Death Before Wicket: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries 10 (15 page)

‘Good,’ said Phryne. ‘See you tomorrow?’

‘Yes, it’s the cricket match,’ observed Joss. He was wondering mightily what Miss Fisher had done to Harcourt to make his eyes shine like that, but did not dare to ask. ‘The students against the faculty. You promised old Jones that you would be there, you said.’

‘So I did. Very well. I’ll see you there at ten.’

Phryne left Theo’s and was immediately seized by the neck as her foot touched the pavement. A huge man dragged her into an alley.

Eight

Here bowled by Death’s unerring ball

A cricketer renowned. By name John Small
.

Epitaph on John Small from
Carr’s Illustrated Dictionary of Extraordinary Cricketers
, J.L. Carr, Quarter Books London 1983

I
t was never easy to ambush Phryne, and she was in such a state of high arousal that she reacted like a cat. She slid through the headlock. How such a small, light sheila had done it Shark-bait Kennedy could never afterwards explain. She put her back against a wall and flicked open her purse.

Sharkbait Kennedy looked into the hollow eye of a small pistol and gulped. Born and bred in the ‘Loo, working for a female boss with all the delicacy of a conger eel, he entertained no comfortable illusions about the threats posed by the Weaker Sex. This lady—he hastily redefined her as a lady—was holding her pistol very steadily and he was in trouble.

‘I think you should tell me,’ said a voice so blackly furious that it stung his ears, ‘why you grabbed me. If you are just a common thief I’ll let you go. But if you’ve got anything to do with Madame and Marrin I’m going to shoot you in the belly and it will take you days to die and every moment will be agony. And I think you should talk quickly. I’m not in the mood for word games.’

The last person who had spoken to Sharkbait Kennedy in that tone of voice had been making plans for the deposit of some business rivals at the bottom of the harbour. Sharkbait talked quickly.

‘No, lady, I ain’t no tea-leaf, and I don’t know the parties you said.’

‘What do you want with me?’ The voice was still level and dangerous.

‘You been askin’ about Darlo Annie,’ said Sharkbait Kennedy, repeating his lesson. ‘Tillie don’t want yer to ask about ‘er no more.’

‘Doesn’t she?’ Sharkbait marvelled that such a lady-like voice could sound so poisonous. ‘Well, you tell Tillie this little visit was wet arse and no fish. I’m looking for Joan Thompson, who was born Joan Williams, my companion’s sister, last seen getting into one of Tillie’s cars. If she’s Darlo Annie I’m going to find her and nothing is going to stop me. If she isn’t Darlo Annie then I have no interest in the girl, but I am going to find Joan Thompson. Can you remember all that or do I have to put a hole in your unpleasant carcass to clarify your mind?’

‘Nah, lady, be nice. Don’t!’ he urged, as the finger on the trigger took up the slack. ‘Don’t do yer block. I’ll say it nice just like you did. Yer lookin’ for Joan Williams, yer want her back, if she’s Darlo Annie yer goin’ to find ‘er, if she ain’t yer goin’ to find this Joan. I got it,’ said Sharkbait hurriedly. ‘Dinkum! Don’t act the angora, lady! No need for violence!’

‘Walk in front of me,’ ordered the small, light sheila, and Sharkbait walked into Pitt Street.

‘Flag down that taxi,’ she ordered, and he stepped out into the road so that the cab was forced to halt, the driver leaning out and requesting in the name of all that was holy that he should speedily explain his impulsive and wrong-headed actions.

‘Go and give Tillie my message,’ said Phryne, climbing into the car. Sharkbait Kennedy walked away, shaking his head.

‘That was Sharkbait Kennedy,’ said the driver, nervously.

‘Was it?’ snapped Phryne.

‘He’s one of Tillie’s standover men,’ the driver went on.

‘Is he? Hotel Australia,’ said Phryne.

The driver, who was about to protest that his innocent cab was no place for a woman who had any dealings with such well known strong-arm bludgers as Sharkbait Kennedy, noticed the gleam of a gun barrel as his passenger shut her purse and decided that, after all, discretion was the better part of valour.

