Urn Burial

The main door opened and Tom Reynolds himself came out.

He was short, stout and hearty, and ordinarily Phryne liked him. At this moment she didn’t like anyone.

‘Well, what a terrible night for a drive!’ he exclaimed. ‘Come inside instantly! John will put the car away. Phryne dear, you must be chilled to the bone. I’d quite given you up!’

‘The fog slowed us down.’ Phryne got out and climbed up the steps to kiss Tom on the cheek. ‘Also, we’ve found a stray of yours, Tom.’

Dot helped the parlourmaid from the car. Reynolds identified her and goggled.

‘Lina? What have you been up to?’

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.

‘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 Decoratif 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 miscellaneous 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 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 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 bath, it’s just down the hall. I’m going down for a late supper with Tom, and a little eclaircissement 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 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 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