Murder on a Midsummer Night (15 page)

They followed him through a hall hung with oil paintings, presumably of ancestors. The house was dark and close and smelt faintly musty, as though the carpets could do with a good going over with vinegar and tea leaves. This must be the family home, Phryne thought. She had seen bigger, and better furnished.

Resolutely unconcerned, Phryne allowed the butler to announce her and Dot, then entered after a studied pause. And there were the Bonnettis, in council.

The children of Mario Bonnetti and his wife, Kathleen, nee O’Brien, had been as follows, Phryne recalled: Giuseppe, or Joseph, born in 1872, now fifty-six; Maria, born in 1874, now a nun called Sister Immaculata, who was not present; Sheila, born 1878, now fifty; and the youngest and last living child, Bernadette, born 1880 and now forty-eight. All of whom had married and presumably had children of their own. The room seemed crowded, though it was very large. Mr Adami, looking dapper but worried, conducted Phryne to the head of a solid walnut dinner table, where a large man was standing. There was a priest, as Phryne had expected, next to him. An old priest, which might be an advantage.

‘Mr Bonnetti, this is the Honourable Phryne Fisher,’ said Mr Adami. Phryne put her hand into the hard, strong hand of the head of the family. Mr Bonnetti had dark eyes and white hair and a commanding presence. This was someone used to being in charge. After all, his father had died more than twenty years ago, and he was the only male heir.

‘I am pleased to meet you,’ said Phryne. ‘This is my assistant, Miss Williams.’

Dot’s hand was also taken and pressed.

‘Very kind of you to help us with our little problem,’ Mr Bonnetti told Phryne. There was not a trace of an Italian accent in his voice. ‘Let me introduce the council. This is Mr Adami, whom you already know.’ Phryne smiled at the harassed lawyer. ‘This is Bishop Quinlan, who has agreed to assist us.’ Phryne shook the old man’s hand, cool even in the summer heat. He had a benign, closed, close-shaved countenance. Dot dipped gracefully and kissed his ring. ‘This is my sister Sheila and her husband Thomas Johnson.’ Phryne shook the hand of a thin, faded woman with a nervous twitch to the eyelids. All her nails were bitten to the quick. Her husband was large and florid, with blue eyes and thinning hair. ‘And this is my sister Bernadette, she is a widow, and her doctor, Dr James.’

Bernadette did not extend her hand but stared blankly down at her handkerchief, which she was folding and unfolding. She had the almost unlined countenance of the mentally bereft and a mass of beautiful hair, still reddish. Dr James gave Phryne’s hand a fast medical examination squeeze. Behind Bernadette’s chair stood a woman wearing the black dress and white apron of a household servant in the old days. Phryne smiled at her and she blinked timidly at this brightly dressed lady.

‘And this lady?’ asked Phryne.

‘Oh, that’s just Tata Guilia, she cares for Bernadette. Cared for all the children, and still here, eh, Tata?’ said Mr Bonnetti heartily, as though to a small child. Tata Guilia smiled a small, shy smile. ‘My sister Bernadette never really recovered from the birth of her last child,’ Mr Bonnetti told Phryne. ‘But sometimes she comes back to us so I thought she should be here.’ He shot a challenging glance at his brother-in-law, Thomas Johnson, who huffed. ‘Well, now, let us all sit down and let Miss Fisher inform us as to the results of her investigation.’

Phryne sat at the bottom of the table and surveyed the room. The chairs were heavy walnut, the walls were hung with dusty velvet curtains in faded red, and there were far too many ornaments, most of them precious, all of them needing a good wash. Phryne particularly liked a Staffordshire pair, maiden and swain, who had been grape picking, and were now returning with baskets on head and hip, depending on gender. The maiden was wearing a shawl of grey dust and there were cobwebs on the young man’s flowery hat. There were various gaps in the dust where things had been removed. How Augustine Manifold would have loved this house, she thought. Poor Augustine. Mr Bonnetti saw her glance.

