Chapter Seven
Jack was nothing if not willing, but freely admitted that there were hurdles. They both dressed for dinner; he did justice to her elegant silks by putting on a clean shirt and tie, and resuming his suit coat; it was thus a sartorial triumph which sat down to Mr Butler's roast.
Phryne fell on it with an eagerness which reminded Jack that, no matter that she had brought it on herself, she had undergone some severe privations in the past thirty-six hours; and they ate in silence for a while, until her initial hunger was assuaged.
"The trouble is, Jack," she continued as though their conversation upstairs had only been broken off for a few seconds, "you can't just take Zorba."
"I realise it might be difficult to track him down," he argued, "but I think that the combined might of the police force of Victoria ought to be enough to secure a single criminal – especially if a certain lady detective," he raised a glass to her, "points him out."
"Oh, I'll do that of course, and hope you put me in the witness box too, to back up poor old Nipper," she replied. "What I mean, though, is that if you only take Zorba, one of the others will simply step into his place. Then the least of your worries will be more intimidation of the mendicants – you'll have a turf war on your hands," she predicted sagely.
"You seem to understand the criminal mind remarkably well, Miss Fisher," he remarked blandly.
"I do, don't I, Inspector?" she agreed cheerfully. "Always from the perspective of the angels, of course."
"Oh, of course," he muttered.
"So, all you have to do is find something to charge Tubs and his chums with," she finished.
He assured her that his ingenuity was up to the task – especially if her allies among the mendicant community could be persuaded, en masse or individually, to come forward.
The fruit bowl was the offering for dessert, and the peaches were plentiful; which was just as well, because the method of entrapping all of their suspects was a taxing problem. Having finally come up with a version of events which would still leave one or two of the police force available for making tea and doing traffic duty (Miss Fisher having expressed the view that it was all they did anyway, wasn't it?), they were wiping off water from the finger-bowls thoughtfully provided by Mr B when a small thunderbolt entered the room.
"MUMMA!" it cried.
"Poppet, you were supposed to be asleep … mph …hours ago!" exclaimed Mrs Robinson, as the tornado launched itself into her lap and planted an enthusiastic kiss on her face.
"You came home and didn't come and see me and I painted you a picture and you need to see it and I didn't get a story because Daddy was busy and it's Winnie-the-Pooh and please will you come and read it now Mumma please?" came out in one breath.
Phryne grinned. "Funnily enough, your father and I have just been discussing Bears of Little Brain. Come on, then – just one chapter, then lights out. I admit, I've rather missed Mr Sanders."
Elizabeth Jane climbed down in triumph, and stood bouncing from foot to foot on the floor as Mrs Robinson took her temporary leave of Mr Robinson.
"You might go and chat to Nipper," she suggested. "See if you can find out where we need to start placing troops tomorrow?"
The Inspector nodded agreement, and as Phryne allowed herself to be dragged upstairs by a determined toddler, wandered through to the kitchen, where he found a surprising sight. Lin Soo was seated at the table; a clean, smart, shorter-haired, bespectacled Nipper had a folded napkin over his arm and an empty plate in his hand; and Mr B was standing at the foot of the table, offering gentle instruction.
"Down from the right, Up from the left," he said, and Nipper suited actions to the words, placing the plate in front of Soo, then moving around her to pick it up again.
"Very good, Nigel!" said Mr B encouragingly. "It's not a rule that's set in stone, but if an employer sees that you know about it, they'll be impressed."
"Thanks, sir," said Nipper awkwardly. "So, you think I could make a go of it?"
"I think you have real promise," Mr B assured him. "Don't you think so, Inspector?"
At the use of the title, though, Nipper jumped and would have dropped the plate if it hadn't been carefully removed from his hand by Soo. "Inspector?" he squeaked.
"That's right," said Jack, calmly. "Detective Chief Inspector, to be precise. And on your side, so you can stop panicking."
Nipper didn't appear to set a great deal of store by this notion, "I never laid a finger on her, I promise!" he said urgently, clearly concerned that he might have been thought to have had designs on his benefactor's virtue.
Jack cracked a laugh at that. "No promise necessary. No-one lays a finger on Miss Fisher unless she expressly permits it – not without repercussions, anyway. And as you are currently in one piece, I must conclude that you restrained yourself admirably."
He pulled out a chair and indicated that the others should do likewise. Nipper dropped readily into another, and Mr Butler compromised by leaning both hands on the back of one – he was never entirely comfortable sitting down in the presence of his employers.
It was perhaps as well that Nipper was sitting down because he wasn't entirely comfortable either, by the time Jack had finished explaining what needed to happen. Once he was assured, though, by Mr Butler (who was rapidly assuming the persona of Deus Ex Machina in the eyes of such an impressionable youth – a process which made Soo's eyes dance with laughter as they met her lover's over the boy's head) that none of the miscreants would a) recognise him now, b) know where to find him or c) be able to get near him with the combined ranks of himself, Soo, the Inspector and Miss Fisher to contend with, he settled down a little and started to pay attention to the plans.
(He wasn't quite sure what a slip of a thing like Lin Soo had to do with all this violence, but he was sure that he could look out for her if needs be. If anyone had explained that Soo was arguably the most lethal member of the household, he might have been even more nervous; so nobody did. Time enough for him to find out if she was called upon to demonstrate her skills).