Pardon My Body

I was driving more or less automatically and it was a little time before I realized that I'd crossed the state line into Connecticut. That lush Luce landscape wouldn't be denied recognition for long, though. A thin moon slanted its light through the foliage which partly overhung the parkway, momentarily lighting up a flat, still stream as the Buick sped by. Another quarter-mile and I turned into the cutoff which would take me to the Golden Peacock Inn.

I'd been there once before, with Lucy Marling, who is just about the best sob writer the town had seen in a decade—but tonight I was celebrating my emancipation from newspapers, and I figured that I'd do it alone and unaided. I wanted a quiet evening to sort myself out, not another interminable session of shop talk, too much bourbon and the final problem of sidestepping Lucy's bedroom. Not that I hate women, but… hell, put it down to blue blood on the distaff side or something. Just an old gripy sourpuss, that's me. Anything you say.

I eased a size eleven tan brogue off the accelerator to take the last bend before the inn, my mind pleasantly anticipating the peculiar and particular aromatic savour of the Peacock's ... read full excerpt from: Pardon My Body ebook