‘We haven’t used this room for a long time. Not since mother became ill. I thought that I ordered it to be cleaned,’ he said meaningfully to a man standing by the door.

‘
Patrone
,’ said the factotum indignantly, in a heavy Italian accent. ‘Mr Johns, ’e no let us in. Troppo val’able things in ’ere, ’e said. ’E call us
ladri
—thieves!’

‘I shall speak to Mr Johns later,’ said Mr Bonnetti. There was an undercurrent of menace in the statement which made all present glad that they weren’t Mr Johns. Phryne hoped that he was the butler, who deserved a little putting-down. ‘But for the moment, forgive us our squalor and inform us, Miss Fisher.’

Phryne looked at Dot, who was far too overwhelmed to speak. So she began, ‘The first thing you asked me to find out was, was there a child? And due to the researches of both myself and my assistant, I can confirm this. There was a child. He or she was born in Ballarat at a home for fallen women run by the Sisters of Mercy on or about the fifteenth of January 1865. He or she was sent out to be adopted—’

‘Wait a moment.’ Thomas Johnson raised a plump red hand, glinting with rings. ‘You say he or she. You don’t know which, girl or boy?’

‘No,’ said Phryne. ‘Not yet. It has been quite difficult to get even this far, you know. If I might continue?’

‘How do you know the child didn’t die?’ persisted Thomas Johnson. He was sneering at Phryne, and she had never been very tolerant of being sneered at.

‘I don’t,’ she responded. ‘Yet.’

Mr Johnson stood up. ‘Seems to me you haven’t got a lot of information for our money,’ he insinuated.

‘Happy to resign the case any time you like,’ said Phryne, putting her hands on the unpolished table, preparing to rise.

‘No, no, no!’ scolded Mrs Johnson, Sheila Bonnetti as was. ‘Thomas, you said you’d be good and patient. You promised!’

‘This is a waste of time,’ he growled at her. ‘It’s just dragging the process out, so that you get less of your mother’s money than you should. We need that money. My business is—’ He had said too much. He sat down again, leaving his heavy hand on his spouse’s fragile shoulder. She winced and bit her lip.

‘Your business is in trouble?’ asked Mr Bonnetti, quietly. ‘Again?’

‘Just needs an injection of capital to turn the corner,’ bluffed Mr Johnson.

‘It seems to me that it has already turned a number of corners,’ said Mr Bonnetti. ‘And it seems to me that all of Sheila’s dowry has been expended in driving it around the corners, eh?’

‘Ridiculous!’ said Mr Johnson violently. ‘I lavish every luxury on her. Don’t I, dear?’ he said to Mrs Johnson, squeezing her shoulder.

‘Oh, yes, dear,’ she responded in a faint voice.

Phryne was disgusted. Dot was interested. She had not known that rich people behaved just the same as poor people. Only the surroundings were different. This was just like her uncle claiming that Dot’s grandmother had left the money to him, not his wife her daughter, and he could spend it as he liked. Which had been down at the pub buying beer for his mates. Uncle Jim had had that exact tone of voice, and that exact shade of brick red in his complexion, while he was telling Dot’s father that his wife was a happy woman.

She hadn’t believed Uncle Jim, either.

‘It was always about money,’ announced Bernadette, suddenly. Dr James took her wrist in his and began counting her pulse. ‘First Father’s money, and weren’t you angry with Mother for getting it, and didn’t you come almost every Sunday, Thomas, begging her for more money for the house, for Sheila, for the business? And didn’t you take a lot of her money for the dowries for your children, Joseph?’

‘Your children aren’t precisely begging in rags,’ sneered Mr Johnson.

‘She was pleased to set up a trust for the girls,’ protested Mr Bonnetti, sounding for a moment less sure of himself. ‘Bernadette?’

