The Five Bells and Bladebone (14 page)

Jury squinted, trying to make out the translation. “ ‘Kifta Mishwi’; what the devil’s that?”

“I’m having the camel custard myself,” said Melrose, wandering to the bar.

“That’s ‘caramel custard,’ ” Jury called after him, noting that macaroni cheese was safely there, as were a few sandwiches. He followed Melrose to the bar.

From beyond the beaded curtain at the far end, a tall gentleman had emerged. Not so much tall as long, perhaps. Trevor Sly had associated too long with camels, for he had a face a little like the dromedary back there — long and lantern-jawed, and with a brown, ubiquitous eye whose focus was slightly off-center, giving the eerie impression that it could take in everything at once. His thin hands flopped at the wrists, for he carried his forearms slightly raised, in that sleepwalking way of some people. Jury could imagine him in one of those fields out there, a scarecrow keeping limp watch over his acre. Though from the sharp look, Jury doubted Sly’s head was stuffed with straw.

“Gentlemen, gentlemen. So glad. Ah, it’s Mr. Plant from Ardry End. Delighted, delighted. We don’t see enough of you, do we?” Sly could waggle and
tut
his words as well as his long finger.

“No,” said Melrose.

“And whose acquaintance might I have the pleasure of here?” asked Trevor Sly, offering a dead-fish handshake.

“Mr. Jury,” said Melrose, looking straight in Sly’s eye as if he meant to correct its alignment with the rest of the world.

Jury smiled. He imagined that Plant’s own penny-wise speech was meant to weigh against Sly’s overspending, thus keeping a balance. “I’m with Scotland Yard C.I.D., Mr. Sly.” He showed his warrant card.

The man threw up his long hands and said, “Oh, God! Isn’t it
awful?
A murderer right here amongst us?” His expression did not reflect the awfulness of the situation. It seemed to make him feel quite spry.

“Just a few questions,” said Jury.

“And food,” said Melrose. “I’m starving.”

“Certainly, certainly, my dear people. Now, our special this evening is —”

“Something I’ve never heard of.” Melrose was studying the bar menu. “I’ll have it. And an Old Peculier. Mr. Jury would probably like the Kibbi Bi-Saniyyi.” Melrose slotted the menu between the mustard pot and the napkin dispenser.

“Roast beef sandwich and horseradish sauce,” said Jury. “And a pint of your Tangier.”

Melrose frowned. “Then bring me both of them.”

“Good choice; I like a man that’s adventurous. Are you sure, Mr. Plant, you won’t try the Cairo Flame?”

“No, thanks. That’s one adventure I can do without.”

Trevor Sly was obviously enjoying this badinage, probably soaking it up like his own strong brew, to tell his customers Scotland Yard drinks on the job with the nobs of the county. “I’ll just get your food, then.” He drew their pints, the stout rising to its feathery heights, the Tangier
with only the barest trace of bubble looking flat as death.

Jury took a long drink and nearly fell off the stool. “Strong stuff.”

As Melrose studied the mirror-camels, Jury turned to look at the wall opposite. Among the pictures there was one of the handsome profile of Lawrence of Arabia, closely placed to a big poster of the equally handsome Peter O’Toole, a montage that showed him in one scene walking across the tops of a black line of train cars against an endless waste of sand and sky. Trevor Sly must have thought Arabia and India were hand-in-glove, for the second film poster was an advertisement for
A Passage to India,
showing the long caravan with Dame Peggy Ashcroft seated in a howdah wearing that expression of empathy and invincibility that only Peggy Ashcroft could. The posters were side-by-side, the camel-train oddly resembling the line of boxcars; yet though the dark caravan and train seemed to be moving inexorably toward one another, the lines were so placed on the posters, it was clear that Peggy and Peter would never meet.

Jury found this terribly sad and turned back to the bar.

At that moment, Trevor Sly came down the bar with their plates of food and condiments held on his arms in lieu of a tray. Long as they were, the arms could probably have accommodated a service for six. He set it before them, with napkins and cutlery, and drew himself a Cairo Flame. When he sat on the high stool, he could twist and twine his legs round each other like rope. His writhing and churning made Jury think of a restless spoon in a stew pot. Melrose frowned at his plate. “This is nothing but beef mince and chips.
This
is what they eat in the Sudan? And this other one —” He poked moodily at the second plate. “— is just like this.” He prodded the first plate.

