Murder in Montparnasse (16 page)

‘That’s true,’ said the farmer, who had introduced himself as Alexander McLeod. ‘But this Eat More Fruit campaign has done wonders for our sales. You know, the bloke in Melbourne, Mr Clapp, the Commissioner, he’s got fruit stands on every station where you can buy a glass of fresh squeezed orange juice, or lemon or grapefruit or berry in season, melon, even banana, and the harvest looks good this year, God willing. Have a taste of this.’ He poured a glass of orange juice from the iced jug on the table. ‘Just have a sip. I watched the girl squeeze this jug only half an hour ago. Have a taste,’ he urged, and Hugh found the juice very agreeable, fruity and fresh with a suitable bite which saved it from being oversweet.

‘While you drink a few glasses of that every morning you’ll never catch a cold,’ said Mr McLeod. ‘And you won’t have to eat your way through a bale of leaves to get your vitamins, Captain Max. You tell your missus that and I’ll throw in a sack of mixed veg when you buy a crate of oranges. Fruit of the Gods, golden as the sun. But you got to squeeze ’em fresh, mind.’

Mr McLeod was waxing lyrical about his produce. With the taste still in his mouth, Hugh remembered something Dot had read to the girls.

‘The apples of the Hesperides,’ he said. ‘In this old legend. The Golden Apples of the Sun.’

‘You’re a young fellow with some learning,’ said Mr McLeod, approvingly.

‘What’s your line?’ asked Captain Max. ‘What are you selling?’

‘This and that,’ said Hugh Collins. ‘I mean, I’m looking for a bloke from round here, Thomas MacKenzie.’

‘You’re too late,’ said Captain Max, easing his waistband. ‘He a friend of yours?’

‘No,’ said Hugh.

‘Well, whatever business you had with him, it’s too late,’ said the captain. ‘He’s dead. Fell into an irrigation ditch and drowned. Matter of a couple of weeks ago.’

‘That’s too bad,’ replied Hugh. ‘An accident?’

‘That’s what they said,’ McLeod hinted darkly. ‘I dunno about it, I got my doubts.’

‘We all got our doubts,’ agreed Captain Max. ‘But that bone-headed cop kept going on about drunk and fell in the ditch and his brother-in-law agreed with him.’

‘Why does that matter?’ asked Hugh.

‘His brother-in-law’s the coroner.’

Hugh nodded. A lot of country towns tended to dynasties. Once you had the local policeman, the local schoolteacher and the local priest, it really didn’t matter who was mayor.

‘But why would the coroner want to cover up a strange death?’ he asked innocently.

‘Doesn’t want any trouble,’ McLeod told him. ‘Because his brother’s got his own irons in the fire, and a lot of townie cops poking around might upset him. Not all the fines that go through that police court go to the state,’ he said, shaking his head.

Hugh was horrified. Things were, he knew, different in the country, but surely not that different.

‘Does everyone know about this?’

‘Of course,’ said Captain Max.

‘Why hasn’t someone written to the police commissioner, then?’

‘What, dob him in? You crazy?’

‘Oh, of course, sorry,’ muttered Hugh. He’d met this attitude before. It took a great deal of courage to inform on anyone in Australia, unless they had just murdered your brother, raped your wife, killed your dog and burned down your house, when it was allowed that you might become a trifle terse and tell someone in authority. Something was going to have to be done about the Mildura policeman and he was not going to be a lot of help in Hugh’s enquiries about the untimely death of Thomas MacKenzie.

‘Ah,’ said Captain Max in quite another tone. ‘Pudding!’

It was a huge, steaming, heavily glazed spotted dog, with custard in a jug.

‘That’s the stuff to give the troops,’ admired McLeod.

After accounting for a lot of the pudding, a glass of port and a sugared orange for afters, Hugh dragged himself into the bar-parlour to digest. He felt like one of those huge snakes he’d heard about, which only eat one pig a year and then have to coil themselves around a tree and sleep it off for months. The girl behind the bar brought him a glass of fizzy salts.

‘Thanks,’ said Hugh, ‘but I didn’t order this.’

‘You’ve just eaten one of Ma Humphrey’s dinners,’ she replied, dimpling. ‘Everyone who gets outside one of her spreads needs a glass of fruit salts.’

‘Thanks,’ he said, sipping. There really didn’t seem to be any room inside him at all but the salts slipped down easily. The bar was otherwise empty. The girl, with a swift glance at the green baize door on her left, leaned on his chair.

‘I heard you was asking for Tommy MacKenzie,’ she whispered.

‘That’s right.’

‘Why did you want him?’

