The Blue Last

might be construed as prying. So scrupulous was she and with so strong a sense of privacy that a question like this one would be considered an invasion of it.

He said, “Just to meet someone. The case we’re working on.”

She kept looking at him, hard, when upstairs a window flew up and Carole-anne leaned out of it. It was Jury’s window, not Carole-anne’s. “Super! There’s a message on your machine!” She seemed proud that the machine was functioning.

“Who?” The light in the flat behind her flooded her hair and made her dress glisten. What a sight.

“Well, I don’t know, do I? He never said his name. What I think was he got cut off in the middle of talking. It was a peculiar message anyway.”

Jury was looking up, waiting. Carole-anne seemed to be thinking, if one could judge thought from down here on the pavement. “What did he say?”

“It was something like, you could only trust your greengrocer. No, don’t trust your greengrocer. Something like that.”

Knowing Carole-anne’s penchant for messing up messages, Jury bet it was “something like that.” For a weird moment all he could think of was Mr. Steptoe. Jury told Mrs. Wasserman he was going back to his flat and for her not to worry. “It’s too cold for being out here without a coat. Go back inside and I’ll see you later.” He knew he sounded impossibly condescending, which he hated.

Shimmering, silver-dust fingernails on shimmering turquoise hip, Carole-anne punched the replay button. Melrose Plant’s voice, sounding surprisingly untaped, said, “Don’t trust your grocer, like Masaccio, and don’t-” End of message.

“He got cut off,” said Carole-anne, reproachfully. “It’s something wrong with the machine.”

Jury found the number for Ardry End and dialed. Carole-anne was looking so troubled, he winked at her, then said, “Ruthven, this is Richard Jury. Is Mr. Plant there?”

“No, sir. But he wanted me to give you a message-”

(Jury hoped it wasn’t the one about the grocer.)

“-that he’d be at his club and for you to ring him there. And you weren’t to talk to anyone until you’d talked to him. He was most emphatic on that point, sir.”

Jury frowned. “But-what’s he doing at Boring’s? I thought he drove back to Northamptonshire this morning.”

“He did, sir. But this afternoon he turned right around and returned to London. I should say that he did so in an enormous hurry and in a highly agitated state.”

Jury smiled fractionally. He wondered if he’d ever seen Melrose Plant in a “highly agitated state.” He rang off and saw that Carole-anne was herself looking agitated and put his arm around her shoulders. Then he thumbed his small telephone index and came up with Boring’s number. Carole-anne seemed to be settling in, head against his chest. Everyone was acting queerly tonight, including, he supposed, himself. When the porter answered (not Young Higgins, but the ginger-haired lad) Jury asked for Mr. Plant. After some asking around had been done, the young porter returned and said that Mr. Plant had just left.

“Not more’n five minutes ago, sir. Is there a message?”

The night seemed made of nothing but messages. “Just tell him Superintendent Jury called, will you?”

His arm still around Carole-anne, he frowned, wondering what was going on. Obviously, Plant knew something, or had come up with something, but… Masaccio’s grocer? What the hell was that supposed to mean?

“Super?”

“Huh?”

“What’s going on? And where are you off to?”

He looked down at her. “Just to meet someone. Another copper.”

“But it’s Christmas.”

“Yep. And we haven’t had our Christmas kiss.”

Intake of breath on her part. “What Christmas-?”

“This one.” He kissed her.

The kiss was not terribly long, or terribly hard. There have been longer, harder kisses in this world, but it was longer, perhaps, and harder than need be.

Carole-anne was knocked for a loop. “Super!” She staggered back to look at him, probably in much the same way Cinderella had looked at the coach and footmen. Then, rearranging a sleeve and a curl (which needed none), she said, “I’ll still be here New’s Year, in case you didn’t know.”

Jury laughed.

She went upstairs and he went down.

Fifty-seven

By now he was late and Mickey was probably already waiting for him at the Croft house, so he knew he shouldn’t be stopping at the bridge, but he did anyway. He wanted to check on Benny. He parked his car along the Embankment and went down the steps.

There was a small cluster of people there, warming themselves at a small stove.

“Benny around?” asked Jury.

“Wasn’t you ’ere before, mate?”

Jury recognized the man in the greatcoat. Tonight he was wearing an olive green soldier’s cap. “I was, yes. I’m a friend.”

The soldier snorted. “You’re the Filth’s, what I say.”

The woman called Mags, blanketed in sweaters and shawls, was there, too. “Benny’ll be back. He went off after Sparky. That dog o’ his. You want t’ leave a message?”

Jury smiled. A night of missed meetings and messages. “No, except you can tell him Happy Christmas for me.”

“Right-o. Who’s ‘me’?”

“The Filth.”

She chortled.

Before he got into his car, he looked over his shoulder at Waterloo Bridge. The old bridge had been a granite thing with columns and arches, wrought iron and black lamps. It had been so romantic-the black Thames, the night, the fog. Even the war was made out to be romantic. He imagined Vivien Leigh looking into the dark water. Robert Taylor with that hint of a smile playing around his lips, smoking a cigarette. Myra and Roy. What a lie.

As he entered the forecourt, the car caught Mickey in its headlights, making him look vulnerable and unprotected. He was standing out on the dock, smoking. Certainly, Mickey was vulnerable and unprotected. Jury wondered how he himself would take the verdict that he was going to die. Not well. Who would? “Mickey!” he called and walked through the forecourt out onto the pier.

Mickey took the cigarette from his mouth and flicked it into the water. He said, “Always love doing that, Rich. Flick the butts away, watch them arc and fall.” He dug his hands deeper into the pockets of his overcoat.

Jury smiled. “You’re worse than I am, seeing cigarettes in such a romantic light. How was Christmas, Mickey?”

“Terrific. Exhausting.” He laughed a little.

That Mickey was exhausted was evident. “Sorry I’m late. I stopped at Waterloo Bridge to check on Benny.”

“He holes up there, doesn’t he? That kid. God.”

“He does. But I think somehow he’s making it.” Jury paused. “You look pretty tired.”

“Yeah. I am.” He nodded toward the boat farther out. “I was just looking at that boat, thinking about Gemma Trimm.” He smiled. “Some kids those two are.”

Jury nodded. “So are yours.”