Urn Burial (2 page)

The maid began to shriek again. Dot put an arm around her.

‘Have you got a housekeeper, Sir?’ she asked.

‘Pipe down, Lina, do. You’ll soon be inside. Sir, I think we’d better call a doctor.’

‘Yes, of course. Take her inside, through to the kitchen. I’ll send Mrs Hinchcliff to you right away, and Doctor Franklin’s staying in the house. What a stroke of luck.’

Two housemen were unloading the luggage, and Phryne allowed them to take the car away.

‘Mr Lin, delighted to meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you,’ effused Tom Reynolds, shaking his hand.

Dot and Li Pen escorted Lina into the house through the front door, ordinarily banned to domestics. Phryne saw the girl’s knees give way abruptly.

Li Pen swept her up and carried her and Phryne reflected that he was a lot stronger than he looked.

Then again, so was Lin Chung. Tom Reynolds was drawing them inside, past the great carved portals and into a proper cathedral entrance.

7

‘The maid’ll show you to your rooms, and perhaps you’d like to come down in about half an hour for a drink and some supper, eh? It’s ten o’clock and we keep early hours in the country.’

Phryne assented absently, boggling.

The inside of Cave House was as remarkable as the outside.

Following a neat maid, Phryne crossed a parquet floor with Greek key-pattern edging, climbed up a monumental

staircase

under

some

Morris

windows and paced along a gallery to a large room. Lin Chung had been led in exactly the opposite direction to some distant bit of the house.

Phryne scented prejudice.

But the room was very pleasant. There was a bright fire burning in the black-leaded hearth under the Art Dećoratif tiles and the Corinthian columns of the marble mantelpiece. Her bed was four-posted, surrounded by white mosquito netting, and had a thick feather quilt. The floor was covered with a hideous but expensive Turkish carpet in glaring red and brilliant green. Phryne took stock. Her room had two bow windows; a powdering closet with a small bed in it, obviously intended for Dot, a lot of exceptionally miscella-neous furniture and an engraving of Hope over her washstand. Hope, as a draped female figure, drooped over the globe of the world, obviously in irreparable, mortal despair at the pitiless nature of mankind. It was an exceptionally depressing picture.

Irritated, Phryne turned her to the wall. Then 8

she tore off her hat, unlaced her boots, and sat down on a spindly Louis Quatorze chair at a marble washstand. Her face in the mirror was set with fury. And, she noticed, smudged. She poured some hot water into a Wedgewood bowl and washed the marks of adventure off her skin with Pear’s soap.

She was sitting by the fire and wiggling some feeling back into her frozen toes when Dot came in.

‘How’s Lina?’ asked Phryne.

‘The Doctor’s with her. He says she’s all right, just exhausted and scratched by all those thorns but he says . . . oh, Miss.’

‘Oh, Miss? What’s the matter, old thing? Sit down, Dot, have a tot of this.’

Dot slumped down into the chippendale chair on the other side of the fire. Phryne produced a flask and made her companion drink down a mouthful of brandy. Some colour came back into Dot’s white face. Phryne took her hand, worried by her pallor. Finally Dot managed to say what was on her mind.

‘She’s been molested, Miss.’

‘God, you mean raped?’

Dot winced at the word. ‘No, Miss Phryne, just molested. The Doctor says she’ll be all right. The housekeeper’s with her – her aunt, she says. Mr Li carried her in, and he’s gone to find Mr Lin.

They’ve put him right out the back.’

‘Yes, as far away from me as possible. I suspect either moralism or racism, Dot, which I would not 9

have expected from an old reprobate like Tom.

God, that poor girl, and I was so angry with her.

Oh well, can’t be helped.’ Phryne dismissed the thought. ‘I’ll go and see her tomorrow.’

‘She’s just saying what everyone says, Miss. And you were right. Her aunt says she’s always reading Fu Manchu.’

Phryne laughed. ‘And what do you think of Lin Chung, Dot?’

‘I never met any Chinese people before, Miss,’

said Dot slowly, stretching out her hands to the fire, ‘so I never thought about them. Then he came along and he’s so educated, so soigne´,’ (she produced the French word with pride) ‘that I never thought of him as Chinese, Miss. He’s just himself.

He’s a nice man. The girls like him, he talks to them and he’s taught them that satin stitch from China. Never drunk, never loud – the butlers think he’s an ornament to the house, Miss Phryne, that’s what Mrs B said. And that Mr Li, he’s nice, too.