‘Just a friend of a friend,’ said Hugh easily. He knew this situation. If nothing interrupted the girl, she would tell him something. What he had to do was to keep his temper, rein in his impatience, and keep smiling. It was a skill which he likened to what his grandfather had told him about salmon tickling. You wait for the fish to slide itself into your hand, caress it very gently, then one finger in a gill and flip!—it’s out and on the bank. He had honed this skill on the Bad Girls of Brunswick Street and the even Badder Girls of St Kilda when he had been trying to catch a man who mistreated prostitutes. He knew that they had some clue to the attacker’s identity, and that they would probably tell him if he allowed them to take their time, bought them drinks, and smiled. Old Jack Robinson had snorted and told Hugh that he had a way with women which would get him into deep trouble if he wasn’t careful, son.

‘Someone killed Tommy,’ said the girl fiercely. She was small and bottle blonde, with dark brown eyes.

‘Why do you think that?’

‘’Cos he wasn’t drunk when he left this pub,’ she observed. ‘They said he fell into a ditch and drowned, dead drunk. He wasn’t dead drunk when he left. I know he wasn’t.’

‘How do you know that?’ asked Hugh, tickling his salmon. He allowed just a suspicion of scepticism to seep into his voice, enough to flick the girl into further disclosure. She flushed with anger. Her voice rose a little.

‘’Cos I met him outside. We was courting. When his business was good enough, we was going to get married. I met him outside the back door at the gate. There’s a seat there. And he wasn’t dead drunk. He was only a little bit drunk and that’s because he hardly ever drank anything. He said he’d just made a good deal and said he’d meet me the next day to buy my engagement ring. But he never came,’ she said, her voice dropping back to a flat, grieved whisper.

‘Why are you telling me?’ asked Hugh, equally low voiced.

‘You’re a cop,’ she breathed. ‘Come to look into it. From the city. Well, ain’t yer?’

‘Yes,’ he said softly. ‘How did you know? And who else knows?’

‘Just me. I got a message for you from Russell Street. Came through the phone exchange just before you arrived.’

‘Then the whole town knows,’ said Hugh, dismayed. Telephone exchanges were the central clearing house for all gossip in small towns.

‘Nah.’ The girl flicked her brassy hair from her face. ‘My sister Elsie is the operator. She does the post office too. I asked her not to tell. She’s a good sort. She won’t tell.’

‘What’s your name?’ Hugh sneezed at the effluvium of Paris Nights eau de parfum which surrounded the girl.

‘Maisie,’ she said. ‘Gotta go. Here comes the Old Trout.’

A stout middle-aged woman came into the bar-parlour, shot a reproving glance at Maisie, who was polishing glasses behind the bar as if she had never left it, and asked for a small gin and tonic. She looked pointedly at Hugh, the sole occupant, and he stood up with some difficulty.

‘Hugh Collins,’ he said, ‘Were you responsible for that magnificent dinner, madam?’

‘Mrs Humphreys. I cooked tonight, yes,’ she said, smiling. ‘I reckon that travelling men need a good dinner. Puts meat on their bones,’ she said, giving Hugh’s massive shoulders and chest a quick, admiring once-over. He was not exactly flattered as he suspected that she might look at a bullock she had a mind to have slaughtered for the table with the same expression. ‘You travelling in something, Mr Collins?’

‘Just travelling, Mrs Humphreys. I was going to look up a friend of my brother’s—Thomas MacKenzie—but they told me at dinner that he’s dead.’

‘That was so sad,’ she said. ‘And I told that stupid cop, he never got that load on at my house. Bar closes on time at six, sharp. Different for travellers and residents, but he wasn’t neither. He was a nice quiet bloke, never drank much, never caused no trouble. I’m sorry he’s gone. Still, bottoms up.’ She drained her glass.

‘Have another?’ asked Hugh. ‘Don’t go leaving me all alone here,’ he added, to entirely remove the notion that he might want to be alone with Maisie. Mrs Humphreys waved a hand at the barmaid and she brought another gin and tonic.

‘You from the city?’ asked Mrs Humphreys, sipping in a ladylike manner.

‘Russ . . . I mean to say, Richmond,’ stuttered Hugh. ‘I’ve just finished a long stint at one job and wanted to wander about a bit, see the country. My brother used to live up here.’

‘He was a Collins too?’

‘Yes.’ Hugh wondered what terrible coil he was about to wrap himself in. In the city you could claim to know someone in a suburb and not get caught out unless you named a street. Here you couldn’t assume that anyone remained unknown within a fifty mile radius.

