Death at Victoria Dock (3 page)

‘Impossible!’ declared Mr. Waddington-Forsythe. ‘They are all quite common men. They could have no attraction for a girl of Alicia’s refinement.’

Phryne, who had loved some uncommonly common men, especially in London and in Paris, was not minded to attempt to explain what could attract a refined girl to a sweaty, tanned, muscular labouring boy with cement in his hair. In any case she felt unequal to the task.

‘I will come to your house, Mr. Waddington-Forsythe, and speak to your wife and Paul. Then perhaps I might ask the school. Who is her closest friend there?’

‘Christine will know,’ muttered the old man. ‘I had nothing to do with them, you understand. All that young women of that age appear to be able to do in terms of social intercourse is to hide their faces and giggle.’

‘Quite,’ agreed Phryne, reflecting that among her multifarious faults as a maiden, giggling was not one of them. ‘This afternoon, then, about four o’clock?’

‘I thought that you might come back with me at once, Miss Fisher, if that would not be too inconvenient. I am very worried about Alicia.’

‘Then you should call the police. Finding runaways is their job.’

‘Not in this case.’

‘No relatives? No one to whom she might have gone?’

‘No. I have telephoned her aunt, with whom she did not get along, and she is not there. There is no one else that either Christine or myself know about. I cannot think where she is. Really, Miss Fisher, you are my last hope.’

‘All right, then.’ Phryne lit a gasper, observed horror on Mr. Waddington-Forsythe’s countenance, and ignored it. ‘She ran out of the house, pushing past her twin Paul, at five o’clock on Wednesday, and you have not seen hide nor hair since. She took some clothes and she has not gone to her aunt’s. Has she any money?’

‘It is quite likely that she has, now I come to think of it. She had her quarter’s allowance. She can’t have spent it all yet, I only gave it to her last week.’

‘How much is that?’

‘Ten pounds, Miss Fisher. Children are a great expense, especially girls. They must have the latest clothes and see the newest film.
’

‘Did she go to many films?’ Phryne was trying to get a grasp on the character of the girl. So far she was shadowy in the extreme.

‘No, actually, she didn’t. Spent a lot of time at church. St. Peter’s, Eastern Hill, you know. She sang in the choir and was very active in the Girls’ Brigade and the Band of Hope. Always went to both services on Sunday. Christine thinks that it is a phase. Wanted to enter a sisterhood a few months ago. I put my foot down about that.’

‘Which sisterhood?’

‘The Anglican Sisters of Charity, in Eltham, or some such place. I daresay that they do a lot of good, and it’s an excellent way to dispose of surplus women—better than having them meddling about in nursing or trying to go into parliament—but not for my daughter. I expect her to make a good marriage.’

‘Did you enquire of the sisterhood? Was Alicia there?’

‘Pack of scheming women,’ commented Mr. Waddington-Forsythe. ‘Said that “Miss Waddington-Forsythe was not there.” When I tried to persuade the confounded Mother Superior, or whatever idiotic title they give themselves, to tell me where she might be she said that it was time for matins and rang off. But Alicia was happy with the sisters. Or so I believe.’

‘So she might still go there,’ said Phryne, very gently because she was restraining an urge to bean this Victorian relic with a lampstand. Mr. Waddington-Forsythe scowled.

‘Yes, it’s possible. I’m coming to you, Miss Fisher, because the detective who was my first choice said that you could manage this job under the constraints which I have been obliged to apply to it. He refused to touch it and said that only the police can catch runaways, and if the Anglican Sisterhood was involved then he had an urgent appointment in China. Damn the man! I believe that he was afraid of them.’

Phryne butted out her cigarette and lit another one, which she did not want, solely to annoy her client. What an unprepossessing thing, she thought, to see the upjumped social-climbing middle class in terror of its position. Poor girl. Religious mania may have seemed positively sane by comparison.

‘All right. I’ll come with you now.’

‘You’ll take the case?’

‘One week. If I don’t find her within the week, Mr. Waddington-Forsythe, then you will hand the case over to the police, with my notes as to the progress of my investigations. That is my constraint. Do you accept?’

