Under The Mistletoe
The tea party was finally breaking up. While the original excuse had been the exchange of Christmas gifts, no-one had ever accused Miss Elizabeth Robinson of turning down the opportunity to make hay while the sun shone; and the sun was most certainly shining on 221B The Esplanade, St Kilda on this particular December 24th. That being the case, an energetic game of tag was played in the garden, followed by milk and biscuits for most of the younger members of the party.
(The youngest, Master Nathaniel Robinson, took little interest in proceedings and responded to being passed from arm to arm by wrinkling his brow in a manner that charmingly resembled his father's expression. His equanimity in bearing the trials of babyhood in the face of a daunting population of doting women was also reminiscent of Detective Chief Inspector Jack Robinson's calm pragmatism, and boded well for a future in working with Difficult Clients).
Eventually, though, the doorbell rang to announce the arrival of Sergeant Collins, and his brood began the arduous process of preparing for leaving; which is to say, Mrs Collins greeted her husband absently while picking up the basket of offerings from Phryne and Jack, her son Gid's cap which was for some reason gracing the art deco statuette on a side table, and his twin Meggie's parasol from where it had been neatly stowed in the hallway. She then settled her own hat tidily over the curls which still needed nothing of the coiffeur's magic to keep their fetching light brown hue, no matter what her children did to try to encourage grey hairs.
(For the record, Meggie eventually stopped trying too hard when she had her second child, but Gid continued to be a headache well into his fifties).
The offspring decided simply to shout greetings to their father and race to meet him; they were accompanied by Elizabeth, who regarded her Unca Hugh very fondly.
"Say goodbye to Elizabeth," admonished Unca Hugh, and his twins dutifully turned to plant matching kisses on their best friend's dimples. She giggled and waved as he gathered them up in his arms; as he did so, he spotted the Christmas decoration over the doorway.
"Kisses under the mistletoe, is it? Better take a berry, then!" he suggested, moving closer so that Meggie and Gid could each pluck one of the fruit from the sprig hanging there, before setting them back on their feet.
"No, Gid, don't eat it," he added, hastily confiscating the prizes from both children and shooing them out of the front door.
"Hold this, Hugh?" begged Dot as she struggled with the parasol. He relieved her of both basket and parasol, and glanced meaningfully upwards as she turned from thanking her hostess.
Blushing slightly, she reached to give him a chaste peck on the cheek; it could only have been the inspiration of the wicked children of the house that had him turn his head at the last moment, to have her kiss land squarely on his mouth, in full view of her friend, partner and former employer.
"Oops," he said – unapologetically.
Dot winced, but the Honourable Phryne Fisher was thoroughly approving, moving across to put a hand on Dot's waist.
"I see Sergeant Collins is fully cognisant of the Spirit of Christmas, Dorothy," she said cheerfully. "You are to be congratulated. Have a lovely day tomorrow."
"Thanks, Miss Fisher. Merry Christmas!" said Hugh, as Dot hid her confusion in taking the arm that bore the basket.
Reaching up, Hugh plucked his own berry from the mistletoe and, waving it cheerfully, followed his children to the tram stop.
"Mr Butler?" called Phryne. "I'm going for my bath, if you wouldn't mind clearing in here?"
A satisfactory response was received from the nether regions of the house, and Phryne smiled at the nanny who had come to collect the children.
"Will you feed him first, Ma'am?" asked Mary Lou.
"Good idea," replied Phryne, who always favoured the efficient solution. "That'll have him set for hours, and let you get Elizabeth to bed. Shall we?"
In complete domestic harmony, the household headed bath- and feed-wards, and Phryne presently laid her head back thankfully on the nursing chair's velvety cushion. Nate was charming, even when hungry; and her sense of humour was often enlivened by his ability to adapt to circumstances. In that at least, both children took after their father. Had he been more his mother's child, he would have been pointing out his needs rather more vociferously, and a great deal earlier.
In the meantime, Phryne's maid, Lin Soo, was assisting Mr Butler in clearing the detritus of the afternoon's events. Crumbs were swept from rugs to restore their lustre; and as factotum and maid left the parlour, laden with dishes, Tobias Butler led the way.