He was real good with Lina. She woke up while he was carrying her and screamed again and he didn’t even drop her. He’s awful strong for his size. Lina thinks the Chows are out to get her and sell her for a white slave. I don’t think she’s very bright, Miss.’

‘Bright or not, she’s had a dreadful experience.

I wonder who the man with the shotgun was?

They play nasty games in the country, Dot. We must decline to join in these rural frolics. There, get into a dressing gown, Dot dear, get warm.

Your bones must be chilled. You can have first 10

bath, it’s just down the hall. I’m going down for a late supper with Tom, and a little ećlaircissement about Lin Chung into the bargain. Shall I get them to send a tray up for you?’

‘No, Miss, I’ll just have a warm-up and change into a dress and then go down to the kitchen. Mrs Croft’s making Mr Li and me some supper. I’m all right, Miss, really. It’s just – out in the car . . .’

‘Mmm?’ Phryne had pulled off her jumper and was rummaging for another in her trunk.

‘I could feel eyes, Miss, eyes in the dark. I mean, I thought I could. I was probably just imagining it.’

Phryne, half-clad, came to lay a hand on her maid’s shoulders and look into the troubled brown eyes.

‘No, Dot dear, you weren’t imagining it, or if you were I was imagining it, too. There was someone out in the dark, watching us arrive. Probably Lina’s attacker, who is armed with a shotgun, and who didn’t like us – not one bit. I was immediately reminded of a Kenyan wait-a-bit hide, the hunter and I sat there all night once, watching the waterhole for a man-eating lion – and all the time he was behind us, glaring at my back. When I got out to close the gate I had just that sense of a predator marking me down for prey. Oh well, there is safety in numbers. You stick close to Li Pen if we come to any real danger, Dot dear, which of course, we won’t. I suspect that Li could be very useful in a crisis. And this is probably some bucolic loony whom everyone will instantly know 11

and identify and they’ll take him right away to a nice safe jail. Don’t worry about it, Dot,’ she advised, finding and donning a red velvet evening top and slipping her feet into soft shoes. ‘Now get warm and have some supper. I won’t be long.’

Phryne descended the monumental staircase and found her host in the parlour where a nice little supper for three was laid out in front of the fire.

Phryne took a Sheridan chair and accepted a glass of sherry.

She examined her host. Tom looked uncomfortable, which did not suit him. His charm had always been his raffish indolence; now concern folded his face into unfamiliar lines.

‘Well, Phryne my dear, you’re here at last.’ His voice was an echo of his usual heartiness. Phryne looked him in the eye and he shifted to avoid her gaze.

‘Yes, and I have a problem,’ she said directly.

‘Why is Lin Chung placed so far away from me?

Are you developing moral scruples, Tom?’

‘Not me.’ He disclaimed morality and took a gulp of his sherry. ‘My wife felt that . . .’

‘Oh, yes? I haven’t met her, have I?’

‘No, she’s a wonderful woman, wonderful, but she has her . . . prejudices.’

‘And one of them is that she doesn’t like Chinese.’

‘Yes. But anyway, you have to think of your reputation, Phryne. You’re always skating on the edge 12

of social ruin. This affair could . . .’

‘Tip me over? I don’t think so. I’m an Hon. and I’m rich – they need me a good deal more than I need them. I tell you, Tom, I object very strenuously to this attempt to censor my behaviour.’

Tom reflected that even hungry, tired and furious, the Honourable Phryne Fisher was beautiful. Her green eyes flashed in her pale face and he found himself wishing he were ten years younger and three stone lighter. That Chinese was a lucky blighter.

‘Well, well, you will do as you like, I expect.

You’ll meet Evelyn at breakfast. She’s a little con-servative, but I’m sure you’ll like each other.’

‘I’m sure,’ lied Phryne.

Lin Chung, who had been halted by the mention of his name outside the door, came in as Phryne said, ‘How is Lina?’

‘Doctor Franklin says she’s just bruised, chilled and shocked. He’s given her something to make her sleep. Though what would have become of her if you hadn’t happened along, Phryne, Mr Lin, I don’t know. There’s nothing around here until you come to Buchan Caves, and that’s a good couple of miles across difficult country.’ He chuckled.

‘She says she saw your headlights and ran for them, so she’s all bumped and scratched but her virtue is intact. One of these rural wooings, I expect, that went a bit far.’

‘No, Tom, it wasn’t like that,’ Phryne began.