‘I accept,’ he said, promptly. ‘My car is outside, Miss Fisher.’

***

The ride, in a chauffeured Bentley, was comfortable. Mr. Waddington-Forsythe did not speak. The chauffeur handed Phryne out in the grounds of an extensive Victorian mansion. Three storeys, plus a series of attics; pillared portico and every window gleaming. One side of the house was disfigured by the skeletal beginnings of a new wing, evidently to be built in the most modern style, matching the existing structure in no respect whatsoever. It was curved, like the wing of a bird, and seemed to be constructed mostly of concrete. Several workmen were in view, doing important things with plumb lines.

‘Renovations? I’d say that you were building a new house, Mr. Waddington-Forsythe.’ This name was going to be a problem, Phryne thought. Perhaps she could get away with calling him ‘sir.’ He might like that and it would cut down the wear and tear on her vocal cords.

‘Yes, Miss Fisher, it is an entirely original design by the most fashionable architect. Sir Adrian Griffith was kind enough to say that he found it most striking.’

Phryne agreed. Striking it certainly was. And if the new wife wanted to make an eyesore out of an honest old house, it was not her business. She felt about modern art as she felt about Baroque additions to Gothic churches. The only time that it looked good was in a building built for it.

A butler of some magnificence opened the front door for the master and led Phryne into an opulent hall, high-ceilinged and gilded, to which someone had added a black glass floor and a hatstand composed of lengths of chromium pipe. Phryne gave up her hat and wrap and was taken into an entirely modern parlour to meet the lady of the house.

Christine Waddington-Forsythe was twenty-five at the most and very pretty, in a large-eyed, frightened-doe way. She was quite evidently about five months pregnant and was dressed in a loose, white wrapper. Her long fingers pleated the edge of this nervously. Sitting beside her on the copper sofa was a scowling boy. He was extravagantly beautiful, having curly blond hair, blue eyes, and a face which Raphael, or perhaps Botticelli, would have sold their grandmothers to paint. He struck Phryne still in her steps and silenced her in the middle of her polite greeting with a loud, ‘Well, are you going to find her?’

‘I hope so, indeed. My name is Phryne Fisher. Are you Paul?’

‘The Honourable Phryne Fisher,’ Mr. Waddington-Forsythe put in his oar. The boy’s angelic face creased further.

‘Well, Miss Honourable Phryne Fisher, are you going to find her?’

‘I shall try.’

Phryne sat down collectedly and lit a gasper. Mrs. Waddington-Forsythe looked ready to faint, but the boy suddenly grinned and got up, unfolding an unexpected length of leg clad in tennis flannels.

‘I’ll find you an ashtray,’ he offered.

‘Show me her room,’ suggested Phryne, following up her advantage. The boy blanched, steadied himself, and looked at his stepmother.

‘I’ll take Miss Fisher up, Paul,’ she said, easily. Her husband laid a hand on her arm.

‘No, no, m’dear, you must not fatigue yourself. Paul will do very well.’

With an agonized backward glance, Paul led the way up the stairs, along a carpeted corridor and indicated a closed door.

‘In here?’

He nodded, swallowing hard.

‘Just wait for me, then.’

Phryne opened the door and entered a small but well-appointed room. There was a wardrobe with school uniforms and Sunday dresses, a sufficiency of underclothes and sports clothes and a selection of shoes. The girl had not cared particularly for her appearance. Phryne found no make-up, not even a clandestine pot of rouge, powder, or a hidden tube of lipstick. There were religious prints on the walls, the largest being a Grünewald crucifixion, an odd adornment for a girl’s room. Phryne stared for a while at the painting, which hung directly below the maidenly white bed, presumably so that Alicia could see it all the time. Green, tortured, leprous, twisted in agony, the fingers and toes curled around the piercing nails, it was gruesome; more gruesome even than real death. The painter had inflicted on this suffering, crippled body all the plagues of the world. Doubtless as a metaphor for all sins, Phryne thought, shuddering as though a goose had danced a whole quadrille upon her grave. She turned to the books.

