Death at Victoria Dock (8 page)

‘You’re a fake, aren’t you?’

‘Most of the time, dear, yes. The spirits do come, you know, but the customers want a result every time. They will want their money back if I don’t produce little Tommy who died on the Front. Though there’s not so many of them any more,’ she reflected. ‘Forgotten or passed on, I expect. What’s it to you?’

‘I want to visit your seance without being identified,’ said Phryne, passing Jean a ten pound note.

‘The spirits are at your disposal, dearie.’

Chapter Seven

‘There is no honour among thieves.’

Proverb

‘
Reckon we’ve drawn a blank, mate,’ sighed Cec, setting down his fifth pot with care. His extremities became unreliable after the fifth.

‘Yair, mate, I reckon we might as well turn it up for today. Monday’s never a good day for the crims. They’re all recuperating from the weekend.’

Bert and Cec were tired and more than a little drunk. They had enquired assiduously but cautiously through all the pubs where Melbourne criminals were wont to carouse and so far had drawn a complete blank. They were now refreshing their strength in their favourite pub, Markillies, while waiting for fresh inspiration.

They finished their drinks and were in the process of getting up when a quiet voice commented, ‘I hear you’ve been asking some questions, Bert.’

‘Yair, Billy, we have,’ Bert replied, sitting down with his hands on the table, where they could be seen. Little Billy Ferguson was the associate and hired killer of most of Melbourne’s more unpleasant gangs, had several murders to his debit, and was, in popular opinion, ‘as mad as a cut snake.’ He was known to
be the minder for Happy Harry’s two-up school, and several policemen had sworn to get him, only to meet with unforeseen misadventures. Physically, Billy Ferguson was small, thin, and softly spoken. No one would have noticed him in a crowd. He was one of the few men of whom both Bert and Cec were afraid.

‘What do you want to know, and why?’

‘We’re working for that lady detective, Miss Fisher. Someone shot at her outside the dock gates on Sat’dy and she don’t take to being shot at. She wants to know who did it.’

‘I see. Now, I might know who did it, if you promise not to keep poking your noses into my business.’

‘Honest, Billy, we never knew it was any of your business or we wouldn’t even have asked.’

‘It ain’t none of my business,’ snapped Billy, sending a chill through Cec. Billy was always armed. ‘The name of the criminals is written on this bit of paper. Here. They’re giving crime a bad name, they are. They’re commos. You’re a commo, ain’t yer?’

‘Yair, Billy, I am,’ agreed Bert, wondering if he was about to join the glorious company of martyrs of the Revolution. Billy grinned unpleasantly.

‘Then you oughta be able to find ’em, and if you need any help with ’em, you can call on me. Bastards, all of ’em. See you, Bert, Cec. You won’t ask no more questions, will yer?’

‘No, Billy, no more questions at all.’

Billy walked out of the pub. Drinkers shifted out of his path. Bert wiped his brow and opened the betting slip.

‘Max Dubof and Karl Smoller,’ he said aloud. ‘I hope this’ll be enough for her.’

‘Too right,’ said Cec.

***

Phryne had ordered chocolate—she would not be able to face tea for quite a while—in the tea rooms of Russell Collins, which was chic, and a change from the Socialist Bookshop.

She was reviewing the next two days and wondering how she was going to fit it all in. At least she was free tonight, and could put herself to bed early in preparation for Tuesday night. Pity about the ballet.

The problem of the tattoo arose in her mind. How to produce a waterproof blue anarchist tattoo, without permanently marking her skin? She finished the chocolate and visited the Ladies’ Room, which was appropriately opulent, paying the bill on the way out.

With a wave she summoned a taxi and ordered a puzzled driver to take her to the Professor’s tattoo salon, next to Antonio’s Hotel in Flinders Street.

The driver uttered not a word, though he was later to add it to his collection of ‘my most unforgettable fares.’

The tattoo salon was brightly lit, lined with celluloid templates stained with various inks, and rather full of gaping men.

It was a full minute before any of the inhabitants moved, and even then they just shifted their gaze. One removed a cigarette.

The skinny boy, scanning the full-rigged ship which he intended to have decorating his arm as soon as the Professor could be induced to accept a note from his father, grinned cheekily and asked, ‘What can we do for you, Miss?’

‘You can introduce me to the Professor,’ replied Phryne, and the boy ran a hand through his curly red hair and called: ‘Professor! Lady to see you!’

He then returned to his contemplation of the templates. Perhaps a black cat would be better. The Professor would never notice that the permission was not in his father’s writing.