“Basically, it is. Too bad, but I ran out of grape leaves, pita bread, and charcoal.”

“Can’t imagine why,” said Melrose, unrolling his cutlery.

“Did you know Simon Lean, Mr. Sly?” asked Jury.

“Yes. He came in here several times. Lends a bit of tone, doesn’t it, someone from up at Watermeadows.”

“By himself?”

“Two or three times, yes. Once with his wife, once with that writer-person, Joanna Lewes.” That he expected this to be quite a meaty morsel was clear.

It was. Melrose stopped pushing his mince around the plate and stared up at Sly. “What? Are you sure it was Miss Lewes he was with?”

“Certainly. I’ve read all her books and her picture’s right on the back.” Sly took another mouthful of his Cairo Flame. “I never forget a face; customers like that.” He hitched his stool a bit closer and rewound himself. “It’d just gone three and no one else was here. They sat way over there” — he nodded toward the far corner to a table by one of the fake palms — “and I couldn’t hear them, but I’d say she was a bit unhappy. Yes, I’d go so far as to say she wasn’t happy at all. Not at all.” He twined his fingers tightly while his high forehead pleated like an accordion in his effort to find the cause of the Lewes woman’s unhappiness. “I’m not saying I heard anything, mind you. It was just the look of her, see; ever so taut she was, sitting there.”

“It was only the one time?” asked Jury.

“That’s right. To tell the truth, I couldn’t help but be surprised. I mean, she’s not exactly dishy, is she? Nice enough, I expect, but he’s the sort — well, you hear things, don’t you?”

“What sort of things?” said Jury, finishing off Plant’s highly spiced dish.

“Mr. Lean likes his women, that’s what.” His smile was like broken twigs, thin and tiny at the corners, spliced in the center.

“Any particular women?” asked Melrose, who had shoved his barely tasted food to one side.

“I’ve heard talk of something going on between him and that Demorney person.”

“Do you know her?” asked Jury.

“To see, I do. Come in here two or three times by herself. But she never come in with him. Awful cold, that’s what I think. Still, I expect that’s what some men like.” Here he smoothed back his thin hair, disturbing the artful arrangement of strands that covered the bald spot, and went on about Watermeadows. “There’s just the three of them, you know. No proper live-in staff, and with
that
big house. Only that old butler and the gardener that comes in now and again for a taste. Lives down the road, here. Name’s Joe Bream. And then there’s his Jewel that comes in to cook for me when I’m in a bit of a rush. She goes to Watermeadows four times a week and I guess they eat leftovers the rest of the time. Right spooky, she calls it. Mostly she never sees a living soul. The wife keeps to herself and so does the old lady. Jewel, that’s Joe’s missus, told me once it put her in mind of that horror film where everybody talks about Mother but there’s not one. It’s just people’s souls get sucked into this room, or something.”

Jury smiled at the notion of Lady Summerston’s rooms sucking up people’s souls. “Tell Mrs. Bream that there really is a Lady Summerston. You say this Jewel cooks for you?” Jury made a note in his small notebook. When Sly nodded, he asked: “Then did she cook up this tasty dish?” Jury nodded toward the plate and pocketed his pen.

“No, indeed. That’s me does the Kibbi Bi-Saniyyi, and to my mind you’d have to go all the way to Lebanon to get better.”

“I’ll crawl on my hands and knees,” said Melrose.

Jury smiled. “It’s very good, Mr. Sly. Very . . . exotic.”

Trevor Sly writhed a bit at the compliment and slid from his stool. “It’s a treat to serve them that appreciates good food, Mr. Jury. The British stick too much to their roast
beef and potatoes. Now, I insist you just try a mouthful of my Cairo Flame.” He was fussing about the beer pulls.

“He’s already paralytic,” said Melrose, pulling out his cigar case and offering it around.

“A mouthful is all we have time for, I’m afraid,” said Jury. “We’ve got to be off.” He picked up his notebook.

The strangely thick-looking brew was set before him and Jury took a swallow too quickly. It felt like Sergeant Wiggins’s description of an asthma attack: instead of a column of air, his throat felt like two boards pressing closer and closer together. He said, somewhat laryngetically, “A wonderful drink for sword swallowers, Mr. Sly.”