But Bernadette had gone again. Dr James shrugged. Tata Guilia produced some drops and beckoned to the man at the door to fetch something. He came forward with a glass of water. Everyone watched as the doctor measured out twenty drops, mixed it with a little spoon, and gave the glass to Tata Guilia. Gently, slowly, the old woman coaxed Bernadette to sip the mixture, though she made a face as if it was bitter.

‘Perhaps we might return to the object of this meeting?’ asked the Bishop in a creamy Irish voice. ‘Miss Fisher, could you forgive this interruption and proceed with your report?’

Phryne obliged. She was getting very tired of family scenes, of which she had experienced enough in her own family.

‘The father of the child was an actor called Patrick O’Rourke, who died in poverty and misery and is buried in the Melbourne General Cemetery. He left his child a message, but I have yet to puzzle it out.’ For some reason she did not want to expose that sad scribbled piece of paper to this well-fed prelate. ‘I can make further enquiries,’ she said, looking straight at Thomas Johnson. ‘If you wish me to do so.’

‘Of course,’ said Mr Bonnetti, standing up and folding his arms. He looked like he was posing for an heroic picture. The Patriarch, perhaps. ‘If you would be so good as to continue, and report your results in—say—a week’s time? Then we will all be in better humour,’ he said. ‘And this room will be fit to sit down in.’

‘Very well,’ said Phryne, and Mr Adami escorted her and Dot out. Warfare broke out behind her as she left.

‘Are they always like that?’ she asked, as the iron butler unbarred the portal and they were out in the sunshine again.

Professional confidence warred with what seemed to be real distaste. Mr Adami, Phryne realised, was a very honourable man.

‘Always,’ he said.

‘I reckon it’s a pavement,’ opined Bill.

‘Nice bit of work,’ said Jim. ‘Considering that the prof says it’s two thousand years old.’

‘What about the bones, then?’ asked Vern.

‘Chaplain sent the message to HQ. “Have found the bones of saint,” he said. HQ sent back, “No record of trooper Saint. Please supply full name, number and identity disc.”’

‘Them blokes,’ said Vern. ‘Wouldn’t know a tram was up ’em till the conductor rang the bell.’

‘Too right,’ said Curly.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Out of my lean and low ability
I’ll lend you something.

William Shakespeare
Twelfth Night

‘Phew,’ commented Phryne, starting the big car and allowing it to slide into the street, inches away from the elevated nose of a highly affronted Rolls-Royce.

‘Phew,’ agreed Dot, closing her eyes. It really was better if you closed your eyes while driving with Miss Phryne. You couldn’t see the near misses, just hear the horns and roars of fury. Due, doubtless, to the special intervention of her guardian angel, she never seemed to hit anything. Dot wondered what Phryne’s angel might look like. Overworked, she decided. Ragged, exhausted, lacking a lot of feathers and greatly in need of a heavenly tonic and a rest on a nice soft cloud, she thought, and giggled to herself.

‘Another frightful gathering,’ said Phryne, giving the steering wheel a deft twiddle to avoid a tram. ‘What did you make of all of them, Dot?’

‘Something cruel,’ Dot replied. ‘Not that I haven’t seen that sort of kerfuffle before. It’s just you don’t expect it in rich people. I thought if you were rich, had a bed and a roof and three meals a day, nothing to worry about, you’d have to be happy.’

‘You’d think so, wouldn’t you? Never mind, Dot dear, we’re happy, despite having all those things. Now, put your detective hat on and tell me about the people in that room.’

‘Well, Miss—’ Dot inadvisedly opened her eyes, gave a faint shriek and closed them again. It did help to think about something else, apart from how close that radiator had been. ‘I didn’t take to Mr Thomas Johnson. I reckon he beats his wife. She was shrinking away from his hand, you saw.’

‘I did,’ agreed Phryne. ‘That might have been a marriage for love to begin with, but now he just wants her for her money. And she is probably desperate to keep him, so she gives him whatever she has.’

‘And it isn’t enough. You heard him say his business needed more capital.’

