Introducing the Honourable Phryne Fisher Page 21

  Bunji chose an extravagant felt with a bunch of violets over one ear in which she looked indescribable. Phryne did not shudder but packed it up in a box and rang for tea.

  ‘By the way, there’s a daughter in that family — Amelia, I think that’s her name. She came to watch Bill fly once. Arty type. Grubby but pretty, slender and pale. I asked her if she wanted to go up with me and she came over all faint, had to be helped to a chair,’ Bunji snorted, not unkindly.

  ‘Poor kid, living with them two, she’s had all the spirit crushed out of her. But she did a fine watercolour of the flight. Don’t know anything about art, but I thought she was rather good. She gave it to me, and I put it on the wall at once. Bill saw it and said, “It’s very nice of you to encourage my sister, Bunji,” as if the stuff was rubbish, and I came right back at him and said that I thought it was a jolly good painting and that he was a philistine, but by then the girl had crept away. He’s a brute, Bill is. I don’t like him. Anyway, dear, ta for the tea and the dinner, and thanks for the gown. I’ll come and see you when you’re settled, Sherlock, and if you want a bit of a fly, just look me up.’

  Bunji breezed off, and Phryne, rather depressed, put herself to bed.

  CHAPTER THREE

  ‘Qu’ils mangent de la brioche’ (‘Let them eat cake’)

  Marie Antionette (attributed)

  Dot sat down to an early tea with Mr and Mrs Butler. There was thick vegetable soup, an egg-and-bacon pie, and apple crumble, with many cups of strong kitchen tea.

  ‘Well, Else, I reckon it’s a nice little house and she’s a nice girl, eh?’ beamed Mr Butler, who had won his duel with the plumber. Everything that Miss Fisher had decreed should flush, now flushed enthusiastically, and the electric fires, about which Mr Butler had had doubts, were working perfectly. Dot frowned. She did not know if this was a correct way to speak about Phryne.

  ‘She’s a lady,’ reproved Mrs Butler. ‘And don’t you forget it, Ted. She’s got grand relations at Home and her dad is related to the King.’

  ‘She’s still a nice girl. Knows what she wants and gets it. And pays for it. Us, for instance.’

  ‘You see, my dear,’ Mrs B. said to Dot, ‘we weren’t going to take another place when our old gentleman died. Such a nice man. He had good connections, too. He left us enough money to retire — a little house in Richmond and a bit of garden, just what we’ve always wanted. But Ted and me, we ain’t old yet and somehow we didn’t really want to retire, not if we could find a good place. A smaller establishment, with no children and other help coming in for the laundry and the rough work. We put ourselves on the books of the most exclusive agency, and doubled our wages. Miss Fisher sent the solicitor to interview us and we told the lawyer what we wanted. All Miss Fisher required was that we swore not to disclose any of her personal affairs to anyone, and naturally we’d never do that. Then the solicitor upped and asked us when we could move in to supervise the alterations, and so we agreed to try out for six months and see if we suited one another. So far it’s going well. What about you, dear?’

  ‘I’ve been with her for three months,’ replied Dot. ‘She helped me out of a scrape. I was out of place because the son of the house was chasing me, and she took me on. Since we started this private investigator stuff it’s been all go. The only thing that might annoy you is tea at all hours if she’s working on a problem, otherwise she’s lovely,’ said Dot, taking another mouthful of apple crumble. ‘This is delicious,’ she added. Mrs Butler smiled. Like all good cooks, she loved feeding people.

  ‘Do you like cars, Mr Butler?’ Dot asked.

  ‘Call me Ted. I love cars. Always wanted to handle a machine like Miss Fisher’s. Lagonda, is it?’

  ‘Hispano-Suiza,’ corrected Dot. ‘She drives like a demon.’

  Ted’s eyes lit up. ‘I expect she’ll let me drive her to parties and balls and so on. I shall have to get a chauffeur’s cap.’

  Dot wondered how she was to mention Phryne’s habit of strewing her boudoir with beautiful naked young men. She could not think of a method of introducing the subject and decided to leave it to Phryne to cope with.

  ‘Well, Miss Williams, the bath water’s hot if you want it,’ said Mr Butler. ‘And the whatsername works, at last. I’m going to polish the silver,’ he said, and took himself off into the back of the house.

  ‘Call me Dot. I’ve got to be at the hotel by eight, Mrs Butler, so can you manage some breakfast at seven? Just tea and toast. Goodnight.’