Trevor Sly fairly twinkled at that and said, “I’ve always said my Cairo Flame is better than medicine. Clears up the sinuses better than Coleman’s mustard.” He snapped his thin fingers.

“My sergeant’ll love it,” said Jury.

T
HE
W
RENN’S
N
EST
B
OOK
S
HOP
, according to the gold-leaf cursive beneath the name, specialized in Antiquarian Books and Bindings. It was located in the former premises of an auto-parts shop. The façade of that shop had run to a faded green and greasy garage door, always open; a guard dog, always asleep; a brown tub of petunias, always in their death throes, but put there to spiff the place up by the owner, who had considered himself quite a lad when it came to decor.

Melrose had much preferred it to the prettified black-beamed, whitewashed, bow-fronted look of Theo Wrenn Browne’s renovated shop. For Theo Wrenn Browne’s purposes the placement was ideal, as it was on the High Street and across from Trueblood’s Antiques (also bow-fronted, but nicely mellow and real Tudor), and jimmied right up against Miss Crisp’s secondhand furniture shop, where Browne was planning a takeover. Two doors down on the other side was the butcher shop, the course of whose trials had been the talk of the town until something more interesting had now come along.

Melrose had nearly toppled on the huge tub of cyclamen and now stood looking through the window. Jury said that
the antiquarian-shop owner might know his first editions but he also knew where the money was.

“He doesn’t know anything,” said Melrose. “Certainly not books, which is one of the several reasons he loathes Marshall Trueblood.” The display consisted of blockbuster novels, some British and some American whoppers; one or two “literary” volumes that were Booker nominees; and absolutely no Joanna Lewes. The Stephen King looked thick enough to break both of Agatha’s ankles.

“Here’s one of Polly’s,” said Jury, nodding toward the window. “
The Nine Barristers
. Sounds awfully Sayers-ish.”

“Well, it isn’t. Oh, I think she
meant
it to be, but Polly’s not exactly a dab hand when it comes to style. She says she’s dried up after that one. I told her to stop being hysterical and get her hair done. There’s the new Elizabeth Onions.” He pointed to a pair of books, lined up so that one could see both the title and the madcap face of Elizabeth, whose pulled-back hair was wound far more tightly than her plots. He had become acquainted with her books at a snowed-in house-party in Durham and found them delightfully dreadful. He was sure this one wouldn’t disappoint him. Since Polly Praed wrote mysteries, he felt he should keep up with the worst of them, allowing Polly’s to absolutely glitter by comparison.

“There he is, worse luck,” said Melrose as Theo Wrenn Browne emerged from the shadows of his workshop to sit down near the window as if part of the display.

 • • • 

Theo Wrenn Browne seemed thrilled at the entrance of Melrose Plant and a superintendent of police.

He was perched on a low ladder wearing Italian-leather sandals and a silky patchwork shirt. Smoke plumed from his cigar. “Melrose! I haven’t seen you since the binding of
Lady Windermere’s Fan
.”

Melrose sighed. The man did not date meetings and
events by the dull days of the week or Bank Holidays, but by first editions and endpapers. Melrose nodded and nearly yawned. The affectations of Theo Wrenn Browne always made him feel like sleeping where he stood. “This is Superintendent Jury. He wants to have a little talk with you.” He drifted back to look at the books.

There were two other customers, a woman copying a recipe out of a glossy-fronted cookery book; and Miss Alice Broadstairs, making a shambles of the gardening section. She managed to nick a page here, tear a dust jacket there, as if her hands were gloved in thorns.

Hitting his head on one of the quaint low beams and barking his shin against a protruding metal rack for paperbacks, he went into the mystery section. Nooks and crannies and a creaking staircase all lined with posters and dust jackets were Theo Wrenn Browne’s idea of a bookshop. Melrose would have preferred the old garage. He should have bought it himself; then he could have left the walls perfectly bald and blank, stuck in functional shelves, and called it Basic Books. He could even have trotted Mindy along as a guard dog. Oh, well, too late now. He picked up
The Maypole Murders
by Elizabeth Onions and found Wing Commander Fisher dead in the opening paragraph. So much for the commander’s career.