Urn Burial

CHAPTER FOUR

The treasures of time lie high, in urns, coins and

monuments, scarcely beneath the roots of some

vegetables.

Urn Burial, Sir Thomas Browne, Chapter I.

THE ROSE garden already contained Miss Mead and Miss Cray, so Phryne and her companions kept walking. The original conceit of the builder of Cave House had stretched to a knot garden which might have been laid out by William Morris himself. It was wet and scented and Phryne sniffed with pleasure as she sat down on a Pre-Raphaelite box bench which could have supported a medieval King, with room left over for the rest of the court.

‘Here’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance,’ quoted Gerald, laying a snippet of it in her lap. ‘I pray you, love, remember.’

‘I’ll remember,’ said Phryne. He knelt beside her, his brown eyes like a spaniel’s. He was very attractive in a dewy, fragile fashion. Phryne could not imagine a more unfitting mate for him than that rough, maladroit girl.

‘Beautiful Miss Fisher,’ he said, ‘I have a favour to ask.’

‘Gerry, get up, don’t be an ass,’ said Jack violently.

‘Go away, Jack,’ said Gerald, never removing his gaze. ‘Aren’t you supposed to be escorting Miss Cynthia to Bairnsdale about now?’

Jack swore and kicked the bench. Then there was the sound of running feet as he retreated towards the house. Phryne ran a meditative hand through Gerald’s silky, curly hair. She knew when she was being charmed, but that didn’t make her dislike the process.

‘Get up, precious, sit beside me,’ she said. ‘You’ll plead just as well in that position and the damp will ruin your flannels.’

A little disconcerted, the young man did as ordered and repossessed himself of Phryne’s hand. ‘You see, you’re one of Mr Reynolds’ oldest friends, he might listen to you. It’s about Jack. He’s my dearest chum, boyhood companion and all that. Tom Reynolds did his father out of a lot of money and won’t give him a bean.’

Phryne cut him short. ‘I know all about it, Gerald, and I’ll try. But it may not work. And in return . . .’

‘In return?’ The spaniel-brown eyes loomed closer.

‘You can help me in my investigation,’ she said, and kissed him, decisively, on the mouth.

He tasted sweet, of early strawberries, perhaps. He kissed beautifully. Phryne finally dragged herself away and stroked one finger lightly along his cheek, which was flushed with the most delicate rose.

‘Tell me about Jack, and Dingo Harry, and everything about Cave House,’ she said.

‘I’ll show you around, may I?’ he asked eagerly.

Phryne was feeling her injuries and was, besides, flooded with lust, an emotion which could not properly be transferred to such slender shoulders as Gerald’s, who might snap under the strain. She hoped that Lin Chung was enduring a really punitive game of tennis and turned to accompany Gerald back to Cave House.

‘Phryne,’ someone called. ‘Phryne, dear, there you are.’

‘Here I am,’ she agreed. ‘Hello, Tom.’

‘Been looking for you, old girl. Haven’t shown you my house. Sorry, Gerry,’ he said to the young man. ‘Got to cut you out. Prior acquaintance and all that.’

Phryne gave Gerald a combustible smile and said, ‘Another time.’

Gerald faded away in the direction of the stables and Phryne looked at Tom Reynolds.

His clipped speech was not unusual. She put it down to the years of sub-editing he had been forced to do before he left newspapers and took to books. He still spoke in headlines. He took her arm and returned the inspection; a stout, red-faced and jolly man, now looking strained and tired. His scanty grey hair was rumpled and Phryne smoothed it down across his pink scalp with an affectionate caress. He always reminded her of a teddy bear.

‘Amazing house, Tom dear,’ she commented with perfect truth. ‘I’ve never seen anything like it.’

‘Yes, it’s a bit of a mishmash, but the brewer who built it, old Mr Giles, built well. It’s got foundations down to the middle of the world and it’s all good material – mahogany and cedar and fine cut stone. Of course, he’d made several fortunes – always safe putting your money into beer. Odd cuss. You were sitting on his tomb.’