  Dot climbed the stairs to her own room, washed her face and hands, and fell into a dreamless sleep in her own bed, in her own room. Outside, the sea roared in the first of the winter’s storms, but in 221B The Esplanade Dot was as snug as a bug in a rug.

  Breakfast the next morning was bacon and eggs. Mrs Butler exclaimed at the idea of sending such a thin young woman out for a long day’s work on tea and toast. Unusually full, Dot caught the tram and arrived at the Windsor in a lowering chill. The wind had dropped but the sky was full of rain. Dot clutched her coat close and ran up the steps, greeting the doorman as she passed.

  ‘You must be freezing!’ she exclaimed, as he fumbled with the big door.

  ‘Not as bad yet as it’s going to be,’ he opined, cocking a knowing eye at the sky. ‘Miss Fisher ain’t going to walk any aeroplanes today.’

  Dot found Phryne dropping her third armload of dresses onto her bed and staring at them.

  ‘I had no idea that I had this many clothes, Dot. I should give them away; what a collection.’

  ‘No, you need them all, Miss. You sit down and I’ll start packing. You make out a cheque for the bill, and I’ll have this all put away in a jiffy. By the way, the doorman knew about your stunt in the plane. You must be in the paper.’

  ‘Oh, good, I’ll go down and buy one. Can you cope?’

  Dot nodded. She would cope much better if Phryne was not there. Phryne took her cheque book and bag, and went out to drink coffee in the morning-room and check each item in a voluminous bill. She was sorry to leave the Windsor. In it she had found great joy with her lover, Sasha of the Compagnie des Ballets Masqués, now returned to France. While staying here she had broken a cocaine ring and had been instrumental in catching a notorious abortionist. It had been a fascinating three months, but one could not live in a hotel all one’s life. She sighed and poured more coffee. A bottle of Benedictine? When had she ordered that?

  Left alone, Dot packed away all of the clothes, the shoes and hats and multitudinous undergarments and cosmetics and books and papers. She counted the jewellery into its casket, locked it and pocketed the key. Then she rang the bell for the minions and went downstairs to see if Bert and Cec had arrived to carry the luggage.

  Offending the Windsor’s sacred precincts stood Bert, in deep conversation with the doorman. Bert was short and stout. He had curly brown hair and a hand-rolled cigarette firmly glued to his lower lip. His mate Cec, lanky and blond, stood guarding a dreadful van at the foot of the steps. Traffic edged around it, hooting bitterly.

  Phryne made three corrections in the bill, added it up anew, wrote out a cheque for a truly staggering amount and summoned the manager. He came with a long tail of staff members behind him, each wishing to be remembered by Miss Fisher.

  Her pile of luggage was being carried out by Bert, Cec and several boys who wished to acquire merit. Phryne rewarded them all, beginning with the smallest boy, and working her way up to the august manager himself, to whom she handed a sizeable douceur, which he took without a flicker.

  ‘Goodbye,’ said Phryne, giving him her hand. ‘I really hate to leave you, but there it is. Thank you so much,’ she smiled upon the enriched and grateful, and walked out of the Windsor, trailing her clouds of glory.

  She took her seat in the Hispano-Suiza, making the journey quickly, for it was freezing in the open car, despite her furs. She pulled up in style to meet Mr Butler at the gate. Dot preferred to travel with Bert and Cec.

  ‘Just bring her in here, Miss, and mind
the paintwork. Nicely she goes,’ he instructed, and Phryne took the car in without mishap.

  Mr Butler grinned and passed a doting hand over the red bonnet.

  ‘Mr Butler, I presume? Do you like the car?’

  ‘That I do, Miss. She’s a beauty.’

  ‘Good. See if you can get the hood up, I’m frozen. Winter seems to have come, eh? I’m expecting you to drive this car for me, so you can take her out for a little practice later, if you like. But be careful of her, she’s the only one in Australia, and where we shall get parts for her I do not know. I must go in, my toes have gone numb,’ were Phryne’s parting words before she ran up the garden path to the back door.

  She walked into a wave of warmth and the scent of cooking, and dropped into a chair in the sitting-room, where there was a small, bright fire. Mrs Butler bustled in.

  ‘Tea, Miss? Are you cold?’

  ‘Frozen, but rapidly thawing. Coffee might be better, but you’ll need to make tea for Bert and Cec and Dot, who are coming with the luggage.’

  ‘Very good, Miss. Cutlets for lunch, with creamed potatoes? Apple pie for dessert?’