For no obvious reason, he hesitated on the threshold, and looked back over his shoulder. Soo, coming up behind him, plates balanced on one wrist, saucers and cups on the other, cocked her head quizzically.
He raised an eyebrow.
She glanced upward.
And smiled a little.
"So pagan, Tobias?"
He nodded in self-deprecation.
Very well.
The words were not spoken, but uttered in the dropping of her shoulders as her face reached up to his.
Pagan blessings had their advantages, and he transferred the teapot to the empty cake plate in order to reach up and pluck a berry from the sprig.
No sooner had they begun washing up, though, than the telephone rang. Mr Butler answered and, after a short exchange, returned to the kitchen.
"Miss Fisher won't be happy," he observed.
"The Inspector?"
He nodded. "Detained at Russell Street. Won't be home until late."
Soo folded the tea towel she was holding over the back of the chair. "I will tell her."
Miss Fisher was indeed Not Happy, but only the tightening of her lips gave her away.
Miss Robinson, however, had overheard and was inconsolable.
"We need Daddy to be home, Mumma! It's nearly Christmas!" she wailed.
"We do indeed, Elizabeth, but we do not need your little brother woken, thank you," pointed out Mary Lou sensibly. "Come on now and choose a story."
Phryne straightened from placing Nate in his cot and surveyed her elder child apprehensively. This was precisely the kind of situation for which she felt ill-equipped.
Elizabeth gulped bravely but tears were still trickling from her eyes. "Will you make him come and give me a kiss when he comes home, Mumma?" she asked brokenly.
Squaring her shoulders, Phryne crouched to hug the child gently. "But if I do that, he might wake you up, and that will make it an extra sleep until Christmas Day," she suggested. "Could you perhaps give me a kiss, and I can pass it on to him when he gets home?"
Elizabeth considered the matter carefully. She loved her father dearly, and valued his kisses very much indeed; however, she also rather liked seeing Mumma and Daddy being friends, which they seemed to be almost all the time (except occasionally when Daddy told her not to do something); and requiring them to have a Nice Big Kiss would definitely help matters along.
She therefore flung her arms around Phryne's neck, and bussed the powdered cheek enthusiastically.
Mightily relieved, Phryne straightened, bid the nursery a collective Good Night, and escaped to the bathtub. She also decided that rather than dining downstairs in solitary splendour she would luxuriate in having a tray brought to her in bed.
Thus it was that the lower floor of the house was deserted when the front door swung open and her elder daughter, Jane, peered around it. Seeing the hallway empty, she turned back and beckoned her companion to follow, tiptoeing in and shutting the door as quietly as possible.
"Jane, I should really go," whispered Detective Constable Lennox nervously. Bad enough that he was walking out with the boss's adopted daughter, but to be in the man's house without an invitation was infinitely worse.
"Don't be silly, Robin," she whispered back. "It's perfectly all right. Uncle Jack would expect you to see me home."
"Then why are we whispering?" he retorted acerbically.
"It's only for a minute," she coaxed. "I just wanted to say thank you properly for taking me to the film. It was super. Clark Gable is so suave, and Claudette Colbert was hilarious."
Mollified, he agreed with both assertions, and allowed her to take his hand and drag him a little further towards the parlour.
The next thing he knew, she was reaching up on tiptoe to plant a slightly clumsy kiss on his unsuspecting lips.
"Jane!" he exclaimed, in a hoarse and scandalised whisper.
Mortified, she blushed and turned away. "I'm sorry. I just wanted ...I've never …"
Never kissed a boy before he thought. And his heart warmed at the magnitude of the gift he'd had bestowed, and he caught her hand. Glancing up, he saw the mistletoe sprig, and reached to pluck a berry. He handed it to her. "Yours, I believe," he said politely.
She looked up at him, brow furrowed, but he was reaching up again. "And here's one more."
Studying her face carefully, he tipped up her chin with his finger, and leaned down to press his lips gently to hers. For Jane, it was simultaneously tender, comforting and thrilling, and her insides became an unsteady mass of sparkling butterflies.