‘There isn’t enough capital in the world to prop up an idiot like that,’ sniffed Phryne. ‘The perpetually unsuccessful could fail to make a profit at a knocking shop on navy night—sorry, Dot, at a drinking school in a brewery, I should have said. And perpetually angry, too; sure that the world is cheating them of their deserved success. Tiresome, very. Sheila’s heart didn’t seem to be in this family conclave, though.’

‘Don’t imagine the poor woman has any spirit left,’ said Dot, hanging onto her hat.

‘How old do you think he is?’

‘I don’t know, Miss. He certainly isn’t young but it’s hard to tell with gentlemen.’

‘Well-groomed, well-fed gentlemen, yes.’

‘Why do you ask?’ Dot opened her eyes and saw that they were on the Esplanade and close to home.

‘This child of shame, Dot, would now be sixty-five. It would be piquant if he happened to have married into the family.’

‘Lord help us!’ gasped Dot. ‘But that would mean . . .’

‘That he had married his half-sister. Indeed. Let us hope that it is not so. There, it wasn’t so bad as all that, was it?’

Dot got out of the car on wobbly legs, privately swearing she would never enter it again.

‘No, it was worse,’ she told her employer. ‘But it was fast!’

Phryne laughed and tore off her respectable hat. ‘Come in, then, and Mr Butler shall make you a sherry cobbler. We might even drink it in the garden. Now the wind has gone, it’s a very pleasant day.’

‘So it is,’ agreed Dot.

When they were settled at the white wrought-iron table with their drinks before them, Phryne asked Dot to continue her impressions of the Bonnetti family.

‘Well, Miss, there was Mrs . . . I never heard her married name. The sick lady, Bernadette.’

‘With the very attentive doctor.’

‘Yes. I saw why Mr Bonnetti wanted her there. When she’s herself she’s very acute. She knew all about the money.’

‘So she did. I wonder about her illness, you know. Did you notice those drops? They were valerian, very strong—I could smell it across the table.’

‘Yes, Miss, it’s used to calm people down. My mum swears by it for nervy people who can’t sleep.’

‘But too much of it for too long unbalances the mind. I remember one aunt of mine who used it so much that she did nothing but cry all day. The doctor sent her to Switzerland to recover. Which she did, after about six months of mountain air and huge meals and healthy walks along the snow line. Also, she fell in love with an alpinist and caused a scandal, but that does not concern us here.’

‘What was wrong with the alpinist? What’s an alpinist?’ asked Dot, drinking deeply of her sherry cobbler.

‘A mountain climber, and he was very lower class and—gasp—he was an Italian Catholic. But she married him anyway. The Fishers have always been strong-willed.’

‘So they have,’ said Dot, smiling at Phryne. The ground had stopped whizzing away under her feet and the sherry cobbler was very refreshing.

The hot sun was shining in an agreeably muted fashion through a canopy of strongly green leaves, jasmine and honeysuckle and clematis. The salty, plant-killing wind was repelled by high bamboo fences. Although the sweet spring flowers had gone, there were still bright pink, bright red and scented geraniums, and Mrs Butler’s herb garden, fertilised by the three chickens who clucked amicably in their run behind a bamboo screen. Mint grew at Dot’s feet, sheltering under the table. She recalled her task and resumed.

‘Mr Bonnetti’s wife wasn’t there,’ she observed. ‘You’d think she would be, at a family council. I gather he’s got a wife?’

‘Oh, yes, she does a lot of good works in the Italian community, runs boarding houses for immigrants and so on. I believe I have actually met her. At the Lord Mayor’s Show, I think. Robust woman in an overloaded hat. Possibly she had another engagement. Or possibly she isn’t interested.’

‘Still,’ said Dot. ‘It was strange. I thought it was strange.’

‘Anything else?’

‘Yes, Miss, that butler. Mr Johns. I never saw such a terrifying person! And the houseman told Mr Bonnetti he had given orders not to go into the room. Mr Bonnetti was not pleased by that.’