‘I was?’ asked Phryne, rather startled.

‘Yes, he planted several of his relatives around here. He’s in the knot garden, his wife is in the rose garden, under a lot of Mademoiselle Bichot teas, and the house is full of urns of his nearest and dearest. He sold the place to Evelyn’s father on the understanding that we take care of the urns, so we have. There’s a marble one on your mantelpiece, I think.’

‘Lord, Tom, you might have warned me! I thought it was a tobacco jar!’

‘Lucky you don’t smoke a pipe,’ he chuckled. ‘I was all for banishing them to the cellar but m’wife didn’t think that was right, and I’ve got used to them. How did you get on with Evelyn?’

‘Very well. She came to see me after I fell off Cuba.’

‘He’s a touchy one. Are you all right, Phryne? Not like you to be thrown. Well, let’s have a look at the house.’

‘Tom, there’s something very wrong here,’ she said soberly as she limped across the lawn.

‘What, with the house?’ He laughed uncomfortably.

‘Pay attention, Tom. Look, you know me. You should know that you can trust me. You’ve been ignoring or playing down two nasty happenings lately. Now that suggests to my suspicious mind that you are either fully aware of the situation and want to deny it, or that you are constitutionally obtuse, and I’ve never known you to be obtuse, Tom. You’re in trouble.’

The bright brown eyes blinked at her unladylike frankness. He began, ‘Now, Phryne, old fellow . . .’ then sank under her cool green gaze. ‘Oh, well, what’s the use. You will have picked up all the gossip anyway by now, you’re such a sponge for atmosphere. Yes, there is something happening. I’ve had letters. Someone wants to kill me. It’s been going on for a while and I’m sick of it – but there’s nothing I could go to the police with, Phryne, just insinuations. I heard about the tarred wire that brought poor Cuba down and could have killed you. That must have been aimed at me. Oh, God, here’s Joan Fletcher.’

‘Tom,’ said Mrs Fletcher, pink with indignation, ‘my daughter . . .’

‘Your daughter?’ asked Tom tonelessly.

‘She’s playing tennis with that Chinese person.’

‘Yes?’

Mrs Fletcher drew in a deep breath and said in a voice loaded with horror, ‘And she’s laughing!’

‘Joan, perhaps you might like to come back into the house and have some tea, you’re overwrought,’ said Reynolds. Joan Fletcher accepted his arm, almost pushing Phryne aside. Mrs Fletcher was dressed in trailing mauve chiffon, a most unsuitable garment for walking in but a becoming colour for her pale complexion and grey eyes. She leaned languishingly on Tom, and Phryne wished that she had kept hold of Gerald. If anyone was going to lean languishingly on a suitable man she wished it to be herself.

‘Listen!’ Joan said compellingly. Tom and Phryne listened.

From the roof came the sounds of a tennis ball hit fairly and hard, back and forth – pock, pock, pock. The rally went on for more than a minute. Then they heard puck! as the ball hit the wall behind and Miss Fletcher said, ‘Well played!’ and laughed.

Her mother was right. It was a light, genuine laugh and Phryne for one had never heard the girl laugh like that before.

‘You’re imagining things,’ said Tom, pulling his eyebrows down out of his hair and shooting Phryne a questioning glance. Phryne shrugged. With his high ideas on reputation and female virtue, Lin Chung was no threat to Miss Fletcher’s virgin state, but she could not see a way of telling Tom that without outraging Mrs Fletcher.

‘I’m sure it will be all right,’ she said. They stood for a while, listening as the tennis players finished their game. Feet rang on the stairs.

Miss Cray and Miss Mead joined them on the portico.

‘How nice to see the young people enjoying themselves,’ murmured Miss Mead. ‘I am not an expert, of course, but Mr Lin seems to be a very good tennis player. So graceful! I have been sitting up there watching them.’

