Free The Horse You Came in On by Martha Grimes Page B

showing.
    â€œYa got that right.” She took four cigarettes, jamming three in her apron pocket, and leaning across the table for Plant to light the fourth, upsetting his pint in the process. “Ah, looka there, Lord Ardry. Pity.” She tsk-tsked and ran her oily cloth over the spill.
    â€œOh, get El Withersby a gin, Melrose,” said Trueblood, not about to rise himself.
    â€œI’d prefer one of Dick’s brews,” said Jury.
    â€œIf you’re drinking that stuff, you must be back on the job,” said Melrose, smiling.
    â€œHalfway, partway,” said Jury, and then, as Melrose went off the bar, he said to Trueblood, “Oughtn’t you be seeing to your customers?”
    In the act of lighting up a jade-green Sobranie, Trueblood raised his painted brows. “Customers? What customers?”
    â€œThere was a lot of commotion in the shop as I walked by.”
    â€œWhat? Couldn’t be . . .”
    â€œStuff might be going out the back door, then.”
    Mrs. Withersby cackled and leaned on her broom. “Mebbe ’twas the van I seen down the back alley.”
    Trueblood was up and off in a flash. Jury looked at the seat. No, nothing there. As Mrs. Withersby rambled on about the new Long Pidd constable being blind as a bat and how the Withersby clan was not one to depend on police for protection, Jury casually ran his hand under the cushion of the bench beneath the window. Where was the damned thing, anyway?
    â€œ. . . an’ drug in little Eddie fer nickin’ the . . . I took umbrage, I did. . . .” She kicked at the pail, dislodging the Mansion polish rag.
    Jury looked down at the pail. There it was. “Mr. Plant’s signalling you, Mrs. Withersby.”
    She turned toward the bar, and Jury quickly extracted the black leather book, shoved it down in his raincoat’s big pocket, and was smiling as Melrose Plant returned with one gin and one strong brew in which the sediment was still settling.
    â€œCheers!” said Jury, raising his glass.
    Mrs. Withersby rejoined them and drank off her tot of gin, collected her broom and bucket, and set off towards the nether regions.
    It had been a safe enough repository. Mrs. Withersby couldn’t read and rarely worked. She was probably only plying that pail and rag today to see what it would get her by way of strong drink.
    â€œWhere’s Vivian?” asked Jury.
    â€œProbably packing.” Melrose cast an agonized glance toward the retreating bucket.
VI
    â€œI’m very fond of him,” said Vivian Rivington, her tone a bit defensive, as she clamped the lid back on the tin of cheese puffs.
    â€œReally? I seem to remember you saying exactly that about another man, years ago, right here in this room.” Jury sipped his coffee. “Remember?”
    Vivian looked at him speculatively. “I remember.”
    â€œThen why don’t you stop all this nonsense and break it off?”
    She sat back, fell back, in her chair, holding the cheese puff aloft and seeming to address it, not Jury. “How high-handed. As if you had some superior knowledge.”
    He smiled. “I do. You as much as told me.”
    â€œNothing. I told you nothing.”
    He drank his coffee, Vivian crunched at her cheese puff, and they were silent.
    â€œAnyway, he’s too busy playing games with Marshall.”
    â€œÂ â€˜He’?” asked Jury innocently.
    â€œOh, stop being ridiculous.”
    â€œI don’t know why you can’t see the truth.”
    â€œI do not see what is not there.”
    â€œKnowing how much Plant hates to leave Ardry End—I don’t think he’d leave even if someone shouted ‘Fire!’—how about that trip to Italy they took? You think he doesn’t care what happens to you?”
    â€œHates to travel? Well, he’s certainly putting on a damned good imitation of a man who’s about to embark for the