Death by Water (27 page)

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As Phryne went into the lavatory she reflected that it mustn’t be a lot of fun to be as greedy as Mrs West was. ‘These are the four that have never been filled . . .’ Kipling knew about greed.

When she returned to the dancing the Melody Makers were in full swing and the room was thronged with costumed people.

‘Who,’ demanded Jo in her sweet tenor, ‘stole my heart away?

Who?’ Phryne sat down until the song was over, and before then Theodore Green found her. She was still the only woman he could dance with. All others retired lightly trampled. And Miss Fisher was only wearing slippers! He could really hurt her!

But she glided into his arms and it was all right again. He forgot what his errant feet were doing and he heard no cries of pain from his second waistcoat button, where her neat black head rested. ‘We’ll make hay while the sun shines,’ promised Jo. ‘We’ll make love when it rains.’ Navigation Officer Green danced and was happy.

Phryne liked dancing with the Navigation Officer. He didn’t mind her leading. Of course, given his level of terpsi-chorean skill, he might not have noticed she was leading . . .

‘I wonder why all the songs say that they can only be happy in a nice country cottage with Old Mister Moon shining in through the window?’ she asked. ‘Most people I know would be bored to tears in a week. The country is really quite crude, you know.’

‘I don’t know,’ he responded. ‘I’ve been at sea since I was thirteen. Before that I lived in an industrial slum. Not a lot of greenery there, unless you count the scum on the river. I might ask Mr Cahill,’ he said, as Mrs Cahill floated past in the experienced arms of the captain, who knew what he liked and was dancing with her.

‘He’d tell you that you needed ten thousand acres before
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you could even start,’ said Phryne. Mr Cahill was dancing with Mrs Singer and had even coaxed her into a laugh.

‘Miss Lemmon has taken a shine to that Mason boy,’ said Theodore Green as the rani and Death circled past. Phryne tried to look at the navigation officer’s face, which is hard to do while dancing a foxtrot.

‘I fancy she feels sisterly,’ she said, in case Miss Lemmon inclined towards a belief in the saying that every nice girl loves a sailor. ‘He needs a sister.’

‘He needs a straitjacket,’ said Mr Green with uncharacter-istic energy. ‘And that Thomas, he ought to be the boy’s keeper.

He doesn’t seem to be doing his job. He got drunk with three stokers this morning and I had to confine him to sickbay until he stopped carrying on.’

‘What was he saying?’ asked Phryne.

‘Oh, that he knew things, and people would see what it was to discard him, things like that. Just gibberish,’ said Theodore Green kindly. ‘It takes some people that way.’

‘So it does,’ agreed Phryne.

The evening went on. The band played. Phryne collected some champagne—that’s not the good champagne, Mam’selle, as Pierre the wine waiter had told her, slipping her a glass of Clicquot—and wandered over to greet the Melody Makers.

She observed Lizbet Yates take her wad of Lumberjack out of her mouth and stick it—horrors!—behind the edge of a Tiffany screen.

‘You can tell she was born in Port, can’t you?’ commented Jo, amused at Phryne’s horrified expression, visible even through the Manchu mask. ‘It’s all right, gorgeous Chinese lady. The stuff won’t stick to glass, not bond with it.’

‘Useful, though,’ said Lizbet sulkily. ‘Sets like concrete after a couple of days. We’ve used it to repair music stands and fix
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water bottles and mend leaky valves, and you remember that night in Darwin when the bike tyre lost its seal and we thought we’d never get back to the ship in time . . .’

‘All right, all right,’ conceded Jo. She stroked her immacu-late front complacently. A very male gesture. All Jo’s gestures were male. ‘It’s a tool kit in itself. No home should be without it. But I still say that when you’re chewing it you look like a cow.’

‘Jo,’ Mavis began, as Lizbet picked up her trumpet in a meaningful manner.

‘Drinks for the orchestra,’ announced Phryne promptly.

‘What’ll you have, girls? Ask Pierre, he will be delighted to serve you. And can you find another glass of that excellent champagne for me?’ she added in rapid French. He grinned conspiratorially, booked orders for the ladies, and sped away on his errand of mercy.

