Lindsay pulled a grim face. ‘You realise that you’ve made me miss three lectures,’ he reproved, and Phryne pulled him down into her arms again.
‘And I shall make you miss another three,’ she said, sealing his protesting mouth with her own. Lindsay knew when he had met a determined woman. He submitted.
Miss Henderson, on inquiring as to the whereabouts of Miss Fisher, was told by Mr Butler that she was in conference and could not be disturbed. Mr Butler’s face was perfectly straight. He was pleased that Miss Fisher had dropped the painter who had been her last lover. The painter had left partly-finished canvases all over the place and had washed his brushes in Mrs Butler’s pristine kitchen sink. A law student, Mr Butler reflected, was likely to be much cleaner around the house.
Awakening from a light sleep, Lindsay turned over with a muttered curse, loath to leave the most ravishing dream he had enjoyed for. . well, for all of his life. His face came into contact with Phryne’s sleeping breast and he woke, and kissed her.
‘Oh, Phryne, so you weren’t a dream!’
‘Quite real and indeed palpable,’ agreed Phryne. ‘But I must get up, Lindsay darling. I’ve got things to do.’
‘Yes, I know,’ said the young man, holding her firmly and pinning her down with one knee. ‘Later.’
‘Later,’ Phryne succumbed, laughing.
Lindsay was in the bathroom, wondering which of the golden dolphin taps would yield hot water, when there was a thunderous banging at the front door, and he heard the admirable Mr Butler open it.
‘I must see Miss Henderson,’ he heard Alastair say, in a muted roar which meant that he was very angry indeed. Phryne pulled on a robe and joined him in listening.
‘Very well, sir, if you would care to wait I will ascertain if she is at home,’ Mr Butler replied.
Alastair yelled, ‘You know she’s at home!’
Mr Butler said crushingly, ‘I meant, sir, that I would find out if she is at home to you.’
There was a silence, during which they could hear feet pacing to and fro across the tiles of the landing. The door to Miss Henderson’s room opened and shut.
‘Miss Henderson will see you, sir.’
The feet ran down the hall. Phryne heard the door crash open.
‘Eunice, have you had the infernal nerve to call in the police?’ shouted Alastair, and Phryne swore.
‘Hell! Has the man no heart? What did I do with my clothes?’
She dragged on some garments and ran down the stairs, with the half-naked Lindsay close behind her.
‘Mr Thompson, I must ask you not to make such a noise!’ she said icily, and he turned on her a face white with fury.
‘You traitorous bitch! What have you done with my friend? All you women are alike — all betrayers and whores!’
He swung back his arm, meaning to slap Phryne across the face, and found himself on his knees with a terrible pain in his elbow. Miss Fisher’s face, calm and cold, was three inches from his own, and he could smell the scent of female sexuality exuding from her skin. It turned him sick.
‘Make one move and I’ll break your arm,’ said Miss Fisher flatly. ‘What do you mean, storming into my house like a bully? Call me a traitor, will you? Here is your friend. I haven’t hurt him. I have pleased him — and perhaps that’s more than you could have done, hmm? Go on. Try to hit me again.’
Lindsay, aghast, had stopped on the stairs when he realised that Phryne did not need any help. The fight was going out of Alastair. At the same time, Dot and Jane came to the front door, Miss Henderson started to cry, Mr Butler picked up the telephone to call the police and Mrs Butler appeared from the kitchen with the poker. Alastair stood up slowly, glared at Phryne, turned, and walked out of the house.
‘The fun’s over,’ said Phryne, pushing back her hair. ‘Come down, Lindsay. Mr B., shut the door, and serve some drinks. Don’t distress yourself, Miss Henderson, it’s just a brainstorm of some kind, he’ll be better tomorrow. Dot, Jane, how nice to see you. Come in and I think I will open a bottle of champagne, Mr B. It has been a very good day, otherwise.’
Phryne sank down on the couch and set about dispelling the sour aftertaste of Alastair’s violence with vivacity and Veuve Clicquot.
CHAPTER NINE
Lewis Carroll
Phryne woke from an uncomfortable dream — not precisely a nightmare but certainly not a delightful reverie — and found that during the night she had pulled a pillow over her face, which probably accounted for it.
Next to her, sleeping like a baby, lay the beautiful Lindsay, as sleek as a seal, and utterly relaxed. Phryne picked up his hand, and dropped it. It fell limply.
‘Out to the world,’ she observed, and went to the bathroom to run herself a deep, hot, foaming bath, scented with Rose de Gueldy. Then she sat down on the big bed and looked at her lover, finding herself unexpectedly moved by his beauty and his gentleness. Her motives in seducing him had been mixed, to say the least; among them lust and the desire to hammer a wedge between him and his friend Alastair predominated. He had been an engrossing, untiring, eager lover and an apt pupil, and she almost envied the lucky young woman whom he would marry. Like Janet in the old ballad of Tam Lin, ‘she had gotten a stately groom’.
He sighed and turned over, revealing the ordered propriety of bone and muscle that was his back, and Phryne was about to slide down beside him again when she bethought herself of her bath, and went to take it, getting to the taps seconds before it overflowed.
She soaked herself thoroughly, and only rose from the foam like Aphrodite when Mr Butler tapped at the door with the early morning tea.
‘Good morning, Mr Butler,’ she said, accepting the loaded tray, and the houseman smiled at her.
‘Good morning, Miss Fisher, you are looking well, the young man has done you good. I’ve brought the papers, Miss Jane’s photograph is in them.’
‘Thank you, Mr Butler,’ and Phryne shut the door, woke Lindsay with a cup of tea, and sat down beside him to survey the news.
Jane’s photograph occupied a column of page three, with the caption, ‘Do you know this girl?’ Phryne thought that it had come out uncommonly well, and should produce results. Lindsay sat up sleepily and drank his tea, and Phryne settled back comfortably against his shoulder.
‘I don’t know if I dare go back to my digs,’ confessed the young man who had done Miss Fisher so much good. ‘How can I look old Alastair in the eye?’
‘Mmm?’ asked Phryne, and Lindsay tried to explain.
‘You see, we’ve known each other almost all our lives, and we’ve always done everything together — we used to climb together, but Alastair had an accident with another climber. He was killed by a falling rock, and Alastair thought that it was his fault, though it wasn’t, of course — rocks can happen to anyone. Then we were in the school play together — he was a good actor. I remember him doing Captain Hook, limping around waiting for the crocodile. . tick. . tick. . with his face all scarred.’
‘Oh? How did he do that?’ asked Phryne, who was not really listening.
‘Glue, Phryne — just glue. You must have noticed how it puckers up your skin if you spill it. A line of glue on the face and there’s your scar. Perfect. Then we joined the glee club, and because we couldn’t climb anymore, he suggested that we take up rowing, and we’ve always done everything together, except. .’
‘Except this,’ said Phryne, kissing him on his swollen mouth. ‘But it was bound to happen, Lindsay. Didn’t you feel left out when he took up with Miss Henderson?’
‘Well, no, she never seduced him, and I always thought her a very dull girl, with that frightful mother. I could never understand what he saw in her, really. A very good girl, of course, but no conversation. She used to just sit there and adore him, and her mother would sit there and abuse him, and I refused to go there again, I just couldn’t see the amusement in it. But he seemed devoted, though he never talked about her. Then again, words could not express what I feel about you, so there it is. And I must get up and go to training,’ said the young man reluctantly. ‘Shall I see you again?’