All works of devotion: a bible, a prayer book. Phryne held them up by the spine, one by one, and shook them, garnering a harvest of little cards, devotional stamps and pressed flowers. Nothing in the girl’s own writing but a copy of the Ten Commandments, which had been printed on a card, doubtless for easy reference. Next to ‘Honour thy Father and thy Mother’ she had written, ‘so difficult. I don’t want to fall into sin but I
can’t
’. The
can’t
had been underscored so hard that the pencil had torn through the surface of the paper.

No letters, no diary. Her school books revealed that she was a middle-of-the-road student with an interest in Latin and Music, and it appeared that she played chess. Some chess problems had been carefully copied out and solved, one with three exclamation marks.

Her violin was still in its case. Phryne took it out and plucked a string: mellow, delicate, sad. It was an expensive instrument and she replaced it with care, having searched the case.

She heard a thud in the corridor and opened the door. The exquisite Paul had heard the voice of the violin and had fainted. Phryne left him where he was and continued her search. She tapped the walls, looking for a hiding place. A girl of this religiosity would certainly have kept a diary, if only to remind herself of her righteous struggle against sin. The walls were solid Victorian panelling, the floor was covered by a carpet which had been nailed down all round, and there was no space in the windowseat, which was full of woollens. Phryne took each jumper out and shook it, but there was nothing there. She must have taken her diary with her. So. Paul should be recovering and she went out to see how he was.

He was sitting groggily on the floor and she extended a strong hand to pull him to his feet. He came up swiftly into her arms and for a moment their faces were very close. The rosebud mouth opened and moistened; Phryne thought that he was going to kiss her, and wondered what she should do.

Fortunately for her virtue, the moment passed. The body which had clung close released itself; Phryne wondered if she had been imagining things. Could there be such a depth of sensuality in a young boy?

‘There. A little overcome, eh? Were you very fond of your sister?’ Wrong question. He stiffened and pulled away from her embrace.

‘No. Interfering little busybody, always poking her nose in, with her damned religion. Thought she was better than anyone, she did. But I don’t like her being missing.’

He led the way down the stairs, where Phyne conducted a brief conversation with Christine, who spoke in a weakening whisper.

‘She took her swimming bag and a change of clothes. That’s all that I could find missing.’

‘And you have no idea where she has gone?’

‘Not unless she is with the sisterhood. She had enough money to get to Eltham, but they say she isn’t there.’

‘Are you worried about her?’

‘Of course.’

‘Was she the sort of girl who was, well, easily deceived? Would she get into a stranger’s car, for instance?’

‘No. Not if it was a man. She was very…shy.’

‘She didn’t like boys?’

‘Not at all.’

‘And who was her best friend at school?’

‘I’m sure I don’t know, Miss Fisher. She never confided in me.’

‘And what about her diary?’

The gentle eyes, lids drooping with weariness, suddenly flashed. Phryne had Mrs. Waddington-Forsythe’s full attention.

‘Her diary? Oh yes. I suppose she took it with her. Now I really must go and lie down, Miss Fisher. My doctor says that I must rest for three hours every afternoon. If you will excuse me?’

Phryne watched her glide listlessly away, and faced the old man and the boy. They were both staring after the retreating drapery.

‘I’ll report in a week,’ said Phryne. She walked out of the house, and was driven with care back to her own house.

Chapter Three

‘The boy by my side, shot through the head,
lay…soaking my shoulder, for half an hour…
can you photograph the crimson-hot iron as it cools
from the smelting? That is what Jones’ blood looked like,
and felt like. My senses are charred.
I shall feel it as soon as I dare, but now I must not.’

Wilfred Owen, Diary: May 1918

Phryne was possessed of sudden disgust. She told Dot to find Bert and Cec and ask them to dinner, then ran up the stairs and flung herself into a padded chair in front of the window which looked straight out to sea. She poured a small whisky and lit a cigarette, for she could still smell blood on her breast, and it worried her.

