Raisins and Almonds

Lee?'

'I've spoken to her and I'm convinced she didn't do it. However, I don't know who did or why, and until I do Jack Robinson isn't going to let his prime suspect go free.' Phryne ran through her investigations so far, which had yielded remarkably little, and said, 'I need to know what is in those papers, and I need to know quickly. No one can read the Hebrew letters. Can you recommend a learned man for me?'

Husband and wife exchanged glances.

'Yes, well, yes, we know who might be able to read them, but ... he's a difficult man,' said Mr Abrahams carefully, consulting his wife with a waggle of one eyebrow.

She nodded and said slowly, 'Difficult, yes, but it is possible that Phryne could handle him. I don't think he's met anyone like her before, Bennie. Neither have I, hmm?'

'His name is Rabbi Elijah,' said Benjamin. 'He lives near you, in St Kilda. He is a very holy man, very learned, but ...'

'Difficult?' finished Phryne.

Mr Abrahams nodded ponderously 'Difficult.'

'I'll go and see him tomorrow. Can you give me a letter of introduction?'

'I don't think that would help. He is ...'

'Difficult,' conceded Simon. 'I can take you to him, but the only one of us Godless almost-gentiles he would speak to is Yossi Liebermann, and you had such a startling effect on him, Phryne ...'

'What happened to Yossi?' asked his father, and Simon described Yossi's abrupt exit from Mrs Grossman's house.

'Too much study, it turns the brain in the end, especially studying the Kabala, that is not meant for humans to understand,' commented Benjamin. 'Also of course he would not be comfortable in the presence of so beautiful and stylish a gentile lady, lest his purity be smirched, I beg your pardon, Phryne.'

'Not at all—a compliment, to have such an effect.'

'Poor Yossi,' sighed Julia. 'His mother had such hopes for him. He's a good shoemaker, a craftsman. Then he started reading all the ancient writings, the old Rabbis and now—' She sighed again.

Mr Abrahams objected mildly. 'He is still a good shoemaker and he is working well, even though he stays up all night, Lily Grossman says, making experiments and stenches and burning her table. Did I tell you that young Saul is almost bar mitzvah? We will need to arrange the reception.'

'He is a good boy, Saul,' said Julia, brightening. 'The reception will be in the house in Faraday Street?'

'es, if it can be managed,' said Mr Abrahams, smiling at his wife.

'Of course it can be managed,' she said sharply. Phryne saw a ghost of the same expression of slightly irritated efficiency which she had seen on Mrs Grossman's face as she chivvied her children to prepare for the visitors. 'I will talk to Lily about it, Ben. You want a good spread?'

'Yes. Everything as Yossel would have wanted. His father was a good friend, a real mensch,' he explained to Phryne. 'And the boy is a good boy.'

'Yossel would be proud,' agreed Julia. 'I will arrange it.'

'About Rabbi Elijah.' Phryne inserted a word into the conversation.

'Rabbi Elijah? Difficult,' said Julia, unconscious of the irony.

'How do I get to see him?'

'You go to his house—Simon will take you—but make sure that he doesn't see Simon. To him we are as bad as the unobservant, almost as bad as the meshumad.'

'Meshumad?'

'The Apostates. Those who embraced the Christian religion without threat of torture,' explained Simon. 'We are not Orthodox enough for the Hasidim, the Holy Ones. Perhaps he might prefer an honest shiksa.'

'Simon!' reproved his father, but Phryne smiled.

'Perhaps he might at that,' she agreed, patting Simon's hand.

His mother smiled.

Seven

Without counsel purposes are disappointed: But in the multitude of counsellors they are established.

The Holy Bible, Proverbs 15:22

I really can't remember anything about it,' protested Miss Lee. 'I already got the novels wrong, that was Wednesday.'

'Yes you can, Miss, you just have to close your eyes and put yourself back there and it's all in your head, just like a moving picture, that's what Miss Phryne says,' Dot instructed. 'Now, you're opening the shop and hanging up your coat and putting on your smock. Go on from there.'

'I unlocked the cash tin and just as I was taking out my stock book a young man came in and asked if I carried newspapers, and I told him I didn't.'

'What did he look like?'

'An ordinary young man,' said Miss Lee. 'Oh, dear, I can't do this. He had a serge suit and an umbrella—I would have said that he was a clerk. In any case he was only in the shop for less than a minute. I broke my pencil, then, and I was sharpening it when the bell tinkled and ...'

'Yes?' prompted Dot. Miss Lee's brow creased with effort. 'You're doing very well, you know.'

'The bell rang, I looked up from my pencil, and there was a delivery man with a big box. It was my auction books from Ballarat ... yes. I asked him to put it in the corner and I checked the invoice—there was something wrong with the invoice—what was it? Ah, yes, it had a blot over the list of contents, I couldn't read it. You have to be careful with dispatch notes, they fudge the orders sometimes, and if I was to sign it without checking what was in the box I couldn't complain if the one valuable book was missing and all the dross was there. Dross always is, somehow. I've never lost a set of Victorian sermons in my life ... I made the man wait until I checked the volumes, then I signed it and he went away. After that there was Mrs Johnson looking in for her cookery book, which I sold her, then this absurd woman and her atlas. Then the two young men and then Mr Michaels. Poor boy.'

'Tell me about the carter,' said Dot. Miss Lee ran her fingers through her short hair and groaned.

'He was just a carter, in gloves and boots and overalls and a greasy cloth cap—rather stout like they often are, dark, I thought, and gruff. But he did look at the books while I made him wait. I really didn't see his face, Miss Williams. Is it important?'

'Probably not,' conceded Dorothy. 'What about the woman with the atlas?'

'Oh, my dear, she was raddled and forty if she was a day, dressed in a rather tight dark blue suit and a perfectly absurd hat. It was a broad black straw with half a seagull on the side and shells all round the crown, I noticed it particularly because I really wanted to ... visit the convenience, and she was holding me up. She was asking me such silly questions and all I could see of her was this awful hat. She was small. About five foot.'

And common?' asked Dot, who had strong views on style.

'Oh, very. And foreign. Then two young men, friends, I gathered that they worked in the city. They had nice suits, a little loud perhaps. They were probably mechanics, or maybe something horsy.' Miss Lee's fine nose crinkled. 'They had a rather ... gamy smell. Then after that it was quiet and I could go to the convenience, and when I got back there was poor Mr Michaels and this all happened. Will this help?' she asked, and Dot patted her hand.

'Yes,' she said with perfect faith. 'Miss Phryne will find them.'

Phryne Fisher had dressed carefully for her encounter with Rabbi Elijah. She wore a black suit, the straight skirt reaching almost to her ankles, and a close-fitting black hat. Simon was impressed at how decorous she looked until she gave him a sensual smile which disturbed his equanimity.

'What do I call this rabbi?'

'He probably won't speak to you, don't be too offended, Phryne. He isn't supposed to talk to ... er ...'

'Shiksas?'

'Er ... yes. Call him Rabbi, if he speaks to you. Also, you must not touch him, in case you might be ritually unclean. Menstruating, you know,' blushed Simon. 'But you might catch his interest if you can show him the