Mystery: The Best of 2001 by Jon L. Breen

Author:Jon L. Breen
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 1591761913
Publisher: ibooks, Inc.
Published: 2011-01-29T06:11:33.156000+00:00

Dan A. Sproul

“Oh, Mona”

Horseracing has been the favorite sport of mystery writers as well as kings. Some, like Dick Francis, feature the owners, trainers, and jockeys; others, like William Murray, view the sport from the bettor’s perspective. In the latter category are Dan A. Sproul’s short stories about Miami private eye Joe Standard. The following is one of the best racing mysteries in short-story form.

Miami is a seasonal city. Things tend to diminish in the summer. Traffic jams are smaller; so also is the price of a hotel room. Calder racetrack produces scrawny race cards and puny mutuel handles. The private detective business suffers, too. Like everything else, the P.I. business goes into a wait-and-hold mode until the first snowflake plummets earthward in Canada, New York, and New Jersey. Then things pick up.

The pivotal date is October fifteenth. Along about then begins a direct corollary between the influx of visitors and the increasing day rate at the Miami Beach hotels. Horses begin to ship into Calder for the Tropical meet. Life gets a little less laid back.

At Standard Investigations we gear up for the season by making sure the phone bill is paid. I use the plural pronoun we strictly in an editorial sense. There is only I, Joe Standard, sole proprietor, except on those rare occasions when my good friend Frankie Swinehart, or Swine as he prefers to be called, comes in to assist me. Normally Swine toils as a security guard at Calder Race Course. It works out for him, since he can get paid and lose it back without leaving the premises, thus embracing the economy of saving time and mileage. Swine is incapable of winning any kind of substantial bet on a horse. And worse, he’s been unable to absorb this awful truth even though it has been demonstrated relentlessly by more than twenty years of betting with both hands.

Along with the lack of mental acuity necessary to master the fine art of handicapping, the fates dealt him a vicious blow in the looks department as well. Swine confronts the world with hyperthyroid, cue-ball-like eyes and teeth with a crooked and pronounced buck. He never had much luck with the girls. What he did have was honesty, loyalty, and a tender-hearted simplicity that belied his looks. I guess that’s why it was so difficult for me to believe Ordway Crook when he called to tell me that Swine had been arrested for the murder of his girlfriend, Mona Phillips.

Ordway Crook, as you might guess from his name, was a lawyer, a divorce lawyer to be precise. We had a sort of business relationship. Certain of my cases produced a disgruntled spouse from time to time. I referred these unfortunates to Crook. He in turn paid me a small referral fee.

“They got in a fight,” said Crook over the phone. “He beat her up pretty good. The cops at the scene say it looks like she might have cracked the back of her head on the corner of a small refrigerator in his room when he knocked her down.

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