I must be going mad, she chided herself. I’ve seen lots of dead men. And I do not smell of blood. It is washed off me and I am wearing different clothes. I must take hold of myself. Ah. Here are the books which Dot has obtained from the library. I shall drink this whisky and then another and I shall feel better.

Having given herself suitable orders, she opened the first book and began to read as much as was known, which was not much, about Latvia, Lithuania, Russia, and the Revolution.

After two hours of concentrated study, the situation was still unclear and Phryne decided to stop and review her notes.

Latvia appeared to have been fought over and shared out between all her neighbours. Poland, Sweden and Russia had all conquered it in turn and like Gaul it had been divided into three parts: Livonia, Courland, and Latgale on the border of Russia—an unsafe place to be. She was reminded of a comment about the constant war in Poland. ‘Well, if you pitch your tent in the middle of Piccadilly you are going to get run over.’ The Baltic had been troubled since written history began and seemed to ‘produce more history than they could consume, locally’ which might have been the reason that they had continually exported trouble.

Nasty things had happened to Latvia during the Great War, and nastier when the Revolution had transformed October forever. Lithuania was forever fighting with Poland about who owned Vilna. It was closest to Russia.

It appeared to be Catholic, as most of the Baltic coast was, which would not please the Bolsheviks. In the Great War it had been occupied by Germany and then Russia; the Soviets had reluctantly accepted the independence of the Baltic States in 1920. Litvinov had signed a non-aggression pact with them. Nothing more was apparent from the books, and Phryne reviewed the early history. The Swedes and Teutons had been driven out by the famous Alexander Nevsky in the battle of the Raven’s Rock. The name pleased Phryne, and she folded up the notes and poured herself another small whisky. Where to find some modern history? It did not seem to have been written down in these sober tomes from the public library.

She thought of her friends, Vera and Joseph Wilson, who would certainly know what was happening in Latvia. They were red-raggers of the deepest dye, and very good company when they could be induced to talk about anything other than politics. Vera kept a political salon of the Trotskyite persuasion and Joseph sculpted. Or did he write poetry? Something artistic, anyway.

Phryne called the Wilsons, who were home, and asked herself to supper that night. It appeared that a lot of company was expected. She did this in cold earnest, having attended Wilson suppers before. It was a measure of her dedication that she did not flinch.

***

Dinner with Bert and Cec was always amusing, especially as Mrs. Butler liked them and made unusual efforts with the food.

‘Who was on the gates, Miss?’ asked Bert, and snorted when Phryne described the watchman.

‘That’s Tom. He’d never notice a murder. Might get him into trouble. He only notices some poor coot who’s trying to take out a tin or two of peaches or a bar of chocolate. He loves pinching them. But anything big and nasty, Tom’s not your man. You musta scared him out of ten years’ growth, Miss.’

Bert chuckled and accepted another roasted potato. The saddle of lamb was perfectly cooked and had all the traditional accompaniments, except Yorkshire pudding, which Phryne did not like, having had a surfeit of it in early childhood.

‘Yair,’ agreed Cec. ‘He wouldn’t be no help. What was the tattoo, Miss?’

Phryne drew it on the tablecloth with her finger. Bert whistled.

‘You know it?’

‘Anarchists,’ said Bert, consulting Cec with a glance. ‘Anarchists, they have that tattoo. Bad men, Miss.’

‘Are there anarchists on the wharf?’

‘Yair, reckon. We got all sorts, Miss. Lot of ’em are Wobblies, and there’s the comrades, then the Stalinists and the Trotskyites.’

‘Which are you, Bert?’

‘I’m just a commo, Miss. I don’t care about what’s happening in Russia. I reckon with a history like theirs they won’t make any better fist of communism than they did of feudalism. Big, strange place, Russia. And I don’t like their leaders. Since Lenin died and the Tsar was assassinated it’s all gone down. Pity. The Great Social Experiment, it is. But with a system which still uses the army to crush the masses, I don’t hold out much hope for it. Here is where we need the Revolution, Miss. Can I have some more lamb?’