A large man put down his needle and emptied his glass of beer.

‘Yes, Miss? Want a tattoo, do you?’

Phryne ignored the laughter and said coolly, ‘I want a transfer. I remember that when I was a child one could produce an ink picture on the skin. I do not want a permanent tattoo. Can you do it?’

The Professor removed his hat and scratched his head, where the black hair was thinning.

‘You don’t know what you are asking,’ he complained. ‘My skill is with the needle. I don’t do transfers.’

‘How permanent is your ink?’

‘My ink lasts forever. You’ll go to your grave with one of my tats.’

‘I see. And is it waterproof?’

‘Yair, but once it’s under the skin it don’t have to be. You can’t wash off skin.’

‘And how do you mark the design?’

‘Like this.’ He reached for a template, inked it with a roller, and curved the inked side around his own arm. He peeled the celluloid off with great skill and left on his skin the reverse of the picture scratched on the template.

‘See? I don’t do freehand drawings. Illustrations, that’s what they are. Some of them come from America.’

‘But you could make one?’

‘Sure.’

Phryne produced her design. The Professor took a square of celluloid and carved the design into it.

‘There you are, lady. Now, since you don’t want a tat, I must ask you to leave.’

‘Oh, no, you don’t, I need the right coloured ink. You can apply it, if you please. I will pay a standard fee.’

‘Whatever you say. What colour?’

‘Blue.’

He inked the template and gestured Phryne to a chair, beside another sufferer at whose arm she did not like to look. It was a mess of ink and blood and must have been very painful.

‘Where do you want this?’ asked the Professor resignedly, approaching with the template. Phryne unbuttoned the drab dress and exposed her cleavage.

‘Oh, cripes no!’ he recoiled. Phryne was firm.

‘Come on, now, be a brave Professor. Just here, if you please, and don’t smudge.’

Averting his eyes, the Professor applied the template with unstudied efficiency, peeled it off. The circled capital A was as clear as print and definitively blue.

‘Good. How long does it take to dry?’

‘Ten minutes,’ gasped the Professor, who had only applied such decorations to ladies of very light repute indeed. His present client did not fall into that class and he found her very disturbing. She, however, was as cool as a halibut on ice and was chatting in a social tone, holding her dress apart so as not to touch the ink.

‘Have you seen that design before? Oh, do go on with your work,’ she offered generously. ‘I would not like to interrupt you.’ The news of what was happening in the tattoo salon had emptied the pub. More drinkers crammed into the shop, until Phryne found it difficult to breathe and the Professor was forced to clear the place with a full-throated roar which drove them onto the street again. The crowd attracted Bert and Cec, who took one look into the salon and ducked out again.

‘You reckon we should wait for her, mate?’ asked Cec. Bert nodded.

‘There might be trouble.’ He took up his post leaning against the wall. ‘So we stay.’

‘No, I never seen that design before,’ answered the Professor, concentrating on the arm in front of him and wiping blood away with cotton wool. ‘There you are, son.’

The patient managed a grin and smiled across at Phryne.

‘It don’t hurt much,’ he lied. ‘Why not give it a go?’

The Professor groaned, but Phryne answered collectedly, ‘Not today. I’ll think about it.’

‘That’ll be dry now, Miss. It will last about a week, and then it’ll wash off. And be nice, Miss,
don’t
think about it. You don’t want a tattoo. You don’t want to go spoiling them nice…I mean, you really don’t want one. It ain’t right for a lady. That’ll be five bob,’ he added, grossly overcharging to compensate for having his afternoon ruined. ‘And thank you.’ He ushered Phryne out, enquired politely of the gathered drinkers as to whether they had any homes to go to, and retreated into his salon, mopping his brow.

The red-headed kid had decided on the ship. The Professor did not even glance at the letter from his father. The boy felt rather hurt. He had gone to a lot of trouble to forge it.

***

‘Need a lift home, lady?’ asked Bert, and Phryne turned to demolish him, paused in mid-word, and took his arm.

‘Why, thank you,’ she smiled, and the assembled drinkers muttered with envy.

Safe in the taxi, Phryne lit a gasper and expelled the breath which she had been holding.

‘Have you got any tattoos, Bert?’

‘Yair.’

‘I don’t know how you stood it. Talk about mutilation. What a place!’

‘That’s the anarchist tat, eh? Clever of you to think of it, Miss, and brave of you to go into the Professor’s den.’

