Introducing the Honourable Phryne Fisher

‘Old or young? Any accent?’

‘Can’t tell, it was on the telephone. No accent that I heard. She said, fifty pounds to plant the stuff.’

‘Where did you get it?’ asked Phryne, sharply.

‘She sent it. Just the one little packet. I picked it up, with the fifty pounds, from the post office.’

‘What post office?’

‘GPO, sir, she said. .’

‘She said what?’

‘That if I didn’t do it, she’d kill my wife and kids.’ ‘And you believed it?’ spat Robinson. Ellis seemed surprised.

‘Not at first, sir, but she said she’d give me a demonstration. You recall those children, found with cut throats, dead in the beds, with their mother dead beside them? That was her work, she said, and you know we don’t have a motive or a suspect for that.’

‘Fool,’ snapped Robinson. ‘The victim’s husband did it. He’s down at Russell Street this moment, spilling it all.’

‘You’re sure, sir?’

‘Of course. I told you so at the time, you cretin.’

‘I. . I believed her. .’ stammered Ellis, and began to cry.

Detective-inspector Robinson dropped the arm he was holding and turned away in disgust. ‘Christ have pity,’ he exclaimed.

‘Pour the Senior-constable some tea, Dot. Now, take my hanky and blow. That’s right, now drink this,’ and Phryne administered tea and a small glass of Benedictine. The young man drank and blew.

In a few moments, he was recovered enough to speak.

‘So I got the packet and I was going to plant it. I did believe her, sir. I needed the money, my wife has to have an operation. . please, sir, don’t sack me. We wouldn’t be able to live.’

He was now crying freely. Phryne took the Detective-inspector aside. He accompanied her, still fuming.

‘Need this go any further?’

‘Of course it does, he’s taken a bribe.’

‘Yes, but under great duress. Could you make a confidential report, not actually sack him, but keep him on? You see, if he is thrown out on the street, it will be a sign to whoever is doing this that the plot has failed, and I don’t want that to happen. Twig?’

‘Yes. But what have you done to attract this kind of trouble?’

‘A good question. I don’t know. But I shall find out. Can we cooperate? Don’t sack Ellis yet, and I’ll let you in on the arrests, once I am in a position to be sure.’

‘Dangerous, Miss.’

‘Yes, but only I can do it, and it’s better than being bored. Come on, be a sport. Think of getting your hands on a prominent local coke dealer.’

‘Well. . Only for a short time,’ he temporised, ‘a week, say.’

‘Two,’ bargained Phryne.

‘Split the difference. Say ten days.’

‘Done. You’ll take no action for ten days, and I’ll let you in on the kill. A deal?’

‘A deal,’ agreed Robinson. ‘I’ll have a word with WPC Jones, too. Ellis is a fool, but until now I would have said that he was as honest as the day. Here’s my telephone number, Miss Fisher. Don’t get in too deep, will you?’

‘I am already,’ said Phryne. ‘Mr Smythe, I have accepted Detective-inspector Robinson’s apology, and I think that we can declare the matter closed. Goodnight, gentlemen,’ she breezed, as Robinson, Ellis and the manager exited. She closed the door on them and sank down onto the sofa, where Sasha put an arm around her.

‘Dot,’ called Phryne, ‘order more tea, and come and have some yourself. That concludes the entertainment for the night, I hope.’

Phryne said no more until Dot came reluctantly and sat beside her, brushing down her uniform jacket as though the touch of the hapless constable had soiled it.

Sasha poured her some tea and leaned back again, encirc- ling Phryne with a strong comforting arm. The young woman was trembling; Sasha wondered if the Princesse had over- estimated Phryne’s strength. Dot sipped her tea suspiciously.

‘Well,’ said Phryne, her voice vibrant with excitement. ‘They are now after me, as well as Sasha. This is excellent, is it not?’

‘Oh, excellent,’ murmured Sasha ironically. ‘Excellent!’

‘What do you mean, Miss?’ asked Dot, setting down her teacup with a rattle. ‘Who is after you? The person what hid the little bag on the wardrobe? I’d like to lay my hands on ’im, I would,’ she continued, biting vindictively into a teacake. ‘E’d know e’d been in a fight.’

‘Him, indeed. Sasha, it is now time to tell us all that you know about this Roi des Neiges. Begin, please,’ ordered Phryne. She was quite cool. The tremor had been hunting arousal, not fear. Phryne was enjoying herself.

Obediently, Sasha settled himself into the curve of Phryne’s side.

‘We were visiting Paris, before the end of the Great War. I was only a child, and I do not recall much about it; just the sound of the big guns, coming nearer and nearer, and Mama being frightened, and we could not sleep. I do not remember Russia, which we left in the winter — though perhaps the cold, that I remember from very small, the snow and the cold wind. Paris was cold, too. Mama and Grandmama came to Paris in 1918, just before the Peace was being signed. They had accomplished a great journey in escaping to Archangel, where the English were; they had gone most of the way on foot.’

‘All very affecting, make a good film, but revenons a nos moutons if you please,’ snapped Phryne, resisting the hypnotic attraction of the brown eyes and the honeyed voice.

‘Patience,’ smiled Sasha, not at all crushed. ‘If you interrupt me, I shall lose my memory. So. We were all in Paris, my father having been killed by the revolutionaries, and Mama sold some of the family jewels to keep us fed. The Tscarnov emeralds, and many other beautiful stones she sold in that winter.

‘We sought a protector, and not Mama but Grandmama found one — an Englishman, a lord, and he found us a flat and nurtured us as if we had been his own, for love of Grandmama — how we laughed about it, Mama and me!’

‘Yes, and so?’ asked Phryne impatiently. Dot was staring at Sasha as though he had dropped in from another planet.

‘So, we lived with the English lord until we were sixteen, then we were sent away to school in Switzerland. We were away for a year, Elli and me, and Grandmama wrote that all was well in Paris, so we did not inquire anymore. Then we returned, two years ago, and found that the old lord was dead — it was sad, he was a generous man — and that Mama was dying. We could see that she was dying. She had become habituated to the cocaine, and since the old lord had left Grandmama a great deal of money, she could buy what she liked. She was sniffing it by the handful, and after the dose she would become bright and happy, like the Mama of yesterday, then morose, then bitter, then screaming and falling into fits. So the cycle. She did not sleep. She begged us to kill her.

‘This was not necessary, for the saving of my immortal soul, as after a few weeks I might have done it,’ admitted Sasha. Tears ran unchecked down his cheeks. ‘She died. Before she died, we besought her to tell us who had done this to her, who had introduced her to this deathly drug. She would only tell us that the King, Le Roi of Snow, had given it to her for free. She thought him kind — then the price had gone up, and then up. She had sold all her jewels. But Grandmama knew that some of the jewellery had not gone to pawnbrokers. This King had a taste for fine stones, we heard, and the great necklace of the Tsars, at least, had gone to him intact. And the Princesse’s pearls.’

Something that Sasha had said hit Phryne’s intuition like a lance through the solar plexus. He paused, feeling the tightening of her muscles, but she could not pin down the thought. She waved him on.

‘And a collar of diamonds made, it was said, for Catherine the Great. Grandmama said that if we could survey Parisian society, then we would one day see the necklace, and then we would have our man. Thus was born the Compagnie des Ballets Masques. Both my sister and I had danced together since we were children; also we had no profession. We danced the old story of the Maiden and Death, and Paris was