Murder on a Midsummer Night Page 14

  ‘And this professor is one of them?’ Dot clasped her hands.

  ‘No, I believe that he was only at the funeral because he knew and liked the deceased. He seemed quite civilised, as did Rachel Phillips. However, handsome is as handsome does, as you keep telling me. We shall see.’

  ‘Indeed,’ murmured Dot. ‘I went and searched for that certificate, Miss Phryne. For the young man in the cemetery?’

  ‘Oh, good, yes, our other problem. What did the Actors’ Benevolent Society say?’

  ‘No one there, Miss, I’ll call again today. It’s just a little cubby hole of an office near the Princess Theatre. But Births Deaths and Marriages had his death certificate. His name was Patrick James O’Rourke, born in County Limerick, Ireland, in 1846. That makes him eighteen at the time of the…er…incident, Miss. I mean, if he was the father of the baby. And Miss Kathleen would be sixteen in 1864, she was born in 1848. Otherwise it’s not a lot of help. Next of kin is marked unknown and the death was registered by Mr. Albert Wright of the Princess Theatre. That must be the Actors’ Benevolent people, I think. They ought to still remember him, he only died in 1914.’

  ‘How?’ asked Phryne, her hand on the doorknob.

  ‘Miss?’ asked Dot.

  ‘How did he die?’

  ‘Accidental gassing, Miss,’ said Dot, reluctant to think of that mortal sin, suicide.

  ‘On the anniversary of his sweetheart’s birth,’ said Phryne. ‘He never married?’

  ‘No, Miss, never married, no children, no next of kin.’

  ‘Just actors,’ said Phryne. ‘Well, he could have done worse.’

  ‘How?’ asked Dot, but her eccentric employer had already gone.

  Professor Edwin Dafydd Rowlands had done the unthinkable: he had arrived early for luncheon. Mr. Butler had coped with this social solecism by showing him into the smaller parlour and supplying him with a strong whisky and water, a plate of Mrs. Butler’s excellent cheese straws, and a newspaper. He was, however, prowling Phryne’s bookshelves when his hostess entered, looking cool in a dress the colour of a Greek summer sky, patterned with the masks of comedy and tragedy. He turned to her with a copy of Plautus’ plays in his hands.

  ‘I am so sorry,’ he apologised. ‘I just can’t resist other people’s books. What a nice collection of classics you have.’

  ‘Thank you. Translations, of course, my Latin is minimal. But there are people I really appreciate.’

  ‘Ovid, perhaps?’ asked the professor, with a twinkle.

  Phryne returned the twinkle with added interest. ‘Him, and Herodotus—my favourite gossip—and some others.’

  ‘Plautus?’ he asked, putting down the volume of plays.

  ‘Much funnier than Terence,’ she said. ‘Come and have some lunch?’

  ‘Delighted.’

  He offered his arm and escorted her into the dining room. It was pleasantly cool, the heavy curtains excluding a raking north wind which had decided to see how much of St. Kilda’s sand it could transfer into St. Kilda’s gardens, birdbaths, and sandwiches. Phryne surveyed her professor. Well dressed in a light grey suit. Smells pleasantly of soap and pipe smoke. Pale rather than tanned. Robust rather than sprightly. Greek rather than Roman.

  Ember floated in as Mr. Butler brought the soup. Professor Rowlands bent to offer a hand to the black cat, who sniffed it and then allowed the royal ears to be briefly caressed. Ember then wound a couple of times around Phryne’s ankles as a courtesy then followed Mr. Butler out.

  And the professor is a cat person rather than dog person, thought Phryne. Still that was no guarantee of virtue. Dr. Nikola, the arch villain of Guy Boothby’s shockers, had a cat of which he was presumably fond—and it liked him, for it sat on his shoulder, sneering, as screaming victims were pushed into the scorpion pit. Where did he get so many scorpions? From a scorpion breeder? In London?

  Phryne shook herself, allowed Mr. Butler to seat her, and reached for her large white serviette. The soup was a delicate, very hot, beef consommé, served with sippets of toast. The professor ate neatly. Another good point. Most men slurped.

  ‘Apicius would not approve,’ he commented.

  ‘Indeed, why not?’ asked Phryne.

