A Groom wirh a View

had said that Ambler had to be in his seventies, maybe early eighties, but he looked like a “rode-hard-and-put-away-wet“ fifty. He couldn’t have been more than five feet tall and walked with the belligerent, rolling gait of an old sailor.
    Ambler was already at the roadhouse and halfway through his first beer when Mel and Smith arrived. Smith performed the introductions and Mel said, “If you’d ever arrested me, I’d have been scared spitless.”
    Ambler preened. “And you’da been right, boy! I had ‘em shaking in their boots in my day. So what are you boys up to that you need to talk to an old geezer like me?“
    “You heard about the death at the Thatchers’ lodge?“ Smith asked.
    “I hear about everything, boy. Got a perp yet?“
    “Nope,“ Smith said. “But we’re pretty sure it was someone in the house. Thought you might tell us a bit about the lodge and the Thatchers.”
    Ambler glared at Mel. “And what’s your place in this?“
    “I’m just a guest. A friend of mine is in charge of planning the wedding that’s going on tomorrow and I’m watching out for her interests. Besides, I’m curious.“
    “And he’s a good cop, too,“ Smith put in. He reeled off a list of some of the difficult cases Mel had been responsible for solving.
    “How’d you know that?“ Mel asked.
    Smith looked surprised. “I checked you out. Just like I did everybody. Anybody can create a fake ID these days. Wouldn’t you have done the same?”
    Mel grinned. “Exactly the same.“
    “So you’re one of us,“ Ambler said. While they were studying the menus, a waste of time since they were all going to have the famous chicken fried steak anyway, Ambler ran through a few of the cases he’d been involved in. They went clear back to Prohibition days when he was just a kid, hanging out with his uncle, who’d been a deputy.
    Mel loved nothing better than to sit around with a tough old cop telling stories of the good old days, but Smith had apparently heard the stories before and gently guided the elderly man back to what he knew of the lodge.
    “It was a monastery to start with. I guess you knew that. Bunch of sissy boys from back East came out here in long brown dresses with a rich guy who musta thought they could pray his way into heaven,“ Ambler said.
    A tired-looking waitress came by and slammed three beers on the table and took their orders.
    “Anyhow,“ Ambler went on, “the rich guy died after they’d been here a couple o’ years and the money ran out. I guess he figured he didn’t need the prayers after he was dead so he didn’t leave them any money to get along on. The monks tried growing vegetables and keeping bees and weaving stuff and whatnot, even turned a hand at making soap for a while, but they gave up and sold the place to O. W. Thatcher. That musta been in about 1932 or ‘33. Bad times, those were. But O. W didn’t seem to be hurting for money like the rest of us. He was a young man then, but ran his dad’s company selling little junky stuff like folding rulers and toothpick holders and such. Can’t imagine how he made a dime on toothpick holders, being as most of us then couldn’t even afford toothpicks...”
    Mel had the feeling this story might not ever really get off the ground. Smith apparently did, too. “So did O. W. spend a lot of time here?“
    “Not at first. Only hunting season. He’d come down here with a bunch of his Chicago cronies and man, were they ever a terror! Drinking like fish, driving around the countryside like maniacs, picking off people’s cats and dogs with their rifles.“
    “Not very welcome in the neighborhood, then?“ Mel asked.
    “Not welcome a’tall. No, sirree. But it got better after a bit. O. W. got married, had a couple kids, started bringing friends’ families down instead of his drinking buddies. By that time, the money situation had eased up and there was less resentment of him on that account, too.“
    “Was the guy they call ‘Uncle Joe’ part of the family?“ Mel asked.
    “Lordy, no! He was O. W.’s bastard kid. The wife probably wouldn’t have heard of having him around underfoot. Wasn’t until she died when the other kids were in their teens that O. W. dragged Joe into the family. And he was a wild one. In all kinds of trouble when he got here, but then the war came and he went off. And he came back different.“
    “Different in what way?“
    “Not wild, for one thing. Quiet-like and always sort of cranky. People