Best detective stories of the year, 1977 31st annual collection_nodrm by EDWARD D. HOCH

Author:EDWARD D. HOCH
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

JOYCE PORTER Dover Does Some Spadework

“You’re supposed to be a detective, aren’t you?”

Chief Inspector Dover unwashed, unshaved, still in his dressing gown, and more than half asleep—stared sullenly across the kitchen table at his wife. The great man was not feeling at his best. “I’m on leave, he pointed out resentfully as he spooned a half pound of sugar into his tea. “Supposed to be having a rest.”

All right for some,” muttered Mrs. Dover crossly. She slapped down a plate of bacon, eggs, tomatoes, mushrooms, sausages, and fried bread in front of her husband.

Dover had been sitting with his knife and fork at the ready but now he poked disconsolately among the goodies. “No kidney?”

You want it with jam on, you do!”

Dover responded to this disappointment with a grunt. “Besides,” he said a few minutes later when he was wiping the egg yolk off his chin with the back of his hand, “I’m Murder Squad. You can’t expect me to go messing around with piddling things like somebody nicking

your garden tools. Ring up the local coppers if something’s gone missing.”

And a fine fool I d look, wouldn tic Mrs. Dover sat down and poured out her own cup of tea. “My husband a Chief Inspector at Scotland Yard and me phoning the local police station for help! And I told you, Wilf—nobody stole anything. They just broke in.” Dover considerately remembered his wife’s oft-reiterated injunctions and licked the knife clean of marmalade before sticking it in the butter. Well, it didn’t do to push the old girl too far. “It’s like asking Picasso to decorate the back bedroom for you, you see,” he explained

amid a spray of toast crumbs. “And if there’s nothing actually missing. . . ”

Copyright © 1976 by Joyce Porter. Reprinted by permission of the author and her

agents, John Cushman Associates, Inc. First published in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine. ' ' -

“Two can play at that game, you know.” Mrs. Dover sounded ominously like a woman who had got all four aces up her sleeve.

A frown of sudden anxiety creased Dover’s hitherto untroubled brow. “Wadderyemean?” he asked nervously.

Mrs. Dover ignored the question. “Have another piece of toast,” she invited with grim humor. “Help yourself. Enjoy your breakfast. Make the most of it while it’s here!”

“Oh, ’strewth!” groaned Dover, knowing only too well what was coming.

Mrs. Dover patted her hair into place. “If you can’t do a bit of something for me, Wilf,” she said with feigned reasonableness, “you may wake up one of these fine days and find that I can’t do something for you. Like standing over a hot stove all the live-long day!”

“But that’s your job,” protested Dover. “Wives are supposed to look after their husbands’ comfort. It’s the law!”

But Mrs. Dover wasn’t listening. “I wasn’t brought up just to be your head cook and bottle washer,” she claimed dreamily. “My parents had better things in mind for me than finishing up as your unpaid skivvy. Why”—she soared off misty-eyed into the realms of pure

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