  ‘Roman cooking was always heavily seasoned with fish sauce, a dreadful condiment made by putting a lot of innocent fish into pickle and burying the whole concoction until it was—excuse me mentioning such a thing at this excellent table—rotten. After which it was, regrettably, dug up again. And slathered over everything. At one point in his book, he says, “Don’t worry if you haven’t got the right meat for the occasion. With enough fish sauce, no one will be able to tell.” Must have been ghastly. Unless, of course—’

  ‘You liked fish sauce. Australians drench everything in tomato sauce, probably on the same principle,’ she said.

  ‘And the English consider HP or Worcestershire the epitome of taste.’

  ‘Sad, isn’t it? When there is such excellent food in the world.’

  ‘You know, when I came here from Wales, I was astounded at the richness of the Australian diet. Such milk, such eggs, such ice cream! I thought it a land of milk and honey.’

  ‘Ah, a green salad, salade russe, and Mrs. Butler’s special poached chicken,’ exclaimed Phryne greedily. Her hashish hunger had not quite left her. She allowed Mr. Butler to carve the chicken, which he did with stately grace, and then piled her plate with goodies. The professor gave her an amused smile.

  ‘This is a feast! I wonder, Miss Fisher, at your slenderness! If I ate like this every day I would not fit through a door, unless liberally greased. Beautiful chicken,’ he added, tasting a slice of the moist delicate flesh. ‘Lovely salads. Now tell me, Miss Fisher, if you would be so kind, what caused you to ask me to this Lucullan banquet?’

  ‘I am investigating the death of Augustine Manifold, and hoped you might be able to tell me about him. I haven’t got any clear picture, you know. And although I did attend his wake at two separate parties, I still haven’t got him clear in my mind.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ replied the professor, possibly a little cast down. Still, the food was wonderful and Miss Fisher kept the best in wine, as well. He sipped a little of the moselle and began, ‘He was a good fellow, Augustine…’

  ‘That’s what everyone says,’ exclaimed Phryne crossly. ‘It doesn’t mean anything, you know.’

  ‘No, it doesn’t,’ he agreed.

  ‘In any case, the port and coffee stage of lunch would be a good time for an interrogation,’ she told him. ‘Now is a good time for discussing neutral topics, like how do you like Australia? And are you staying? And how is the university treating you? And things of that order.’

  He smiled again and ate a forkful of creamy salade russe, with its beetroot and potatoes and mayonnaise which had not come out of a jar. ‘I like it here,’ he said. ‘I never want to be cold anymore, and I never am, not cold like Wales, where you look out in meagre daylight in January and know that there are three more months of misery and gloom before you see a glint of the sun. I can manage the hot days by staying inside and reading Xenophon. I have a nice house in Parkville and a housekeeper who can cook. Everything is so new here, so fresh, so unlike Europe, laden down with its horrible history of war and death. I had quite enough of war in the Middle East. The university appreciates my scholarship—such as it is—and I have enough time to get on with my book.’

  ‘Indeed? Thank you, Mr. Butler, perhaps half a glass. What is your topic?’

  ‘Xenophon,’ he said, accepting another glass of wine. ‘Anabasis.’

  ‘What I Did On My Holidays,’ said Phryne.

  ‘Now, now,’ he chided. ‘Xenophon is relevant. Modern, even. Consider our recent history. A Polish legion fought its way across Russia and Siberia during the revolution, and when they finally saw the sea, bless them, they didn’t call out in Polish but in Greek—�
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  ‘“Thalassa, thalassa! ”’ echoed Phryne. ‘Yes. True. Same went for Mawson, who had crawled the last few miles, when he realised he was at the end of a terrible journey. “Thalassa, thalassa!” It means “Home, home!”’

  ‘Or, “Rescue, rescue” or, perhaps, “We are, in all probability and against all odds, actually going to live through this.” Yes, indeed. How I recall—’

  He broke off and Phryne’s thumbs pricked.

  ‘You recall something about the war?’ she asked. ‘I never went near the Middle East, I was in France, driving an ambulance.’ Professor Rowlands looked at Phryne and decided, visibly, to trust her with his reminiscences.