‘Must have been before my time,’ said his landlady, after racking her brains. ‘I’ve only been here five years. My husband bought a pub when he came out of the army. Then when he died I came over here. This was his cousin’s pub. I took over the licence. Well, good luck, young man,’ she said, draining the glass and getting up. ‘The washing up doesn’t do itself, you know. And I’m sorry about Tommy MacKenzie. If I were you, I’d ask the orange juice fellow. He was talking to him that night.’

‘What orange juice fellow would that be, Mrs Humphreys?’ asked Hugh, reverting to salmon tickling.

‘Why, he stayed at this very hotel. I can tell you who he was if I can look at the register. Maisie!’ she shrilled. ‘Get the register!’

‘All right,’ said Maisie. ‘If you mind the bar.’

‘Sauce,’ said Mrs Humphreys. She went behind the bar and absent-mindedly poured herself another tonic, to which she added gin in a way which conveyed that her left hand did not know what her right hand was pouring.

Maisie returned with the big leather-bound folio and Mrs Humphreys leafed through it.

‘Here he is,’ she said. ‘Foreign gentleman he was, though he spoke quite good English. “Enchanté, madame,” he said to me and kissed my hand. He spent a lot of time talking to young Tom MacKenzie.’

Maisie made a sound halfway between a sob and a snarl.

‘I’m making allowances for you because it was your young man,’ said Mrs Humphreys ponderously. ‘You get yourself a double brandy now, my girl, drink it down quick, and pull yourself together.’

Maisie poured and gulped. Her gasp and choke informed Hugh Collins that she was not a hardened spirits drinker, despite the dyed hair and the make-up.

‘Here he is. Nice curly writing, ain’t it?’ Mrs Humphreys shoved the book over to her visitor.

‘Very nice,’ said Hugh. He read the name. René Dupont. ‘A French gentleman, was he? And an address in Melbourne, in Collins Street, I see. Well, perhaps I can talk to him when I get back to Melbourne. What did you say his business was, Mrs Humphreys? Another drink for Mrs Humphreys, Miss Maisie, if you please.’

‘Oh no, I couldn’t,’ fluttered the licensee of the Mildura Hotel. Maisie sloshed impatiently and out of sight, and when the drink came it must have been close to neat gin. Mrs Humphreys did not gasp as she went on with the story.

‘Orange juice, it was. He had an idea of freezing orange juice and sending it to Europe, like they freeze beef. Trouble with oranges is that they spoil, but frozen juice wouldn’t spoil.’

‘And when did Mr Dupont leave?’ asked Hugh, gently.

‘Day after Tom MacKenzie’s death. Missed all the fuss. Nice gentleman . . .’ Mrs Humphreys was definitely fading out. ‘Well, I must go. Maisie! Take the register back.’

‘Yes, Mrs Humphreys,’ said Maisie with what Hugh guessed was unwonted docility.

The cook walked steadily out of the room—she had had practice, Hugh guessed. Maisie fled with the register and then came back and grabbed Hugh by the arm. He flinched a little. Years of hauling at brass taps had given Maisie a grip like an orang-utang.

‘What did you see in that book?’ she hissed. ‘You saw something suspicious.’

‘We shall have to get you into the Force,’ responded Hugh, freeing his arm before his fingers went numb. ‘The name first of all: it’s the French equivalent of Smith. And that address in Collins Street is the Melbourne Town Hall. I can see how I’m going to have to get a message to my boss about this Mr Dupont.’

‘Wait until nine,’ said Maisie, smiling for the first time since he had met her. ‘And we’ll go and see Elsie.’

The prisoner wept. No one heard her.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

It is best to vary the diet, for monotony jades the
appetite.

Auguste Escoffier,
Ma Cuisine

Dot came in as Phryne flung the fifth and last dress onto her bed and swore.

‘Hell’s bells! Come and help me, Dot, do, before I throw all my clothes out the window and go down to dinner naked.’

‘That would shock Mr Butler, and the poor little new bride as well,’ said Dot calmly. ‘What about mixing some of these up?’ she suggested. Phryne watched as Dot picked up a pair of soft dark blue satin lounging pyjamas and laid next to them a decorous, high necked Chinese brocade tunic. ‘That’s what Chinese women wear, near enough.’

‘Yes, but what if the girl has been dressed up in western clothes? I’d make her uncomfortable in her stockings and shoes,’ objected Phryne.

‘Then it’s time for Madame Fleuri’s latest,’ said Dot. She unwrapped a dark purple, beautifully draped dance length dress. Phryne accepted it and Dot dropped it carefully over her head so not a hair stirred out of place. The dress fell into perfect lines, bias cut, flowing, high necked.

‘There,’ said Dot, smiling. ‘Not Chinese and not western. Juste à la mode.’