‘It’s all bluff, butlers—they’re servants,’ Phryne told her, sipping her cocktail. ‘Just look them straight in the eye and state your business. It would be funny if it was Mr Johns,’ she said idly. ‘But either of the two could have been the people at the funeral. T Johnson, that was the signature. Either Mr Johnson or Mr Johns.’

‘Yes, but that would mean they knew that Patrick O’Rourke was the father of this missing child,’ protested Dot.

‘Yes, it would mean that, and the matter now becomes impossibly complex. We are going to leave it to percolate, and we are going to have a nice talk about new curtains. Your room, Dot. Those flimsy ones were only a stopgap when I was furnishing the house in a bit of a hurry. What do you say to some heavier ones?’

‘The sun wakes me up very early,’ conceded Dot. ‘But it seems a shame to waste the cloth, and they’re such a nice pattern, those pretty birds in all my favourite colours. Maybe we could get a blind? Or a shutter?’

‘That’s an idea. But have a look at the catalogue, Dot, and see if we should get you some new ones. Use the flimsy ones in winter, perhaps, or have them lined?’

Phryne opened the huge Myer catalogue, and soon they were both absorbed.

Presently, they heard voices in the house. Lin Chung’s porcelain bath had arrived. It was being hauled up the stairs by two Chinese carriers and a giant. That was the initial impression. Phryne assumed that this broad expanse of muscle, lightly covered by a stretched blue singlet, shorts and boots, was the ‘large young fellow’ who was a connection of Mrs Butler’s and who was now to be hired to do the heavy lifting. He looked perfectly capable of lifting anything, up to and including a heavy goods motor vehicle.

Phryne and Dot watched as the large package was manhandled up the stairs and into her boudoir.

‘I’ll just get the broom and clean up the packing,’ worried Dot.

At that moment the doorbell rang and Mr Butler paced magisterially off to answer it. There was a flurry of footsteps and a young man scrambled inside, found Phryne in the parlour, and flung himself at her feet, panting, ‘You have to help me! They’re all mad! They’re going to kill me!’

It was James Barton.

‘Shut the door, Mr Butler, if you please,’ said Phryne calmly. ‘We shall conduct Mr Barton into the small parlour, and perhaps you can supply some very strong coffee? Never mind the packing, Dot, go to the spyhole and tell me what you can see.’

Dot obeyed. There were little telescopes built into several places in Phryne’s house. She examined the front gate, then moved to the girls’ part of the house and examined the side way.

‘Nothing there,’ she reported. ‘No people. No car, either.’

‘All right. Come along now, old thing,’ she encouraged, hauling James Barton up by the shoulder. ‘Come along with me and you shall have coffee and I will protect you, in all probability.’

‘They’re all mad . . .’ he shuddered, but cooperated enough to allow himself to be lowered into a soft chair and supplied with a handkerchief, a glass of cold water and, in due course, a cup of coffee so strong that Mrs Butler sent it into the parlour in a kitchen cup, not being too sure of the strength of Miss Phryne’s Clarice Cliff or the good bone china. It was heavily sugared, for shock. His hands were shaking too much to hold the cup.

Phryne watched as Dot helped the young man absorb the dangerous fluid. There was enough ‘awake’ in that coffee to keep him alert for the term of his natural life. Though he seemed convinced that that would not be long. He was genuinely terrified, Phryne thought; sweating, shaking, eyes dilated black.

Jane and Ruth came in, attracted by the noise, were warned by Dot and went out again, though Phryne was sure that they would be loitering just outside the door. James Barton did not seem to see them. He was still sobbing. And Phryne had thought him the most sane of the Atkinson clique! Of course, that wasn’t saying much . . .

The doorbell rang again. Mr Butler went to answer it and James Barton curled into a ball and screamed, ‘Don’t let them in!’