Mr. Butler loaded Bert’s plate. Cec put in, quietly, ‘If you are going to be mixing with the anarchists, Miss, I reckon you’d better take us along. I hear that they have guns. Why not let Bert and me go to ground and see if we can pick up a whisper? They used to rob banks,’ he added, ‘and you can’t just go into Markillies’, Miss, can you, and have a beer with the boys.’

‘No, I can’t, and that is a generous offer, but I would not like to send you into danger,’ protested Phryne. ‘The Revolution needs you—and I need you, too. And Alice needs Cec.’

‘Yair,’ agreed Bert. ‘And my landlady needs me. Another thing. Come September the tenth the wharves will be dead. No one will report for work. So we’d better get cracking.’

‘Why will no one report for work on the tenth?’

‘Beeby award,’ growled Bert. ‘They’re trying to reorganize the docks. Want two pick-ups a day. That means that if you don’t get a job you have to wait for the late pick-up. Man could waste a lifetime hanging around. They want to lower our wages and cut down conditions and grind us into the dirt, so they either change the award or we go out, and we stay out.’

‘Well it’s the first of September today. Better, as you say, get cracking. I’ve told you all I know, which is very little. Go anywhere, spend any money, but I want these bastards. They shot my car and they tried to shoot me and they killed a beautiful young man and he died in my arms and I cannot forgive them. Understood? Any news, ring me. I’ve got another job, but this is of the first importance.’

Bert nodded, with his mouth full. Cec accepted ten quid on account and stowed the notes away.

‘Tell me all you know about the anarchists,’ she ordered.

Bert swallowed, shot a glance at Cec, and began, ‘They were involved in the fight against the Tsar in Russia, that’s where they learned their bad habits. They blew up Tsar Alexander, the last Tsar’s father. They believe in nothing; that if society was free, without laws or police or gaols, then it would be virtuous. Meself, I can’t see it. And they act like ordinary gangsters. In London in 1909 and 1910, they staged a few bank robberies and a wages snatch which went wrong. Political consciousness ain’t no replacement for good planning, Miss. They shot their way out, killing children and women, which real revolutionaries would never do, then finally got caught in the Siege of Sidney Street—you must have heard of it.’

Phryne nodded. She had been in Australia and a child at the time but some news had filtered through.

‘They poured bullets into the house, and the anarchists poured ’em out. Eventually the house caught fire and they were all killed.’

‘So that was the end of them?’

‘No, Miss! You can’t kill off anarchists like that. There were more of them. Some had been in Paris and some weren’t in the house. Peter the Painter was one. There was…’

Bert broke off and took some more potato.

‘There was…?’ prompted Phryne. Cec grinned.

‘It’s a secret, Miss, but you already know, I expect. We heard that some of them anarchists came to Melbourne, to work on the wharf. Peter the Painter was supposed to be one of ’em. But there’s a lot of Balts on the docks and he could be any one of ’em. I don’t suppose he looks like his police photo any more and I don’t think they had fingerprints when he was captured last. Anarchists were supposed to have something to do with two bank robberies this year, but as I said, we don’t know that, it’s just rumour. There are more stories on the wharf than Moss Trooper could jump over.’

‘I see. Well, that is very interesting and if you have finished, Mrs. Butler will bring in dessert. You will be careful, Bert, Cec, won’t you? I’d hate anything to happen to you.

‘The anarchists. I want to know who they are, where they meet, and most especially I want to know who the young man was and why they shot him. Get me whatever you can.’

‘What are you going to do, Miss?’ asked Cec, accepting a cup of coffee and a small port.

Phryne sipped port and smiled.

‘I am going to supper with the Wilsons in Brunswick, whence you shall drive me in the taxi, and wait, if you please. That is the fashionable face of communism; I might pick up something. Probably fleas, if Vera still has that verminous Spanish guitarist infesting the place. Are you with me?’

Bert and Cec raised their glasses. Bert was short and stout. Cec was tall and lanky. Between them, there was nothing that they could not reach.

‘We’re with you,’ agreed Bert. ‘And maybe we won’t get shot at so much this time. A man begins to feel like a target. Cheers,’ and he downed the glass of very good port.