  ‘Yes, well, I was in Palestine with Allenby, a consultant about things classic, incomprehensible, or archaeological. He was an amazing man. Looked just like an Empire hero, you know: tall, bluff, built like an ox, temper like Zeus Pater, chin you could strike matches on. The troops called him The Bull. When he was on one of his lightning inspections they’d radio ahead, “BL” which stood for “Bull Loose”. But he was remarkably learned and interested in everything.’

  ‘Archaeology?’

  ‘Certainly. And birds. No, thank you, I really couldn’t eat another crumb.’ Mr. Butler cleared the table as the professor went on. ‘Storks, for instance. He had all the lookouts reporting when they saw storks flying and in what direction. Big puzzle in the ornithology world, apparently, where did the storks go when they migrated into Africa. Allenby solved it. Admittedly most ornithologists don’t have an army to do their observations. And whenever the troops found anything buried when they were digging—lot of digging in army life, you know—he’d send me to find out what it was. They found at least two beautiful pavements, one Roman and one Hellenic, probably Herodian. And bones, lots of bones.’

  ‘Fascinating,’ said Phryne, as Mr. Butler brought in the sorbet of tropical fruits and the ice cream.

  ‘It really was,’ said the professor. ‘I didn’t want to be there, but then, neither did Allenby. He’d been sent to Palestine to fail. They said he called Haig a blithering idiot.’

  ‘No argument here,’ said Phryne, who had her own opinions on that general.

  ‘No, nor here—and his only child, a son, had just been killed in France. He was sick of soldiering and just wanted to go home to his birds. So he wanted to finish the war, and the only way he could do that was to win, and he rather efficiently did that, in a very short time. He took Damascus, cleared the Turks and Germans out of the whole of Palestine, and became Governor of Jerusalem, much against his will. He did it so well that the Jews thought he was pro-Arab and the Arabs that he was pro-Jew.’

  ‘Nice,’ approved Phryne. ‘I remember seeing the newsreel film of him walking into Jerusalem.’

  ‘Yes, well, he was far too modest a chap to ride into the Holy City. Considering the precedent, you know.’

  ‘Quite,’ agreed Phryne.

  ‘I was working with Richard Meinertzhagen, the spy. Clever Dick, the soldiers called him. He was a very cunning chap. Been with Allenby since the Boer War. We worked out a series of codes based on Plautus. That’s why I’ve never been able to read the plays without remembering the war, you see.’

  ‘Thalassa?’ prompted Phryne.

  ‘Oh, yes, we were lost in a dust storm in Judea, in the wilderness. Terrible storm. Dust in everything, mouth, ears, eyes, bitter dust. Hot as the depths of the inferno. We knew we would die if we didn’t find shelter soon. But no use sitting down and crying, so we staggered on. Up, always up, hoping to get out of the dust. Then it cleared and we saw the River Jordan, and we cried “Thalassa, thalassa!” as we rolled down the hill and into the water. Oh, it was lovely, so wet and cold. And fresh. If we had gone on in the way we were supposed to go on, it would have been the Dead Sea, and that would not have been refreshing. Dear me, I am prosing on. What did you want to ask me, Miss Fisher? Ah, yes. Augustine Manifold. He was rather all things to all men, you know, which is perhaps why you can’t get a clear picture of him. The single most important thing about Augustine Manifold was his ambition. He was going to get on, make his big transaction, settle his mother, and lead his own life, if it killed him.’

  ‘As it did,’ Phryne put in.

  ‘Yes, apparently.’ The professor sighed. ‘Well, let’s see. He was one of the finest self-taught minds I have ever encountered. Learned languages like a child, by listening, though he got his Hebrew from the elder Mr. Rosenberg and his Greek and Latin from a cramming class. Of all people he reminded me of George Borrow, who got drunk on words. And his discernment was remarkable. He could look at an object from a civilisation he knew nothing about—Mesopotamia, for instance—and say ancient or modern, fake or real. It was uncanny, almost supernatural. You know there are people who claim to be able to tell things about the previous owners from touching something they owned?’

  ‘Psychometry,’ said Phryne.

