The First Golden Age of Mystery & Crime by Fletcher Flora

The First Golden Age of Mystery & Crime by Fletcher Flora

Author:Fletcher Flora
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: crime, mystery detective, sleuth, murder
Publisher: Wildside Press LLC
Published: 2015-09-17T16:00:00+00:00


SHE ASKED FOR IT

Originally published in Manhunt, Aug. 1960.

It was about six o’clock of a long summer evening, and Lard Lavino had just brought the suppers over from his cafe. You probably know how it is with meals in a lot of county jails. The sheriff gets an allotment for feeding the prisoners, so much per meal, and if he’s got an economical wife to prepare them he can usually make a little gravy for himself, honest graft, and no one goes hungry in the process. I don’t happen to have a wife, being a bachelor, and so I had this arrangement with Lard to furnish the meals. On paper he charged me exactly the allowance, payable the first of the month, but we had a little kickback understanding between us, not on paper, and it worked out so that neither of us got rich but both of us made a little.

Sometimes Lard sent the meals over, and sometimes he brought them himself. This evening was one of the times he brought them himself. There were only half a dozen of them, guests of the jail being mighty few at the time, and I was thinking I ought to get off my tail and gather in a few vagrants and minor offenders to build up the food allowance for the month, but it had been too damn hot, and still was, to do a lot of things a man would normally do for his own profit. It made me feel even hotter to look at Lard. He weighs about three hundred pounds, just short of it, and the grease was seeping out of his pores to soak his shirt and make a high sheen on his fat, swarthy face.

“It’s hot,” he said. “God Almighty, Colby, it’s hot!”

“Sure is,” I said. “You bring a plate for me?”

“Well, you didn’t say if you wanted one, but I brought it just in case.”

“Good for you, Lard. Saves me a walk over to the cafe. What’s it tonight?”

“It’s Thursday, Colby. You know what it is Thursdays.”

“Oh, sure. Chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes and cream gravy. Lard, why the hell don’t you shift the menu around now and then? Chicken fried steak on Wednesday, say, and salmon patties on Thursday.”

“What the hell difference does it make if you eat steak on Wednesday or Thursday?”

“Just a thought, Lard. Just something for a change.”

“Nuts. You want me to peddle the trays?”

“Never mind. I’ll do it myself.”

“Well, you better do it right away. Cream gravy ain’t worth a damn if it gets cold, you know. I’ll send back in about an hour for the things.”

He went out, and I distributed the trays before the cream gravy got cold. It didn’t take long because, like I said, there weren’t many guests—one chicken thief, two habitual violators of the peace, a pair of drunken drivers with ten days each, and a farm laborer doing a year minus GCT for sticking his brother-in-law with a pitch fork. The brother-in-law, though perforated, didn’t die.



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