Phryne thought that she detected a note of irony in the soft, well-bred voice, but could not be sure. So Miss Fletcher and Lin Chung had been provided with a chaperone. Mrs Fletcher sagged a little with what might have been relief. Equally, Phryne sensed an unwholesome excitement under the mauve chiffon. Was Mrs Fletcher willing her daughter to make a scandal, perhaps, or – no, not as serious as that – to fall in love, tragically, and need a mother’s helping hand and wise counsel, to share the excitement of a love affair? If so, she seemed doomed to disappointment. Judy came clattering down the stairs with Lin Chung behind her, flushed with nothing more sinful than exercise.

‘I say, spiffing game,’ she exclaimed. ‘Play again, Mr Lin?’

‘Certainly.’ Phryne saw that Lin Chung was not even breathing hard, much less sweating, and his cream flannels were unmarked. She caught his eye and he smiled and made a dismissive gesture with one hand – a bagatelle, it seemed to say.

‘Tea,’ said Tom Reynolds, and ushered them into the parlour.

A small table contained a pot of tea and one of coffee, which Phryne decided to avoid, and a plate of homemade ginger biscuits. Mrs Reynolds, apparently quite recovered, dispensed cups and the company sat down.

They were joined by Gerald, who wafted in and leaned on the doorpost.

‘Remarkable library,’ he said. ‘Tom dear, whoever gave you all those books? Have you read them?’

‘Don’t be puckish,’ begged his host. ‘Life is too short to watch young men being puckish, even decorative young men like you. Why, what have you found?’

‘The Yellow Book ,’ said Gerald. ‘You’ve got a complete collection with Beardsley illustrations. Surely old brewer Giles can’t have bought such inflammable literature.’

‘No, I believe that it was his wife,’ said Tom. ‘She had artistic pretensions. Now, do you want some tea or not?’

‘Gerry, how about a nice game of tennis?’ suggested Miss Fletcher. ‘You don’t want to frowst about in the rotten old library all day.’

‘Yes I do,’ he said sweetly. ‘You’ve got a partner, Judy. Play with him, he’s much better than me. I’m a real duffer at tennis. No tea, thanks, Mrs Reynolds.’

He wafted out again, and Judith declared to the company, ‘I believe he’s jealous!’

There was a dead silence. Lin Chung rescued the situation.

‘You promised me another game, Miss Fletcher,’ he said, putting down his untouched cup and picking up his racket.

Phryne gave him ten out of ten for gentlemanly behaviour.

‘Such a nice day,’ commented Miss Mead. ‘Though it looks like rain, I fear.’

‘Yes, and the river is rising. We shall be cut off if it comes up another foot. Nothing to worry about,’ said Mrs Reynolds. ‘We have a large store of food and the water never comes up beyond the knot garden or the stables. Just a matter of waiting it out. I hope that Jack and Cynthia will be all right, though. Sometimes the river cuts the road.’

Phryne spared a few enjoyable moments wondering what Jack Lucas would do with the voluptuous and predatory Miss Medenham if they were cut off by floodwater, decided that he would be equal to the challenge, and drank her tea. Miss Cray who had ostentatiously refused sugar said, ‘I never take sugar. I gave up during Lent some years ago. Austerity is my goal.’

‘Very fitting,’ murmured Miss Mead, getting out her crocheting.

‘Very,’ agreed her host. ‘It does you credit, Sapphira.’

‘How is that poor parlourmaid?’ asked Miss Mead of Miss Cray. ‘You were going to visit her.’

‘Yes, but that Doctor would not let me in. I left her a few tracts. At such times one must think of one’s soul.’

‘Indeed,’ agreed Miss Mead. ‘It was strange that she was attacked so far from the house. Still, I expect that it was a wandering madman, some tramp – poor girl. Do you like this new pattern, Miss Cray? It’s for my cousin’s child and I am a little doubtful about the edging.’ Miss Cray unbent enough to give an opinion on the delicate shell pattern. Mrs Fletcher joined in with reminiscences of Brussels and the lace she had bought there for Judith’s baby frocks, and Phryne drifted to Tom Reynolds’ side.

