Chapter Three

The Hispano-Suiza screeched to a halt in Cobden St, so Jack released his (rather firm) hold on his hat and (rather less firm) hold on Phryne's thigh, clad in suitably modest blues and greens which had last seen the light of day at Ascot Racecourse.

As they descended from the car, they received a wave from Mrs Collins, who was seated in the sunshine outside the church, with the pram, whose contents appeared mercifully still to be asleep.

"Miss, I'm so glad you're here!" whispered Dot, which earned Jack an "I-told-you-so" look from Phryne.

"Hugh's in the sacristy still, with the body. It's Father Ryan, Miss. Who on earth would kill a priest?"

"We shall find out in due course, Dot," replied Phryne briskly. "Inspector, shall we go and inspect the deceased? Wait here, Dorothy, I shall be out presently. I need to talk to you."

They made their way into the cool of the church.

"I need to talk to Hugh even more," remarked Phryne to Jack, sotto voce. "I don't know what he's been doing to that poor girl, but she's positively wasting away. Your Senior Constable has some explaining to do, Inspector."

"Before you tar and feather the poor chap, you might want to bear in mind that I found him nodding off at the front desk yesterday morning," retorted Jack. "I suspect that the answer lies with two young people called Margaret and Gideon – or Meggie and Gid, as I believe they are affectionately known. By the people who hold them in affection."

Phryne rolled her eyes.

"Why do people do it, Jack? Have babies, I mean?"

He shrugged.

"I suppose we'd all like to be immortal; having a child is at least one way to live, if not forever, then certainly a lot longer than threescore years and ten. It's a living legacy."

There was something in his tone that made her glance sharply at him, but by that time they'd reached the sacristy, and Hugh Collins met them at the door.

"Inspector, Miss Fisher – I've touched nothing apart from confirming that he's dead," said Hugh worriedly.

"Thank you, Collins," said Jack. "Do you have any feel for time of death?"

"He was still warm when we found him, sir, which would make sense."

"How do you mean, make sense?" asked Phryne.

"Well …" Hugh Collins was clearly uncomfortable. Jack took pity.

"Talk me through what you know of the timings, Collins."

"Well, sir, we were due to have a meeting at one-thirty, to talk about the twins' baptism." Hugh hesitated, and cleared his throat a little. "Dot and I got here at around one-fifteen, and the church was empty when we arrived so we sat down to wait."

"But that's perfect, Hugh!" exclaimed Phryne. "You could have been here when the murder took place! Tell us what you saw."

There was a short silence, during which Hugh's eyes were anywhere other than on his interlocutors.

"Did you see anything at all, Collins?" Jack asked quietly.

"Er, no. No, sir. No." Hugh admitted.

"Were you perhaps … not in the church for that time?" pressed his superior officer.

"No sir – I mean, yes sir. We were in the church," Hugh cast around for any possible source of help, and gave up. "It's a warm day sir, and a good walk to get here … and the walk put the twins to sleep, and so we just sat down quietly in the back of the pews …"

"… and fell asleep," guessed Jack.

Hugh flushed.

"Yes, sir. Sorry, sir."

"Unsurprising in the circumstances, Collins, don't worry about it." And with that, the flaw was removed from the discussion once and for all. Phryne speculated briefly as to how it would be dealt with in the obligatory report, but decided Jack would find a way to cover for his man there, too. "So, no-one at all in or around the building when you arrived or when you found the body?"

"No, sir." Responding immediately to the Inspector's professionalism, Hugh was once more on the front foot.

"There are only three entrances to the building, sir – the main door, the north door that the priests and celebrants use, that leads to the sacristy, and the door to the bell tower. The bell tower's separate, and there's a door from that which leads into the body of the church – so really, there were only two ways to get to the sacristy – through the church, or through the north door."

"So, either the murderer sneaked past you and Mrs Collins – or they came in through the north door," mused Jack.

Phryne wandered over to the outside door, giving the body a wide berth, and tried the door with her gloved hand.

It opened – with a geriatric creaking and groaning. She raised her eyebrows at the policemen.

"If they came in this way, they had to be expected." Closing the door again, she meandered around the room as Jack homed in on the body.

"A stiletto, by the look of it. Brutal, efficient."

"Jack, look." Phryne had stopped by the mantelpiece, pointing to a small glass – normally used to hold communion wine. There appeared to be some dregs of wine in the bottom. She picked it up and sniffed it – and recoiled.

"Not sure I like St Peters' taste in port, Hugh!" she remarked. "Should we take it for examination, Jack?"

"Definitely," he said. "Collins, can you hunt around for something we can put it in? And the bottle, too."

Phryne had continued on her travels, and arrived at the shelf with the glassware.

"That's interesting …" she reached out, and picked up another glass in a gloved hand.

"Look – condensation on the glass, and just this one – someone has washed it up, and recently, I'm guessing."

"But why not wash both glasses?" asked Jack, perplexed.

"No idea," she responded, and popped the second suspect into a second bag supplied by the resourceful Constable Collins.

As she did so, the door from the church opened and reinforcements from the on-duty force arrived to continue proceedings. Jack and Hugh got down to the tedious work of recording the event, and Phryne sauntered out of the north door into the sunshine, in search of her exhausted assistant.