He drew back, and looked into her dazed eyes with satisfaction. "Happy Christmas," he whispered, and quietly let himself out, with one backward, smiling glance; in his hand, she saw the tiny white pearl of the mistletoe berry which he held up, before tucking it carefully into his top pocket. She may have used her feet to climb the stairs but couldn't have sworn to it; and was completely oblivious to the presence of an observant lady sleuth, who sneaked back to the boudoir before being caught eavesdropping.
The last person home was less surreptitious, but a) he was tired, b) he was in a hurry and c) he had nothing to hide. He hung up his coat and hat, and debated for a moment before heading to the kitchen to see if Mr Butler had left a sandwich for a hungry policeman.
He found more than he bargained for - not only was there a sandwich, but it had been lovingly placed on the table by a lady who had heard his approach and was pouring an icy beer.
"Hello Jack," she grinned. "I heard your car pull up. You must be starving! Tuck in."
He did so gratefully, and she poured herself a whisky to sit across the table from him and watch him devour his favourite ham, cheese and mustard pickle in thick, white doorstops.
"Dare I ask what kept you?"
He grinned back, "I've never known you not dare ask a question before, but sadly, it was tremendously dull, but time-sensitive, and the Chief was very apologetic about having to keep us until everything was signed in triplicate."
She sighed. "I'm a huge fan of Bill Cooper, but I can only assume that his timing was better when he was younger."
Jack looked rather than voicing the question, as he'd been taught not to speak with his mouth full.
She smirked. "He and Mary have five children, Jack. I would therefore deduce that at some point his timing must have been - well, spot on."
His shoulders shook, and he wiped his mouth with the napkin, before rising to place his plate and glass on the drainer. When he showed signs of moving to wash up, however, she forestalled him.
"Let Mr B do it in the morning, Jack - come on, I've a message to give you from Elizabeth."
Intrigued, he allowed himself to be dragged out to the hall, where she halted in the doorway to the parlour, and glanced upwards.
"Oh!"
His gaze followed hers. There was a sprig of mistletoe attached to the centre of the door frame above them; but it was only identifiable from its leaves.
The berries were conspicuous by their absence; every last one had been extracted during the course of the evening by the rest of the household, in proper recognition of friendship and love.
Their eyes met.
"Problem, Miss Fisher?"
"Not at all, Inspector." She gathered her considerable resources and dropped his hand to move into a closer embrace.
"Just as my kisses cannot be compelled by parasitic - or even hemi-parasitic - greenery, they equally do not require greenery, or indeed any kind of vegetation, if I do not deem it necessary." She traced his cheek with a finger. "I have two messages to deliver. The first is from your daughter."
His eyes lit up.
She kissed him. Chastely, but firmly.
He pulled away. "I take it I'm in trouble for missing bedtime?"
"You are. But you are forgiven, and will be even more so if you're available for Christmas stocking dissection in the morning."
He indicated assent to the duty, and looked at her expectantly. "You said you had two messages?"
"I did."
The second took rather longer. It began with a kiss which was certainly not in any way chaste, and led to a rather precipitate departure for the boudoir.
"Miss Fisher … I have to ask …"
"Yes, Jack?"
"Is my co-operation in what you have just suggested a last-minute demand from St Nicholas?"
"Be in no doubt. If you turn me down on this matter, it will be nothing but coal in your stocking tomorrow."
"Then I have no choice but to embrace the opportunity with all the good will I can muster."
"And I have nothing but good will to all men at this time of year, as you know."
"All men?"
"Well, most of them," she allowed honestly. "I can think of a few exceptions."
Then she surveyed the opportunity awaiting her in her bed, and smiled wickedly.
"And at the moment, though, I'm definitely focused on one man in particular. I'm all in favour of Peace on Earth, Jack. A word of warning … it may get a bit noisy in here soon."
It did; but no-one earthly was aware, and the unearthly didn't mind a bit. Some of them even sang carols about it.
In a resounding, rejoicing, major key.
But with the woes of sin and strife
The world has suffered long;
Beneath the angel strain have rolled
Two thousand years of wrong;
And man, at war with man, hears not
The love song which they bring;
O hush the noise, ye men of strife,
And hear the angels sing.
(Edmund Hamilton Sears, 1810-76)