‘Come on, old thing, let’s escape,’ she murmured, and he put down his cup. They were just approaching the door when the Doctor came in.

Doctor Franklin was a tall, slim man, with fashionably pale skin and slightly long dark hair, brushed straight back from a high forehead. His eyes were of an indeterminate shade between grey and blue and his profile was pure matinee idol; high-nosed, Roman and refined. He gave Phryne a smooth, well-tended hand and said, ‘Ah, Miss Fisher, how delightful to meet you. How do you do?’

‘Very well, thank you.’

Now that she could see him close up, he was not as young as he looked, or as confident. The hand had a slight but definite tremor; the palm was damp. There were fine lines around his eyes, extending into grooves around his finely chiselled mouth. She seemed to remember hearing that he had taken a leave of absence from his booming Collins Street practice with ‘nervous exhaustion’, a portmanteau term which could cover everything from the occasional headache to a full-blown hysterical collapse.

‘Miss Cray, Miss Mead, good morning,’ he said, looking past Phryne and releasing her hand. ‘Yes, thank you, Mrs Reynolds, I would like some tea.’

Phryne and Tom escaped into the reception hall and Tom wiped his brow with a blue handkerchief.

‘Phew! What a collection. Come along, I want to show you the house.’

‘All right, Tom dear, but if you don’t like your guests, why on earth do you invite them?’

‘Reasons,’ said Tom obscurely. He led the way through a green baize door into a dark little hall. He knocked on a closed door which was lettered ‘Butler’s Pantry’ and called, ‘Hinchcliff, I’m taking Miss Fisher on a tour. Can I have the cellar keys?’

Mr Hinchcliff, magnificent even though his waistcoat was unbuttoned and he had been evidently putting his boots up for a rest when his master called. He emerged and detached the keys from his watchchain.

‘Don’t forget the stairs are slippery, Sir,’ he warned.

Phryne was conducted down the corridor and into the servants’ hall, which contained the staff having morning tea. Dot was introducing Li Pen to ginger biscuits. Mrs Croft the cook was listening to his account, in his hesitant, accented English, of the home life of ginger. The rest of the staff were talking amongst themselves and the boy Albert was sitting on the back doorstep playing mumblety-peg with a jackknife. It whizzed past Phryne’s ankle. The boy gaped, grabbed the knife, and fled into the yard a scant inch ahead of Tom’s foot.

‘Young devil,’ said Tom indulgently.

‘I’ll tan his hide,’ said Mrs Croft. ‘Little monster! Mr Black, can you catch the little blighter?’

‘No,’ said the mechanic, glancing out the window. ‘He’s got a fair turn of speed, Mrs C – he’ll be miles away by now.’

He went on with his tea.

Phryne surveyed the table. Mr Black, from the indelible grease, was evidently the chauffeur and machine-minder. He had extended his range of skills so far as the carving and setting of a pile of very neat wooden clothes pegs. Mr Jones, who was a deal cleaner, seemed to be the houseman. Mrs Croft, a formidable woman in an apron so starched that it bent around her ample figure, was Cook. An earthy person and attendant, even earthier, had to be the gardeners. A scruffy girl with a mass of chestnut hair escaping from its bonds and water-wrinkled hands, was obviously the scullery maid and kitchen dogsbody. She was staring into her cup as though expecting reproof on its cleanliness. Mrs Hinchcliff was not there – perhaps she was with the distressed maid Lina. Dot, sitting between Li Pen and Terry Willis, smiled at Phryne.

Li Pen had obviously graduated from ‘Chink who might be Fu Manchu’s advance agent’, to ‘Chink who was a nice bloke really and quite a pet and very well informed about ginger’. Phryne was glad to see it. The servants were adapting faster than the guests, which was, perhaps, to be expected. Li Pen accepted another biscuit and Dot refilled his cup.

‘Just taking Miss Fisher on the grand tour,’ apologised Reynolds. ‘Didn’t mean to disturb anyone.’ For the place of the Boss was in the house and the place of the staff was in the servants’ hall and the twain were not supposed to invade each other’s domains.