‘Sorry,’ said Jo. ‘I take it back. Face it, Lizbet, I’m just jealous of your boyfriend.’

The Melody Makers laughed with relief. Phryne watched the party begin to wind down. The older dancers had already found chairs and were fanning themselves and wondering about the awful energy of the young. Phryne saw Mrs Cahill, pink and perspiring, drinking iced champagne cup with Mr Aubrey and Mr Cahill. Margery Lemmon was still dancing with Death.

The doctor was attending to a guest who had, under the influ-ence of punch, attempted to do the black bottom and landed squarely on her own. Professor Applegate was sitting by the wall, nodding while she listened to some important fact that Theodore Green was imparting to her. The Wests were dancing together to the gramophone which replaced the band during breaks.

The band drank their drinks and limbered up lip, wrist and voice. ‘We’ll be going up to the sun deck after the captain
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hands out the prizes,’ Lizbet said to Phryne. ‘For the last set.

Here comes the captain now.’

Captain Bishop had enjoyed his evening. No one had got unpleasantly drunk, immense ingenuity had been shown in the costumes and everyone had been civilised. He liked his ship to be happy. Mind, tomorrow there might be some sore heads, but tonight all was gas and gaiters.

‘Ladies, gentlemen,’ he began. The drummer gave him a sting to attract attention. But Captain Bishop’s powers of projection had been formed as a reefer in a tearing gale going around the Horn, and needed no augmentation. ‘It has been a lovely evening,’ he said. There was applause. ‘And now, before we move up to the lido, I need to present the prizes. For the most beautiful lady,’ he said, and paused. ‘A dreadful task to choose between so many beautiful ladies, so I left my choice to my officers. And they tell me that the most beautiful lady in the room is . . .’

Phryne saw Jonquil West start to move toward the captain, confident that her name would be called.

‘The Honourable Miss Phryne Fisher,’ announced the captain. Table three applauded loudly. Phryne passed Jonquil on her way to the captain, and thought that one of Circe’s snakes had uncoiled and hissed at her.

She accepted a silver cigarette box embossed with the ship’s name and her own. She bowed in proper Chinese fashion and to her amazement the captain bowed back, to the exact depth required by custom. Captain Bishop had not wasted his time ashore in foreign ports.

‘The most ingenious costume,’ announced the captain. It went to a young man fetchingly disguised as a billiard table, and Phryne hoped it made up for the very uncomfortable evening he must have spent inside that green baize box.

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‘The most popular costume award,’ said Captain Bishop,

‘is given by acclaim amongst the judges. And that award goes to Mrs Cahill, a very pearl amongst princesses.’

Mrs Cahill, with an expression that indicated her night was complete but her feet were starting to hurt, accepted her prize to the accompaniment of good natured cheers.

Then the party began to break up. The professor, Mr Aubrey, the Cahills and Mr Singer took their leave and sought their virtuous couches. Phryne, the Wests, Death, Margery Lemmon, Mrs Singer and the younger persons followed the Melody Makers up the stairs to the lido, where the stars blazed like lanterns. There was no wind, so it was not freezing, but Phryne did spare a moment to hope, piously, that Mrs West might not catch the pneumonia she was so assiduously court-ing. Phryne found a corner and a seat and lit a cigarette as the dancing began again. The heelless slippers were not ideal dancing shoes and she was thinking of going below. It had been fun. A really charming evening.

Death swung past her, gown billowing, dancing with a lady in very fluttery garments. Mrs Singer was dancing with a man disguised as a wizard. Phryne watched for a while, content to sit still. There was something wild and strange about music across the water. The dockyard continued its work, never stopping, as any delay cost someone money. Ships came here from all over the earth and bore away good nourishing New Zealand butter and wool and rock lobsters to a cold and hungry world.

Fascinating.

The music went on. Phryne stayed where she was, as serene as a Chinese doll. She was still watching the derrick move, the hook never stopping, the slings lifted and set down with wincing care, when the last dance was announced and she got up to find someone to dance it with.

