All I Want is a Couple Days Off*
https://margotkinberg.com/2019/03/22/all-i-want-is-a-couple-days-off/
http://margotkinberg.com/?p=19190
Fictional or real, most sleuths are hardworking, dedicated people. But that doesn’t mean they never want to take some time off from their work. Like anyone else, sleuths sometimes want to relax, spend time with their families if they have them, and take a break. But it doesn’t always work out that way.
If you’ve ever had the experience of getting ready for a few days off, only to have a work emergency come up, then you know how frustrating it can be. It’s the same for a fictional sleuth, and that can add some interesting tension to a story.
Agatha Christie’s short story The Mystery of Hunter’s Lodge sees Hercule Poirot in need of some time off, so that he can recover from influenza. He and Hastings get a visit from Roger Havering, who lives at Hunter’s Lodge, Derbyshire. It seems that Havering has had a telegram from his wife, telling him that his uncle, Harrington Pace, has been murdered. Havering wants the case investigated. Poirot desperately needs some time away, so he sends Hastings to Derbyshire in his stead. There, Chief Inspector Japp is already investigating, and he and Hastings work together to find out who the killer is. As the case unfolds, they stay in contact with Poirot via telegram, and he puts the pieces of the puzzle together.
In Ellery Queen’s The Origin of Evil, Queen decides to take some time away so that he can work on his writing. He’s rented a place in the Hollywood Hills, and he’s looking forward to making some progress. Then, he gets a visit from nineteen-year-old Laurel Hill. She says that her father, Leander Hill, recently died of a heart attack that was deliberately induced. He’d been receiving some weird, even ghoulish, ‘presents,’ and Laurel is convinced that that’s what brought on his heart attack. She also tells Queen that her father’s business partner, Roger Priam, has also been receiving ‘gifts.’ Queen doesn’t want to get involved at first. He’s trying to get away from ‘it all.’ But the mystery does intrigue him, and Laurel won’t be put off. So, he starts to ask questions. And, in the end, he finds out who sent the parcels (and, therefore, killed Leander Hill) and what it all means.
Fans of Martha Grimes’ Inspector Jury/Melrose Plant series will know that Jury has some ongoing friction with his boss, Detective Chief Superintendent (DCS) Racer. So, Jury is prepared to be annoyed when Racer calls him just as he’s packing for a weekend trip to visit Plant in the village of Long Piddlington. It seems that a human finger has been discovered in another town, Littlebourne, and Racer wants Jury to investigate. Jury explains that he’s off on a trip, but that cuts no ice with Racer. A seriously irritated Jury lets Plant know he won’t be visiting, and then heads to Littlebourne. Not long after the discovery of the finger, the rest of a human body is found. It turns out that the dead person is Cora Binns, who worked for a London temporary agency. She’d been sent to Long Piddlington to interview for a job, but never made it to that interview. Plant joins his friend in Littlebourne, and, each in a different way, they search for the truth about the murder. It turns out that this death is related to a vicious attack on another villager, and to a robbery a year earlier.
At the beginning of James Lee Burke’s A Morning For Flamingos, New Iberia, Louisiana, police detective Dave Robicheaux decides to take some time away from work. He’s recently been through the traumatic experience of losing his police partner to a line-of-duty killing. Now, he just wants to ‘step back,’ spend time with his daughter, Alafair, go fishing, and relax. But that’s not to be. He gets a visit from an old friend, former DEA agent Minos Dautrieve. It seems that Dautrieve has been appointed to the Presidential Task Force on Drugs, and he wants to involve Robicheaux in one of the task force’s plans. The task force wants to bring down New Orleans crime boss and drugs dealer Tony Cardo. Dautrieve proposes that Robicheaux pretend to ‘go dirty,’ and befriend Cardo so as to get close to him. Then, he can be brought to justice. Robicheaux wants no part of it at first. But then, Dautrieve mentions that one of Cardo’s associates is the man who killed Robicheaux’s police partner. This operation will give Robicheaux the chance to go after that man. This persuades Robicheaux to agree to the operation. But it turns out to be much more complex than it seems, and Cardo is much more complicated than he seems…
And then there’s Andrea Camilleri’s August Heat. In it, Inspector Salvo Montalbano and his lover, Livia Burlando, had planned to take a holiday to beat the intense Sicilian heat of August. But that changes when Montalbano’s second-in-command, Mimì Augello, has to change his own travel plans. Now, Montalbano has to stay in Vigàta. When he tells Livia what’s happened, she suggests that she and some friends could take a beach house, so that she could at least see him when he’s not actually at work. Montalbano’s not overly happy at the idea, but he goes along with it. Then, he gets drawn into a murder mystery when the son of Livia’s friend goes missing and is found in an unused tunnel that runs beneath the house - a tunnel that also contains a trunk with a corpse in it…
You would think that sleuths would be entitled to some time off once in a while. After all, they certainly work hard enough when they’re on duty, at things most of us wouldn’t want to handle. But it often doesn’t work out that way. And that tension can add to a story, right, fans of Donna Leon’s A Question of Belief?).
*NOTE: The title of this post is a line from Huey Lewis and the News’ Couple Days Off.