Mrs Croft, as senior officer, inclined her head graciously as Phryne and Tom went on.

The cellar was reached by a Gothic stone stair which would not have disgraced a castle. It was, as the butler had said, slippery.

‘There’s a well down here,’ said Tom. ‘We dug another outside the house and capped this one, but it’s dangerous in the dark.’ He pulled on a cord and a bare electric bulb flicked into life. ‘I’ve got my own generator. I can’t be having with lamps, even though Evelyn says they cast a softer light. Too much work for the staff. I’d have to employ a boy just to clean and fill them and I already employ half the locals as it is. I’d better get Black and Jones down here with a pump. The river’s rising.’

‘Does it often flood?’

‘Every seven years or so. Never been bad since I’ve been here – old Mr Giles was flooded in for weeks in the old days. Water never gets up to the house but the cellar is below the watertable so we get seepage.’

‘I see you inherited Mr Giles’s wines.’ She looked at rows and rows of bottles marked with cellarman’s whitewash.

‘And I’ve been adding to them,’ agreed Tom. ‘There’s good wine coming out of the Barossa now, some reds that I’ve laid down for ten years; good port and tokay, even a rather tasty light hock. Quite passable with soda.’

The cellar was very large. It seemed to run most of the length of the house above. In the dim, unlit recesses, Phryne could see a jumble of old furniture; broken sideboards and chairs, what could surely not have been a marble sarcophagus, a pile of obsolete chamber-pots, and a stack of mildewing chests.

‘Junk,’ said Tom. ‘And there’s more in the attic. Come on, it’s cold.’

‘About this threat to your life?’

Reynolds was about to speak, then shut his mouth. ‘Not here. We can be overheard.’ He pointed up to where the servants’ hall probably was. The sound of tinkling spoons and crockery being collected could be heard. Li Pen was saying, ‘Ginger is given to make a horse strong and fast,’ and she heard Terry Willis chuckle. ‘Yair, I’ve known it to happen, ’specially when it was put under its . . .’ he dried up with the concluding word ‘tail’ unsaid, probably under Mrs Croft’s glare.

Tom Reynolds grinned and led the way up the castle staircase to another, which was by contrast lined with panelled wood and smelt of beeswax.

‘This is the first floor,’ he said to Phryne as she emerged behind him. ‘Bedrooms and guestrooms and the like. I put in bathrooms and lavatories as soon as I realised that I was going to live here.’ They walked along a passage heavy with plaster mouldings in the shape of cornucopias to another stair.

Phryne’s knees were tiring and her bruises were all shouting at once. But the movement was unstiffening her and she picked up her pace to keep up with her host.

‘Here are the servants’ rooms and the attic.’ Tom seemed determined to exhibit his whole house to Phryne. She opened a door at random and approved of a small room with an iron bed, a wardrobe, one window, a light, a smudgy picture of a child with an umbrella, and the ubiquitous servant’s trunk, known as a box, on a stand.

‘Very nice,’ she said. ‘Where to next?’

‘The roof,’ he said.

They skirted the dome, which dominated the hall, and Phryne looked down, leaning on a carved railing. The tea party was breaking up. She saw Miss Cray and the Doctor pass through the hall together, deep in discussion. Miss Mead and Mrs Fletcher were mounting the monumental stairs, talking about grades of wool and the need to keep babies warm. The staircase was lined with portraits of someone’s ancestors, urns on brackets, and a huge oil painting of a fox-hunt, strong on horses, so aged and smoky that only the hunting pink of the riders was visible.

Gerald emerged for a moment from the library, keeping his place in a yellow-covered book. Then he brightened and ran across the marble tiles to the front door to greet Jack Lucas escorting an unmistakable Miss Medenham in a bright-red coat and hat.

‘I say,’ Phryne heard him say. ‘I say, Gerry, isn’t it exciting? The road’s two feet deep in water. We’re cut off.’