another woman would have clashed; on Carole-anne it merely melted like a Caribbean sunset.

She was dividing the contents of the skillet onto two plates.

“I ate dinner. I don't want any of that artery-clogging meal.” Actually, he did; he was hungry again. It was hard for Carole-anne to look woebegone, given her dramatic coloring, but if she tried really hard, she could. On the spatula lay a beautifully fried egg. “Well, maybe just a little,” he said.