Anyone who could face down Sharkbait Kennedy deserved to ride wherever she liked.

Phryne threw herself down and buried her head in her pillow; she was trembling with rage. Dot, who knew the signs, sat down on the edge of the bed and remarked, ‘You know that cop? He telephoned. He said that no one answering the description of Darlo Annie or Joan was dead or in hospital. So that’s a relief, sort of. Would you like a bath?’ She offered Phryne’s usual method of relaxing.

‘No. I’d like a drink,’ said Phryne savagely. ‘The cognac, my notebook, and uninterrupted silence.’

Dot fetched the bottle and the notebook, tiptoed to her own room and shut the door. Quietly.

Phryne tore off her clothes, wrapped herself in a silk dressing gown of great magnificence, and sat down to the table, taking a gulp of cognac from the bottle and choking slightly.

Columns grew under her pencil. She needed to make sense of the players.

Those involved in the theft from the safe. The Dean himself, of course, private income, bad temper, always yelling at poor Sykes for his bad bookkeeping. He might have a reason to steal the books, if he had been diverting some of the bursaries to his own use, but why should he? And his wife had lost her garnets and might be exigent. Sykes. A rabbity man with not a particle of initiative, but he could have been using his perceived inefficiency to cover up his own theft and the loss of the books might preserve him from discovery. Harcourt, in league with Madame and Marrin, might have stolen anything on their orders, but said he hadn’t and Phryne was inclined to believe him. Joss the magnate’s son and Clarence the Arts black sheep of a medical family, both of whom had got her into this out of their regard for Harcourt? They didn’t seem to fit in as thieves or be subtle enough to enact such a double bluff. Professor Bretherton, who wanted that papyrus very badly for something other than the translation.

As did Madame and Marrin, who might have had other acolytes apart from Harcourt. What was it about that papyrus? Madame and Marrin wanted it for ‘a magical working’, but surely Bretherton didn’t believe in magic? From the photographic plate, there was nothing else on the face of the papyrus. Was there writing on the back of it? If it had been ancient, surely a good scholar like Bretherton would have translated it also. Until she found the papyrus Phryne did not like her chances of finding out from either party.

Who else? Brazell the anthropologist and Ayers the archaeologist, who wanted different things to be done with the Dean’s fund. Ayers wanted to go back to Egypt, Brazell wanted to go back to his desert—Ayers because his tastes inclined towards pretty boys; Brazell, presumably, because his tastes inclined towards sand. Old Professor Jones, who did not seem to have anything to do with any of it. Jeoffry Bisset, who loved beautiful things and grieved for the loss of Juana’s Book of Hours.

All of them, with the possible exception of those involved in the papyrus story, appeared harmless. All of them had keys to the faculty office and any of them might have noticed that the safe back could be removed by anyone with a screwdriver and a modicum of strength. Had Bisset taken a lady there on Saturday night to avail himself of the Dean’s couch, and improved the shining hour by emptying the safe?

Might be difficult to explain to the lady, of course, unless the lady was hired and very bad company indeed and it was her idea. Phryne’s pencil broke and she sat for a moment, contemplating Bisset and watching the curls of wood from her sharpener.

No. Bisset could certainly have robbed the safe and taken the Book of Hours home with him to cherish and protect it, but he could not have put the examination papers in Adam Harcourt’s carrel. Bisset was an idealist, and while idealists in Phryne’s experience were capable of sacrificing anyone to their ideal— like Chas Nuttall and his art—they were not mean, and the planting of those exam papers had been the act of a fundamentally mean personality.

Which one of her subjects showed that mean streak? Who would want Harcourt to fail? None of them, for all that Phryne could see.

But at least that little encounter in the alley had informed the elusive Tillie Devine of Phryne’s intentions, and if Tillie had Joan for some purpose of her own, she might release her to stop Phryne’s inquiries into the whereabouts of Darlo Annie, assuming that they were not the same person. She wondered where her own cold fighting ferocity had come from. She had fully intended to gut-shoot the attacker if he had come from the
soi-disant
magicians.