  Phryne nodded, and took off one shoe. Her toes really had gone numb. She rubbed them briskly, reflecting that the Melbourne winter looked like being long and trying. She was grateful for the fire and all her other blessings for a quiet five minutes, before there was a thump at the door and she knew that the luggage had arrived.

  Bert and Cec were a team. They had worked together for so long, in the army and on the wharf, that each seemed to sense where the other was. Consequently they were very efficient.

  Apart from a few loud comments on her decor, Phryne did not hear a word or a bump as her possessions were carried up the stairs with ease and despatch.

  ‘Come and have tea,’ Phryne shouted as the last chest was carried in and Dot shut the doors of the sagging van.

  Mrs Butler brought in a trolley laden with cakes and sandwiches, and the big kitchen teapot. Bert and Cec clumped down the stairs to accept cups and perch themselves on the overstuffed chairs.

  ‘How have things been going?’ she asked, and Bert grinned.

  ‘We bought a bonzer new taxi,’ he took a sandwich, ‘and we sold the old grid. It’s been going good, Miss. And you’re in the paper, did you see?’ he added, flourishing the early Herald. Phryne looked at the front page. Bert’s stubby finger pointed out a picture of a young woman poised on the upper wing of a biplane, with the legend ‘The Hon. Phryne Fisher in Flight’, then her eyes dropped to a stop press underneath.

  ‘Mr William McNaughton was found dead on his tennis court today from head injuries. Police inquiries are continuing.’

  ‘Oh, Bert, look at that,’ she whispered.

  Bert read the paragraph and said, ‘Yair? Another capitalist bites the dust. So what?’

  ‘His wife is a client of mine. Are you on, if I need you?’ Bert handed Cec a cake and took one himself.

  ‘Yair, Cec and me is on,’ he agreed. ‘Good cakes these.’

  Dot finished her tea and ran lightly up the stairs to begin unpacking. Mr Butler accompanied her, more ponderously, with a pinch bar to open the tea-chests. Phryne wondered whether she should ring Mrs McNaughton, while Bert read another part of the paper aloud.

  ‘Irish Lottery won by Melbourne Flyer,’ he said. ‘Blimey! What a bloke could do with ten thousand quid.’

  ‘Really?’ asked Phryne. ‘What bloke is that?’

  ‘It’s here, in yesterday’s Herald. Henry Maldon, famous flyer, who last year won the air race from Sydney to Brisbane, has been confirmed as the winner of the Irish Christmas Lottery, a sum exceeding ten thousand pounds sterling. Mr Maldon today refused to either confirm or deny that he was the winner, but his housemaid Elsie Skinner agreed that the letter bearing the superscription “Irish Lottery” had arrived on that Monday in January, and that both Mr and Mrs Maldon seemed very happy. Mr Maldon has been married for three years to the former Miss Molly Hunter, the daughter of a prominent grazier family. They have one child, Alexander. The six-year-old child of Mr Maldon’s former marriage, Candida, lives with the family. When asked what he would do with the money, Mr Maldon closed the door and refused to talk to our reporter.’

  ‘I don’t blame him,’ commented Phryne.

  ‘Yair, and I can think of one housemaid who is now out of a job,’ said Bert.

  ‘Yes. Will you stay for lunch?’ asked Phryne, and Bert shook his head.

  ‘We got a living to make,’ he said gloomily, then spoiled the effect by grinning. ‘So give us a shout if we can help with any of the. . er. . rough work, Miss.’

  He collected Cec and departed. Phryne took up the newspaper and began to read. She was restless and could not concentrate. How had Mr McNaughton died? Had Bill been arrested? Should she call Mrs McNaughton, who would be a bundle of hysterics by now?

  Phryne was summoned by Dot, who wanted her to make the final decision on which of her clothes were to be given away, and the subject proved so absorbing that lunch was announced before the two of them had finished more than half of the garments.

  The cutlets, creamed potato and peas, and the apple pie were excellent, and Phryne said so, treating herself to two cups of coffee before she allowed Dot to drag her back to her room. After another hour, Dot had stored all the good clothes and had a heap of rejects in the middle of the floor.

  Phryne stood up and said decisively, ‘You can have whatever you like, Dot, and then you have my full permission to dispose of the rest. I am going to ring Mrs McNaughton. I should have done so before, but she is going to be in such a state. .’

  At that moment, the doorbell rang, and Phryne heard Mr Butler’s firm tread in the hall. There was the sound of the door opening, then a faint shriek and a thud. Phryne ran down the stairs and encountered Mr B. carrying a limp bundle with some difficulty.

