Chapter Seven
"Miss? Er … Phryne?"
Bless her – Dot would never get the hang of Miss Fisher's first name.
"Hmmm?"
Phryne looked across from the wardrobe to where Dot was kneeling beside the chest of drawers.
"Do you know what strikes me?"
"No, Dot – what?" Phryne turned to give her full attention. As a mother of twins, Dorothy Collins was terrifyingly domesticated. As a committed Roman Catholic, she was to Phryne quite mystifying. As an investigative colleague, her insights were invariably worth hearing.
"There doesn't seem to be much here."
Phryne looked, looked again and looked around. "I see what you mean! I wonder if … hang on."
She crept to the door and listened for a moment. The murmur of voices from the study suggested that the policemen, willingly or otherwise, were buying their spouses time. Glancing back, Phryne beckoned Dot, and the two tiptoed out onto the landing. It wasn't hard to identify the master bedroom, and as soon as they were inside, they started to explore.
The opulence was crowned with a four-poster bed, enhanced by velvet hangings in luxurious chocolatey shades. The rest of the furniture was equally heavy and ostentatious, and the surfaces and walls were covered with fussy ornaments and several faux-artistic photographs of a beautiful young man that Phryne had last seen done horribly to death in Little Bourke Street.
"Dot?" Phryne beckoned her partner to join her in front of one such.
"Nice picture, Miss," agreed Dorothy, hesitantly – correctly supposing that they weren't there to admire the art.
"Nice blazer," was Phryne's response.
"Ohhh …" Dot realised the purpose of the exercise, and examined the picture more closely. Then another, taken at the racecourse, in a very natty three-piece. Then another that seemed to be at the beach, in light linen. She folded her lips, and looked back at Phryne.
"Not seen any of these, Miss. Or the shirts."
Phryne inclined her head, and they edged back to the original room. Now that they knew what they were looking for, the search took no time at all. Appropriating the warm woollen coat from the wardrobe, they descended the stairs noisily, and Phryne called out blithely as they crossed the hall.
"That's us leaving, Mr Dawlish, thank you so much!"
The study door was snatched open.
"Oh, are you …?"
"Yes, all done. I think this coat will be absolutely wonderful for one of our gentlemen, if you think you can spare it?" asked Phryne innocently.
"Well, yes, of course – perhaps if I could just …" Dawlish reached for it, and Phryne obligingly gave it up, to allow him to check the pockets. Finding them empty, he rather feebly handed it back.
"Oh, quite right," Phryne nodded approvingly. "One can't be too careful. So, if you're sure?"
Even in asking, she had already turned for the door, Dot at her heels.
As she opened it, she turned back to offer a farewell smile to the Generous Benefactor; and met the gaze, over his shoulder, of a Sardonic Detective who had come out into the hallway, his Apprehensive Sergeant at his shoulder.
The smile became dazzling.
"Come on, Miss Williams, I think we should take this wonderful coat straight to the office. I know there's a gentleman who'd be very interested in what we've found. Thank you again, Mr Dawlish, for your extraordinary generosity!" With a cheerful smile, she practically skipped out of the house, Dot at her heels.
"I think we can conclude our business for now, Mr Dawlish," offered Jack. Recalled to awareness of his other visitors, the man turned and frowned.
"Is there nothing you can do without correspondence, Inspector?" he asked. "Have I to give up all hope of finding Seth's killer, simply because he was a poor letter writer?"
Jack reflected that the deceased must in that case have been a fairly useless accountant, but forbore to say so.
"I think the best we can do is circulate a picture in the area he was found," he said instead. "Do you have something we could use? We might then find someone who saw him and the person he met."
Dawlish hesitated for a moment, and then reached for a portrait on the desk. "Perhaps this?" he suggested. When Jack nodded, he extracted it from the frame, sighed gustily and handed it over.
"Now, could I ask you to excuse me?" said the man plaintively.
The police acquiesced and let themselves out.
"Where to, sir?" asked Collins as he let in the clutch.
"City South," replied Jack, "Although I have a nasty feeling that all the seats in my office will already be taken."