She read through her notes, took a deep gulp of cognac, and steadied her breathing. Should she have taken Harcourt home with her? She had been tempted. A pretty young man, just what she usually chose to beguile the idle hour. But Harcourt would fall in love with her, now that he was free. That would not be a good plan. He was intelligent and nervy, and she did not want to break his heart.

Phryne accepted that, at bottom, she was as promiscuous as a cat, with a cat’s honesty, appetite and complete lack of interest in what anyone else thought. She desired a lover at present, but even if Tillie Devine had kept a stable of young men she doubted if she would have bought their attentions. Something would turn up, she thought, pouring some cognac into a glass. One more drink then she would go to bed, dream suitably, and otherwise sublimate her lusts into solving the puzzle and getting back to Lin Chung.

She reflected as she sipped the cognac—shame to gulp such a good brandy—that she had left Lin Chung in the throes of matrimonial negotiation, and she would not have him for much longer. She had made a bargain with his grandmother. Phryne had Lin Chung while he was unmarried, and he reverted to his clan once he was married.

‘Heigh-ho,’ sighed Phryne, and put herself to bed.

In her dream she did not lie beside the smooth limbs of Lin Chung, but lay unable to move a muscle, splayed under the bulk of Marrin, and his teeth met in her throat. She felt the warm gush of her own blood on her breast and could not even scream.

Morning brought Dot, breakfast, and Professor Bretherton. At a nod, Dot allowed him into the bedchamber, where Phryne was sitting up, eating toast and marmalade and drinking coffee so strong that the scent hung heavy on the air.

‘Miss Fisher, where did you get café Hellenico in Sydney?’ he asked, inhaling deeply.

‘Dot made it for me. Do you want some?’ asked Phryne. She was still a little shaky from the dream, which had been so vivid that she had already examined her throat for teeth marks. There were none. The Professor nodded, and Phryne sent Dot to make some more over her travelling spirit stove.

‘Heavy night?’ he asked sympathetically.

‘You are the frozen limit,’ said Phryne with admiration. ‘The last time I saw you, John Bretherton, you were walking out on me at dinner. Have you come to apologise?’

‘Abjectly,’ he said, taking up her free hand and kissing it. ‘Will you ever condescend to forgive me?’

‘I’ll have to think about it.’ Phryne finished her toast and set the tray aside. The strong Greek coffee was clearing her head of the remnants of the dream. What had happened? Psychic rape, or the actions of her own imagination? Perhaps she might ask Dot for a holy medal—Phryne was not usually given to nightmares.

On the wings of her thought, Professor Bretherton reached into his pocket and produced a small stone which he dropped into her hand.

‘I understand from Harcourt that you rescued him from Madame and Marrin, a remarkable feat,’ he said. ‘More than I was able to do.’

‘Yes?’ Phryne encouraged. Dot handed Bretherton a small cup of the concentrated coffee and he sipped slowly. Phryne turned the pebble over. It seemed to have some carving on the smooth side, but she could not read it. It was evidently very old. It felt strangely warm, as though it had lain in the sun, and strangely natural, as though she was holding a cicada or a deep-sea shell, not an artifact.

‘I couldn’t get finer coffee in Athens,’ Bretherton said to Dot, who smiled and took the cup. Bretherton waited until the door shut after Dot before he began. ‘Madame and Marrin are devotees of Crowley and he is a devotee of Egyptian magic, or what he thinks is Egyptian magic. So are the Golden Dawn and you seem to have had some acquaintance with them, so possibly you have your own defences.’

Phryne scanned his face. He still looked like a respectable middle-aged Professor of Greek. White hair, still thick. Intelligent grey eyes. A strong face with the slightly pointed ears of the Celt; a Juvenalian who reliably found that the worst should be expected of human nature. This mysticism was unexpected.

‘But…’ she prompted.

‘You must have a great deal of natural force or you could not have out-faced that bounder Marrin. He had poor Harcourt firmly in his clutches and nothing I could say would convince the poor young idiot that it was all nonsense. Indeed, belief is a power all by itself. All the ancients agree, even Lucretius, who strove to convince men that they had nothing to fear from death because death was the end of all consciousness.’

‘I see,’ murmured Phryne, deciding that the Professor was wittering. ‘Tell me about this pebble.’