Chapter Eleven
When they were shown into the store owner's office, though, they were proved to have been almost certainly correct in their original assessment.
"Come in Inspector, Miss Fisher," she called. "Forgive me if I don't get up."
She was sitting at her desk, but at an angle. One foot was propped on a stool, and appeared to have an ice pack wrapped around it. Her left wrist was also bandaged securely.
"Idiotic thing," she commented before they had the chance to enquire. "I've been running around this place since I was a toddler, but today, for the first time, I took a tumble on the main staircase. Turned my ankle and wrenched my wrist when I grabbed for the bannister, but I suppose I should be grateful it wasn't worse. Some fool of a customer, sorry, some valued patron of the store," she grinned at them, "shoved me just as I started coming down."
She straightened in her chair and winced.
"Sorry to hear it, Miss Lawless," said Jack. "Can I ask, though, whether you saw the Satterthwaites' maid this morning? She was in the store, I understand."
She looked confused. "The maid? I don't think so. I'm honestly not sure I'd recognise her in any case. It's very different, isn't it, seeing someone in uniform in someone's house, and seeing them in their own clothing in the street?"
They agreed that it was, and there seemed little more to be said; rising, they took their leave.
Irresolute, they stood on the pavement outside the store.
"What now, Jack?"
"Well, we should probably check the remaining alibis – but there's only Camellia Lin, Christopher Satterthwaite and the Herberts that we know of." He sighed. "I've got a nasty feeling it's going to come down to anything the Collins' can glean from the newspapers, though why anyone with a grudge against Mrs Conway should also try to kill a housemaid …" he trailed off.
She took his arm. She'd once claimed that it helped her to think things through to do so, and as he tended to prefer it when she did it, he wasn't going to object.
"All right then; let's go back to City South to see if Dot and Hugh have come up with anything yet, and then … on to the University to see Christopher Satterthwaite?"
Not having anything better to suggest, he acquiesced.
Dot and Hugh hadn't just Come Up With Something. Hugh was almost hopping from one foot to the other in his excitement.
Halting their cacophonous explanations with a single hand, Jack ushered everyone into his office, sat Mrs Robinson on his side of the desk and Mrs Collins on the other. Hugh then let Mrs Collins do the talking, because he wasn't daft.
"So, Dot, what have you got for us?" invited Phryne. "What has Mrs Conway been up to, to get you so animated?"
"Miss," the younger woman's eyes were sparkling, "it's not just Mrs Conway – although we've plenty on her, especially women's rights." She clasped her hands to stop herself fidgeting.
"Miss, it's all of them. All of you, I should say."
Phryne and Jack looked at one another as if to check whether what Dot had just said had actually been translated back into the original Swahili, then back at Mrs Collins.
"I'm sorry, Dot," said Phryne hesitantly, "I don't quite …"
Dot smiled, and got out her notebook – though Phryne observed that she didn't actually refer to it at all.
"Miss, you were right – the papers are full of articles about how Mrs Conway was likely to be elected, and the speeches she's made on women's education and women's rights and so on. But," she edged forward on her chair, "while I was reading one of the articles, I saw one next to it about Mrs Lin, and how she had introduced a whole new line of painted silks to the department stores. There was a lovely picture, and it talked about how she was such a strong businesswoman in her own right. Mr Lin barely got a mention."
"Then Hugh," she glanced fondly up at her husband, whose gaze was alternating between his adored wife and the two auditors, to make sure they Weren't Missing Any Of This Because It Was Important And It Was Dottie Saying It, "Hugh saw the piece about Miss Lawless. Did you know, Miss, they're opening another huge store in Sydney? It's going to have a view of the new bridge, and everything. And it's all because of Miss Lawless. They had a picture of her putting a spade into the ground for the foundations."
Phryne was already sitting back in Jack's chair, eyes half closed, considering. "And there was all that nonsense about me, wasn't there, and the cases we've had since I came back to Melbourne. Such tosh," she dismissed it, "as though I'd done it all myself instead of being part of this excellent team," the warmth of her smile enveloped all those present and definitely raised at least one temperature by a couple of notches on the thermometer, "but there, in the press, nonetheless."
"What was there about Enid Satterthwaite, Dot?"
At this, Dot's expression clouded.
"Nothing, Miss. It's the only part we didn't have any explanation for."
Phryne and Jack both raised their eyebrows at that, and exchanged a glance. Miss Fisher pushed herself to her feet, and leaned on the desk as though, thought the Detective Inspector wryly, she owned it.
Are you trying to pretend she doesn't, Robinson?
"Excellent sleuthing, Mrs Collins! You have, I believe, taken us well on the way to cracking another case." Turning to her husband, she extended a hand.
"We were going to go to the University anyway, Jack – I think it's all the more important now, don't you?"
He was about to allow himself to be led out of City South Police Station by the hand. She had as well grab him by the tie and drag him along over her shoulder in front of the assembled constables in the outer office.
He politely took the hand, kissed it and released it, ushering her ahead of him through the office door.
At least this way he got to admire the Fisher Sashay.