‘Just a bit of slap and tickle in the moonlight,’

said Tom. ‘Have some soup, Mr Lin. It’s chicken.’

13

Phryne said flatly, ‘Tom, that girl was terrified for her life, not her virtue, and I heard a gun fired.

And tonight is not a night that even the most determined and lustful rustic wooer would choose for an assignation. It’s as cold as the grave.’

‘Never deterred me,’ said Tom. ‘Not with a good compliant parlourmaid in prospect. Ah, that was a long time ago. Would you like soup, Phryne?

Yes? I expect the girl heard someone out after rabbits and got a fright. Nothing to be alarmed about.’

Phryne gave it up, accepted a bowl of very good soup, and then a slice of cold roast beef on homemade bread. Lin Chung offered a few suitable words about the house, about which Phryne felt the less said, the better.

After supper, Lin Chung escorted her to the head of the staircase where she detained him with a hand on his arm.

‘Thank you for your support tonight,’ she said.

‘You drive very well.’

The bronze face inclined gravely. ‘It was my pleasure, Silver Lady.’

‘Do you know where my room is?’

‘Yes, but I shall deny myself that honour.’

‘Oh?’ Phryne could not believe her ears. ‘Why?’

‘Your reputation, Phryne. I overheard Mr Reynolds just now. An affair with a Chinese is social ruin, he said. He is probably correct. While that remains the case, I would do nothing to injure you.’

‘Hmm.’ Phryne did not have an immediate 14

counter-argument. This needed thinking about and she was tired and worried by Tom’s refusal to take the attack on his employee seriously. ‘Very well.

I’ll see you at breakfast. Sleep well.’

‘Ah, Silver Lady,’ he whispered, so that she could only hear him by standing close, ‘not as well as I would with you.’

Phryne breathed in the cool scent of his skin for a moment, then kissed him decorously on the cheek and walked to her room, without looking back.

15

CHAPTER TWO

We were hinted by the occasion, not catched the opportunity to write of old things, or intrude upon the antiquary. We are coldly drawn unto the discourses of antiquities, who have scarce time to comprehend new things, or make out learned novelties.

Epistle Dedicatory, Urn Burial, Sir Thomas Browne.

BREAKFAST WAS early; Phryne arrived at nine o’clock and found that most of the guests had eaten and gone. This was all to the good. She had slept well but alone, and that never improved her temper. She had only one companion: a youngish man with a very self-conscious tie and long straight dark-brown hair falling over his face, who was eating as though he did not expect to ever see bacon and eggs again – the famous surrealist poet, Tadeusz Lodz, whom she recognised at once. He was good-looking in an unwashed bohemian fashion, and as soon as he saw her he laid down his cutlery, rose to his feet and bowed over her hand, which Phryne 16

thought was courtly above the call of duty, considering how hungry he evidently was.

She poured herself a cup of coffee and gathered some toast and a poached egg from the steaming silver dishes lined up on the buffet. The coffee was cold and she rang a small silver bell for more.

A scrubbed and bouncing housemaid, cap askew, took the order and came back in a very short time with a fresh pot. Phryne drank some of the inky beverage. It was scalding and mostly composed of chicory. She grimaced. There seemed to be some sort of idea amongst Australian cooks, amounting to a religious conviction, that the combination of lukewarm water and Grocer’s Best Ground constituted the drink which Parisians called cafeánd wrote songs about. The poet cleared his plate, took a gulp of tea and said, ‘I am delighted to meet you, Madame. Would you care for some ham – some bacon – more toast?’

His voice was delightful, a dark-brown toffee-coloured voice, with a marked accent which turned his W into a V and made his vowels lush and prolonged.

‘No, nothing more, thank you. Well, perhaps a sliver of ham. Mr Lodz, may I ask you a strange question?’

‘Madame?’ incongruously blue eyes lit with interest.

‘Did you hear a shot last night?’

‘Do you know, the whole time I have been in this Australia, no one has asked me such a question. Remarkable. But I regret, Madame, I was 17

struggling with some lines which would not become absurd – they remained, no matter what I did with them, ridiculously banal – and I heard nothing. Why? Who was shot?’

‘No one. A maid was attacked, though, and I certainly heard a shot.’ Phryne ate her toast. ‘Tell me, Mr Lodz, your natural habitat must be a cafe – I have never known a poet, especially a surrealist, to move far from his cafeáu lait – what brings a town-dweller like you to the country?’