  ‘Mrs McNaughton, Miss,’ he observed gravely.

  ‘Lay her on the couch, please, and ask Mrs B. for some tea.’ Phryne removed the woman’s hat and elevated her feet. Dot produced smelling salts.

  ‘They’ve arrested Bill,’ whispered Mrs McNaughton, and lapsed back into unconsciousness.

  Mrs McNaughton had not been treated well by the stresses inherent in having a murdered husband and a murderous son. Her face was puffy with long crying, and her fair hair straggled all down her unmatching dress and coat. As Phryne eased her into a more comfortable position, three soaked handkerchiefs fell out of her sleeve.

  ‘Poor woman,’ observed Phryne. ‘I think we need a doctor, Dot. See if there’s a local one. Mrs B. might know. Tell him we can pick him up if he hasn’t got any transport. Ask Mr B. to ring the lady’s house and tell her staff that she is here, in case they are worried about her. And I shall fetch a blanket,’ she added to the empty room. She found a soft grey blanket in the linen closet and wrapped Mrs McNaughton carefully, as she was now shivering. She sat down on her new easy chair and began to search her patient’s handbag.

  There were keys, more wet hankies, salts, powder compact, a search warrant for the house, telephone number of Russell Street’s Police Station, one fountain pen (leaking), Phryne’s card, a card-case (mother-of-pearl), two letters tied with ribbon, a purse with seven pound three and eight-pence, and some powders in paper, marked ‘Mrs McNaughton. One powder as required’.

  Phryne replaced all the chattels except the letters, and opened them carefully, sliding off the elaborate bow of ribbon. She read rapidly, with one eye on her inert client, who moaned occasionally. As she read, her eyebrows rose until they disappeared under her bangs.

  ‘A fine, robust turn of phrase the gentleman has,’ she commented aloud. ‘Who is he?’ She leafed through the pages of passionate prose and found the signature: ‘Your devoted Gerald’. Gerald had not carried his frankness as far as putting his full name or address on the letters. Phryne folded them carefully in their original creases and slipped them back into the envelopes and the ribbon. Mrs McNaughton had hidden depths. Her husband�
��s name was — or had been — William, and she had been married for many years. The letters were recent, the paper and ink were fresh. The incriminating correspondence was back in the bag and Phryne was staring idly into the fire by the time Dot and Mr B. re-entered, escorting a very young doctor.

  He was tall and slim, with curly hair and dark brown eyes. Phryne felt an immediate interest and stood up to greet him. He took a stride forward, caught his foot in the hearthrug, and almost fell into Phryne’s arms. She embraced him heartily, feeling the strong flat muscles in his back before she replaced him on his feet and smiled at him.

  ‘I’m Phryne Fisher,’ she said warmly. ‘Are you the local doctor?’

  ‘Yes,’ stammered the enchanting young man, blushing with embarrassment. ‘Sorry. I still haven’t got used to the length of my legs. Hope I didn’t hurt you. I’m Dr Fielding. I’ve just started with old Dr Dorset; I’ve only been here a few months.’

  ‘I’ve just moved in,’ said Phryne. ‘I hope we shall be friends. Meanwhile, this is Mrs McNaughton.’ She indicated the supine woman, and Dr Fielding lost his clumsiness. He took a chair and sat down beside the patient, gestured to Mr B. to bring his bag, then gently pulled back the ragged hair from her face. He unhooked his watch and took her pulse, put away the watch, and laid the limp hot hand down carefully.

  ‘She’s collapsed from some terrible shock,’ he said sternly. ‘What has happened?’

  ‘Her son has just been arrested for murdering her husband,’ said Phryne. ‘I think that you would call that a terrible shock. She arrived at the door in a state and fainted into Mr B.’s arms. Did she say anything, Mr Butler?’

  ‘No, Miss Fisher. Just her name. Then she keeled over. Shall I fetch anything, Doctor?’ His voice was quietly respectful.

  ‘Yes, can you go down to the chemist and fill this prescription?’ Dr Fielding scribbled busily. ‘I can give her an injection which will help for the moment, and then she should be put to bed.’

  ‘Doctor, she doesn’t live here,’ protested Phryne. ‘She should be taken to her own home. And if I am to investigate the matter, I need her awake, at least for a short time, to tell me what happened when her husband was murdered.’ Dr Fielding looked Phryne in the eye.