But the visitor was Lin Chung, looking concerned.

Phryne left James in Dot’s care and watched as Lin dismissed the Chinese carriers, blinked respectfully at the large young fellow, and conducted Phryne upstairs to view her latest acquisition. She was delighted. It was a large porcelain tub, spring green in colour, with blue lotuses depicted as if floating on the water. It would hold a large block of ice and was altogether an improvement on the tin bath. She kissed Lin’s smooth-shaven cheek.

‘Thank you! How is your Grandmamma?’

‘Not sure if a Chinese doctor would support such a newfangled apparatus. I sent Dr Shang to talk to her. He says that the only way to balance a Yang wind—hot and dry—is to use Ying methods—cold and wet. Besides, he is a good influence on her, he is almost as old as she is and remembers the old days. He will prescribe a soothing tea for all of us and I suspect that I am better out of the way. I am glad you like the tub. Now, Phryne, I never interfere in your affairs, but I couldn’t help noticing . . .’

‘The screaming young man? Yes. One of the Atkinson lot, and I would have said the most sane, though I could be wrong. He says they are going to kill him. I haven’t been able to get a sensible word out of him, he’s beside himself with terror. Would you like to stay? You might pick up something extra, it’s always useful to have a second auditor. And I’ve got an idea about the Atkinsons, which will require you to remember what you learned as a stage magician.’

Lin bowed, both hands together, and said in stage Chinese. ‘As you prease, little Missee.’

Phryne clipped his ear. Lightly.

Downstairs, the situation had settled. The carriers and Mr Butler’s large young fellow had gone. Phryne assumed that someone would eventually tell her his name.

Dot was trying to calm James Barton, Mr Butler was putting the chain on the front door and Mrs Butler was asking how many people would be in to lunch. This being the most important issue at stake, Phryne informed her that there would be six, if James Barton had recovered enough to eat. If not, then the table would not be too put out.

‘Always better to cater for more than less,’ approved Mrs Butler, and went back to her kitchen to pulverise chicken livers for what Miss Phryne called ‘pâté’ but she called ‘potted meat’. Lin accepted a cool drink and sat down on the sofa. Dot was still kneeling beside the terrified young man, encouraging him to sip more coffee. She had never seen a grown-up man so absolutely distrait.

Phryne, who had, thought of shell shock and drugs.

‘Tell me, James, what have you taken?’ she asked in a clear, business-like voice. ‘I need to know now.’

‘Just smoking,’ he said. ‘I didn’t drink . . . I didn’t drink the . . .’

He broke down again. Dot, Lin and Phryne looked at him.

‘I am reluctant to suggest more drugs,’ said Lin Chung. ‘But perhaps Dr Shang could help?’

‘Of course,’ said Phryne, who was considering 1) valerian and 2) a clinically measured belt over the bonce as a cure for the young man’s neurasthenia. Any potion from Dr Shang would probably be more efficacious.

‘I will telephone,’ said Lin Chung, and went into the hall to do so.

Dot managed to get the rest of the coffee down the young man’s throat and let him lean back. She fetched a cool cloth, wrung out in water and eau de cologne, put it over his eyes and then lowered the blinds, as he seemed sensitive to light. His sobbing died away, but he retained his clutch on Dot’s hand. Dot gave Phryne a questioning glance.

‘Just sit with him for a while, Dot, if you would,’ Phryne told her. ‘This is a crisis and, with any luck, we might find out what is going on in the Atkinson menage. There’s no harm in him,’ she added.

‘No, Miss, he’s like a babe with a nightmare. I’ll be all right for a bit if you can pass me that cushion to kneel on.’

Phryne passed her the cushion and went out to explain the situation, as far as she knew it, to her family and staff.

‘Girls,’ she said, knowing that they were hiding just behind the larger parlour door, ‘come out and listen to me. There is a break in the Atkinson case, but it means that we must keep a sharp lookout and not take any risks. What were you going to do this afternoon?’