‘No, but you can send him a photograph, can’t you?’
‘Yes, I’ll do that. And I’d keep out of Alastair’s way, Miss Fisher, if I were you.’
‘I can look after myself,’ said Phryne crisply. ‘Get weaving with the photo. See you soon,’ she added, and hung up.
The cadet was very impressed that the detective-inspector could swear for so long without repeating himself.
Bert in later years said that breakfast at Miss Gay’s was the single most miserable experience of his whole life. ‘Not sad, mate,’ he explained. ‘But down right starving mean stone the crows and starve the lizards dirt miserable.’
The table was laid, as before, with cruet and mismatched plates, and Mr Henry Burton’s special dishes.
They sat in a hungry circle around a vat of horrible porridge, as thin as library paste, scorched and lumpy, while Mr Henry Burton said grace in an unctuous voice. Bert refused the clag, but the others ate voraciously. Mr Burton was breaking his fast on new rolls, hot from the oven, cherry jam, and butter. He had a pot of brewed coffee next to him. Bert accepted a plate of incinerated egg-powder and bacon so burned as only to be of professional interest to a pathologist. He tried to make a sandwich with his two pieces of stale white bread and marge, but the bacon broke as he touched it with the knife.
‘Can’t you give a man a feed?’ asked the tradesman, holding out a plate on which reposed a four-days’-dead egg and bacon of transcendant carbonisation.
‘I can’t take your bacon back to the kitchen, Mr Hammond,’ snapped Miss Gay, slapping at Ruth’s head as she passed. ‘You’ve bent it.’
Bert drank a cup of tea and chuckled.
After breakfast, the workers departed, and Mr Burton showed signs of going out. He took his hat and his stick, donned a fleecy-lined overcoat, and yelled for Ruth.
‘Call me a cab, girl.’
Bert grabbed the moment. ‘I’ll get you one, sir, he said civilly, and stepped into the kitchen, where Miss Gay kept the telephone.
‘Ruthie!’ he whispered, ‘we’re taking Mr Burton. Here’s a card. You go to this house if she hurts you again.’
Ruth nodded, stowed the card in her pocket, and Bert slipped back into the hall.
‘At the door in a moment, sir,’ he said, and went down the rickety front steps to look for Cec, who was due directly.
The bonzer new taxi pulled up, and Bert opened the door for the gentleman, closed it and jumped into the front seat.
‘Here!’ protested Mr Burton, ‘I didn’t ask you to share my taxi!’
Bert grinned. ‘It’s my taxi — well, half mine. This is my mate, Cec. Say hello to the nice gent, Cec.’
Cec muttered ‘hello’ and kept his eyes on the road.
‘Where are you taking me?’ asked Burton.
‘A lady friend of ours wants to see you real bad.’
‘Which lady?’
‘The Honourable Phryne Fisher, that’s who.’
‘Is she a fan? I hope that she does not want her fortune told. I don’t tell fortunes, you know.’
‘No, she wants some mesmerism done,’ said Bert.
They were on Dynon Road and fleeing like the wind for St Kilda. If he could keep this oily old bastard talking, that would be all the sweeter.
‘Yair, some of that hypnotising what you done on the Halls, they say you used to be great.’
‘Used to be? My dear sir, I am the Great Hypno. You yourself have seen my powers.’
‘Yair, I remember. You made shielas as stiff as boards and laid ’em between two chairs. But I don’t reckon you could put anyone under that didn’t want to be,’ said Bert easily, and Henry Burton bristled.
‘Oh no? You, for instance?’
‘Yair, me, for instance.’
‘Look into my eyes,’ said Henry Burton, ‘and we will see. Look deep into my eyes.’
Bert looked. The eyes, which were brown and had seemed hard, were now soft, like the eyes of a deer or a rabbit; deep enough to drown in. They seemed to grow bigger, until they encompassed all of Bert’s field of vision; the voice was soothing.
‘You hear nothing but my voice,’ said Burton softly. ‘You hear nothing but my words, my voice, you do nothing but as I command you. You cannot move,’ he suggested softly. ‘You cannot lift your hand until I tell you.’ Bert, terrified, found that he could not lift his hand. He was frozen in his half-turned position, seeing nothing but the eyes, and wondering vaguely why he could not hear the engine of the cab or any other noises. Bert began to panic and vainly struggled to move so much as a finger.
Cec stopped the cab outside Phryne’s house and got out. He opened the door and commented in his quiet, unemphatic tone, ‘If you don’t release my mate, I’m gonna break your neck.’
Mr Burton flushed, leaned forward, and snapped his fingers in Bert’s face. ‘You feel rested and refreshed,’ he said hurriedly. ‘You are awake when I count ten. Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, you are free now, four, three, two, one. There.
‘Just a demonstration,’ said Mr Burton airily, and got out of the car and climbed the steps to Phryne’s front door.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Lewis Carroll
‘Ah, this must be the Great Hypno!’ exclaimed Phryne, as Mr Butler conducted her guests into the parlour. ‘This is my companion Miss Williams, and we are delighted to meet you. Do sit down. Would you care for a drink?’
The Great Hypno smirked and bowed, gave his coat and hat to Mr Butler, and took a seat, accepting a whisky and soda.
‘You wanted to see me, Miss Fisher? What about, may I inquire? It must be pressing, since you had me kidnapped. I am pleased that my fame is still strong, I have been retired from the stage for five years.’
‘Yes, why did you retire? Bookings not too hot?’
The man bridled, tugging at his glossy forelock. ‘Certainly not,’ he said indignantly. ‘I found another. . er. . line of work, which was so engrossing that it required me to devote all my time to it.’
‘Yes, I have always thought that it must be a tiring profession, procuring.’
Bert, who had remained near the door, nodded as though he had had his suspicions confirmed. Cec watched the scene with a still face, but his fists clenched.
‘You take the likely ones from orphanages,’ stated Phryne. ‘And the repulsive Miss Gay adopts them. Such a charitable woman! I’ve spoken to three institutions where she is well known. A lady with a social conscience, they said, those stupid people, a lady who takes on the hard cases and bad girls, and finds them suitable employment. That is with the help of her tame mesmerist, who makes sure that the difficult ones don’t raise any dust. Eh, Mr Burton?’
‘I have never been so insulted in my life!’ huffed the stout man, fighting to get out of his armchair.
Phryne laughed. ‘Oh, come now, in all your life? You mustn’t have been listening. Don’t get up, Mr Burton,’ she added, revealing the dainty gun which she was aiming at him. Mr Burton blanched. He dropped back into the chair and extracted a silk hankie and mopped his face.
‘Come on, admit it and don’t waste my time!’ snapped Phryne. ‘Or I shall have an accident with this little gun, you see if I don’t! How many girls? Talk!’
‘It must be. . oh. . thirty-five or so. Yes, thirty-five, if you don’t count Jane.’
‘Thirty-five,’ said Phryne stonily. ‘I see. Where did you sell them?’
‘Various places. I supplied the country, mainly. They mostly came from the institutions well broken in, you know, little tarts in all but profession, and it wasn’t necessary to hypnotise many — a waste of my art, as I told