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The party had thinned out to the stalwart, the inebriated and the diehards who never left before someone played ‘Now Is the Hour’. She held out a hand to Jack Mason but Death did not seem to see her. She claimed the doctor and they began the last, slower, nearly-ready-to-go-to-bed circling of the lido.

‘Now is the hour, when we must say goodbye,’ the song began. Phryne, leaning a little on the doctor’s chest, which smelt pleasantly of iodoform, was in the perfect position to see a boathook shoot out of the mass of dancers, hit Death squarely in the middle of the back, and precipitate him into the sea.

One moment the antic figure with flapping black garb was whirling along, holding on to his partner with one arm and his scythe with the other. The next, he was a kicking, screaming stick figure, plunging down into the night-black air until, far below, there was a splash. And thereafter nothing.

Madam Lina Fejes

Kecskemet Hungary

Honoured Lady

I write to inform you that my sister Maurika hereby tenders her
resignation from your household. Please inform your brother that
she is leaving immediately for America. Any letters will be returned.

Petofi family

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CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Like a God self-slain on his own altar
Death lies dead.

A Swinburne

‘The Forsaken Garden’

As soon as it happened Phryne looked hard at the crowd, trying to imprint the picture on her mind so that it could be examined later, when she was less shocked. The Melody Makers had frozen mid-note. They were all in their places, except Jo. The dancers were milling around, trying to stare down into the water, screaming for help or demanding that someone force brandy down their throat according to preference. The doctor and the other officers had gone to deal with the emergency with well-trained efficiency.

Phryne stared hard. Mr Singer was holding his wife by the arm; he had decided not to go to bed, then. Margery Lemmon was leaning over the rail, with Jo of the Melody Makers hanging on to her waist and telling her not to be foolish. The Wests stood next to each other. All the rest of her table had
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gone to bed. Poor Jack Mason. So very young, and now not to get any older or acquire any sense. What a waste.

Phryne backed a little and sat down on her previous bench.

Then an officer returned, indistinguishable in white uniform and cap. He raised his hands.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, we are doing all we can. Could you go to your cabins now? And stay there while we do what we have to do. If you would be so good,’ he added. Phryne knew that he had to be Navigation Officer Green.

Obediently, Phryne turned to the staircase. Guests were now tumbling down it, anxious to be out of the night and the cold and the breath of death. Jo hauled Margery Lemmon back and shoved her towards the stairs. The Melody Makers gathered their instruments and came too. Phryne wanted a drink and some time to contemplate what she had seen. She spoke a few sentences to Pierre in passing and he supplied her with a bottle wrapped in a white napkin in a deep basket. Conversation in the Grand Salon was shrill and hysterical and Phryne did not want to hear it. She made it to her suite, locked herself in, and placed herself and the Manchu make-up for a sinfully long time under a hot shower.

Her face felt dry, so she sat at the dressing table and applied cream. The she opened the basket, unwrapped the bottle, and poured herself a full glass of the Petit Duc cognac. The basket also contained a selection of cocktail canapés. She was thinking so hard that she jumped when something laid a respectful paw on her knee. She looked down. It was Scragger, appearing slightly less disreputable than usual, politely intimating that crabmeat vol-au-vent did not come his way very often.

Phryne was pleased to see him. She spread the napkin on the carpet and supplied the more fishy of the available treats with a liberal hand. The cognac was soothing her nerves. And
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it was nice to be able to smile without feeling that she was going to crack her face.

Scragger made a good meal. As an old campaigner, he ate with a certain amount of whoofling and spattering, but then he meticulously cleaned up every edible scrap and sat down to give his fur a lick and a promise.

Phryne ate the rest of the canapés while she wrote out her statement describing exactly what she had seen, and appreciated his company.

When Dot came in disgracefully late, Phryne was asleep, and there was no trace of Scragger but the white napkin, decorated with paw prints, still lay on the floor.

Detective Inspector Evelyn Minton of the Dunedin constabu-lary was having a bad night. Awful enough that he should be named Evelyn in a man’s profession like the police. Still, he reflected, it could be worse. He could be either of his brothers