‘No, not at all, poor man, he was very polite.’

‘Yair, well, he ain’t used to ladies coming into his salon. We found out who shot the boy, Miss, and who shot at you.’

‘You did? Bert, that’s wonderful!’

‘We were told,’ Bert admitted. ‘Little Billy Ferguson gave us the office. We’d been asking questions, see, and he don’t approve of people asking questions. A bad man, Miss. You got that betting slip, Cec?’

Cec handed Phryne the grubby paper. She tucked it into her purse.

‘That’s excellent work, Bert, really excellent, and so quick! What’s wrong with Little Billy?’

‘Nothing, if you like murderers, and I don’t. He’s got them pale blue eyes that look straight through yer. Give a man the grues, he would.’

‘Does he give you the grues, Cec?’

‘You bet, Miss.’

‘An impressively nasty character, evidently. Were you in any danger?’

‘Nah, he don’t like the commos, he says that the anarchists are giving crime a bad name. Wasn’t it Little Billy that did for that cop outside the Olympic Games pub?’

Cec nodded.

‘Olympic Games? I don’t know a hotel of that name.’

‘Nah, it’s called the Railway Hotel. In ’Roy. They have an SP in the courtyard, see, and when the cops raid ’em there’s lots of Olympic events for the blokes who are running away. The long jump, the hundred yard dash, the high-jump over the wall.’

Phryne laughed.

‘Home, Miss? And you got anything more for us to do?’

‘Not at the moment. I’ll call you if I need you. Thanks for the ride, friends. How much?’

‘On the house,’ said Bert, chuckling. ‘You’ve done me a bit of good at Antonio’s. No one expected me to pick up the best-looking sheila in Flinders Street. Give us a call if you need us, Miss. Good night.’

Phryne was met with downcast looks from both girls and Dot when she breezed in.

‘Whatever is the matter? Had bad news?’

‘It’s Mary Tachell, Miss,’ explained Dot. ‘We telephoned her house and her mother says that she’s come down with a bilious attack and won’t be up for a week.’

‘Little beast. She ate like a pig!’ muttered Ruth.

‘Never mind. One thing about investigation, my dears, is that where one avenue closes, another opens. I now know who killed Yourka Rosen (that is the young man’s name) and I am going to a seance tomorrow night to do a little…er…manipulation of his murderers. So I can’t go to the ballet, girls, but never mind; you shall go regardless. I must get out of this depressing dress. Excuse me. Oh, Mr. Butler, put on all the alarms tonight. We might have visitors. Has anyone called?’

‘Mr. Smith, Miss. He will call again. No one else.’

‘Good,’ and Phryne floated up the stairs to a wash and a rest.

***

Phryne spent a blameless evening reading
The Winter’s Tale
with Ruth, who was still convinced that Shakespeare could bear translation.

‘Why does he take so long to say anything?’

‘The Elizabethan stage had no scenes and only hand-props. His actors had to create the scene, as well as the action. Look how cleverly he has leafed the innocent conversation of the Queen and Polixenes with the King’s own jealous thoughts. It works very well onstage, I promise. We shall go to the next Shakespeare anyone puts on. You shall see.’

‘But they are like brothers, it’s explained in the first scene,’ objected Ruth. ‘How could he possibly get such a wrong idea?’

‘There is no sense in jealousy, pet, and no King or brotherhood is proof against a bee in the bonnet.’

‘I suppose so,’ agreed Ruth, and kept reading.

Altogether it was a very agreeable evening and Phryne put herself to bed full of remembered love and poetry.

***

Tuesday dawned clear and cool with promise of sun to come, and Phryne remembered her tattoo in the nick of time and washed around it. She made an experimental dab with the sponge and no ink came off.

Phryne occupied her morning with an extensive telephone canvass of all the girls at the convent and the Presbyterian Ladies College to whom Alicia Waddington-Forsythe could possibly have fled. Reverend Mother provided the convent girls, and Jane the PLC. None of them had seen her, and most of them seemed relieved that they had not. She laid down the phone at eleven, found her bathing costume, and went out to the beach for a brief swim. She hoped the bracing water would help her think.

Phryne knew that bathing was tolerated, though strictly illegal, on St. Kilda beach during the hours between sunrise and sunset, and had bought her costume in Paris. It had no legs and very little back and she was somewhat disappointed that there was no one on the beach to be shocked by her semi-nakedness. This would test the tattoo, she thought, and plunged forward into the sea, which closed, salt and bitter, over her head.