***

Phryne dressed for the Wilsons. A peasant skirt, bias-cut and braided, which waved around her ankles; a heavily embroidered tunic in fine wool with flowing white lawn sleeves beneath it, and a boxy little hat with attached scarf. She wore soft red Russian leather boots and took a large handbag, stuffing into it a lot of pound notes—Vera always had causes to be financed—her little gun and a new packet of cigarettes. Not even for revenge was she going to smoke Joseph’s frightful revolutionary South American cigars.

Dot looked in as she was about to leave.

‘Got everything, Miss? And is this dangerous? Shall I wait up for you?’

‘No, just the usual Wilson supper. Don’t wait up. See you later.’ She waved at Dot as she passed and descended the stairs at a run. Bert and Cec were waiting for her in the salon and they went out to the cab, with no comment except for a brief, ‘Crikey!’ from Bert in relation to her costume.

The drive to Brunswick was comfortable and Phryne recruited her strength by dozing in the back seat. She disliked the Wilsons’ parties intensely, not because of any fault in the Wilsons, who were darlings, but because of their habit of cramming their very small house with every red-ragger, painter, sculptor and poet they could find, and expecting them to perform all at once. It had led to some memorable evenings and quite a lot of fights. Phryne recalled the expression of a Catalan nobleman who had just had a certain suggestion put to him by a very advanced poet of the body-urge and laughed herself awake.

Vera was standing at the top of the stairs as Phryne toiled up two flights, tripping over pails and a perambulator. She was a tall woman with the limbs of a Valkyrie and the general aspect of a rather vague and benevolent Brunnhilde. Her long blonde hair was always plaited into two braids coiled over her ears and she had a regrettable tendency to wear smocks—in fact, she was wearing one now. It had hollyhocks embroidered on it.

The noise from the rooms behind was terrific.

‘Hello, Vera. Nice to see you again! How’s the Revolution?’ yelled Phryne above the babble of many voices and the strumming of what was probably a lute. Vera beamed.

‘Phryne, my dear! We have lots of people you must meet. Do come in, can I get you a drink?’

Phryne considered. She was quite full and it seemed a terrible insult to that fine old British Empire Oporto nectar to follow it with any of the nauseous fluids likely to be lurking on Vera’s premises under the name of ‘drink.’

‘Just some water,’ she trilled, lifting her voice to carry. Vera fought her way back through the crowd with a beer glass full of what was probably water, or what passed for water in Brunswick. Someone seized her by the ankle and she looked down.

‘Poetry is a function of rebellion,’ growled a black beard. ‘I will now recite the poem I wrote on the occasion of Lenin’s death.’

‘Later,’ promised Phryne, and fled, stumbling over several people of indeterminate sex who were entwined so closely that she could only tell that there were three of them by the heads.

She cannoned straight into Vera’s back, and was saved from falling by a strong hand which dragged her up. She looked into a rather lined and weary Slavic face, with dark blue eyes and greying brown hair. He smiled sweetly and Vera turned around.

‘Oh, Phryne, there you are. This is Peter Smith, he’s the one to tell you all about the Lithuanian situation. Knows everyone. Peter, this is Phryne Fisher, an old friend of mine.’

Peter Smith, in whose name Phryne did not for an instant believe, lifted the hand he held to his lips and kissed it.

‘Miss Fisher,’ he said. His voice was deep and very attractive. ‘I am honoured to meet so famous a detective. Is it an investigation which brings you here?’

Phryne considered. Some part of the truth seemed necessary.

‘Someone tried to shoot me,’ she said bluntly. ‘I dislike being shot at.’

‘I can understand that,’ agreed Peter Smith, guiding Phryne around a large table loaded with books and oranges. ‘Would you like an orange? The fruit boat at 5 North today had a loading accident.’

Phryne took one and leaned against the table as it appeared that she was not going to get any further into the room. This was a personable man, she thought, a little stocky, perhaps, but beautifully muscled. His stance was weary and his air cautious.