  ‘Yes, well, Augustine was like that. But he kept that skill well under his hat; he didn’t want anyone to think he was a lunatic. He did it for me, once, as a favour, with a Greek pot. He described the girl who had broken it, a Circassian slave, as if she had been standing in front of him. He kept saying, “But she’s got blonde hair,” because he thought all Greeks were dark. Bless him. But he was a chameleon, you know. A salesman. The ladies who bought his porcelain thought him deferential. His workers liked him. He is a great loss,’ sighed the professor, drinking his coffee.

  ‘What did that strange crowd of Gerald Atkinson’s want with him, then?’ asked Phryne.

  ‘Oh, they are hunting treasure,’ said the professor with a wicked grin. ‘And now they will never find it.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Phryne.

  ***

  Dark, again, and hot, with a tearing wind, and the tall man unlocked the postbox. His hand trembled so much that he could hardly manipulate the keys. He found the envelope. His hoarded notes were gone. Inside was a folded note. Same handwriting, same paper.

  Fifty in two weeks, or I tell.

  He stood with the paper in his hand for so long that a passing policeman diverted from his beat to ask if the gentleman was ill. His face, in the streetlight, was as white as the paper he held in his hand.

  The man gave a muttered excuse about the heat and hurried away.

  The policeman watched after him. He would go down in his notebook, along with everything else that happened on this hot night, when the dogs were cranky.

  Chapter Eleven

  The best actors in the world, either for tragedy,

  comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical,

  historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-

  comical-historical-pastoral, scene individable,

  or poem unlimited.

  William Shakespeare

  Hamlet

  Phryne put down her coffee cup with a click. ‘Treasure?’

  ‘Yes, you see, it fascinates everyone, the idea of treasure. Gold, jewels, buried in the ground, free to all finders. Except it isn’t, of course.’

  ‘What sort of treasure?’ demanded Phryne, not to be deflected.

  He chuckled. ‘The usual sort, see previous reference, gold, jewels, coins etc.’

  ‘You, sir, are trifling with me,’ she told him.

  He smoothed back his white hair and smiled at her. ‘Sorry. It’s just so ridiculous. Well, Miss Fisher, to break a confidence, they told me that Blackbeard the pirate—that is, Edward Teach—had buried many hoards, and they wanted one of them. And it was no use me saying that the treasure might have been buried by the said pirate, but who was to say that it was still there? I was reminded of Maes Howe in Orkney. There is a Viking inscription on the wall. “Treasure lies to the South East. Happy the man who finds it.”’

  ‘And I was the man, and I’m very happy?’ guessed Phryne.

  ‘How acute you are! The Orkneyinga Saga say
s that they did indeed find it, and had a great deal of trouble—even for Vikings, who were used to trouble, mostly causing it. They said that two of their number went mad, and it was very inconvenient carrying them and the treasure with the dead kings throwing gold cups at them all the time.’

  ‘Haul comrade ten yards, drop comrade, go back for gold, haul gold ten yards, pick up comrade. Yes, I can see that it might have been inconvenient. I have been into Maes Howe and it is a haunted dark place. Gave me a case of the willies which I have not had since Mycenae, which it strangely resembles.’

  ‘Yes, it’s one of the puzzles,’ he agreed, picking up a biscuit. ‘It’s a perfect Mycenaen chambered beehive tomb, and it’s in the middle of nowhere—as far as the Greek world was concerned, of course.’

  ‘Mysteries,’ said Phryne.

  ‘There are lots of them,’ he agreed, and crunched his biscuit. ‘Fortunately.’

  ‘About this treasure,’ she pressed. ‘What had Augustine to do with it?’

  ‘He sold them various artifacts which he said came from the hoard,’ he replied. ‘Pieces of eight. Gold chains. Things which might indeed have been of the right century. But nothing that pinned it down. So the next step was…’

  ‘A treasure map? Of, as it might be, an island? With an X marks the spot on it?’ demanded Phryne sarcastically.

  ‘And palm trees and directions like “fifty paces north from the place of skulls”. Yes. I fear so.’

  ‘It must have been a hoax.’

  ‘And yet, I never thought Augustine a humorous man, and I knew him as rigidly honest. Even as an antique dealer. He never said something was original if it wasn’t. He made rather a point of showing that, for example, a painting had been retouched or a furniture leg repaired. His patrons loved him for it and bought even more from him. Would he so lightly throw that reputation away?’