Murder in the Dark by Kerry Greenwood Read Free Book Online

tipped his hat. He looked like a standard bushman—oilskin, boots, leather hat—until the car’s inhabitants realised that ‘he’ was a woman, riding as easily as if she was sitting in an armchair. Phryne grinned at her and was rewarded with a smile, white teeth in a tanned face.
    Then the car swept around a further curve and the house was revealed.
    It was a true, proper, stately home, Phryne thought. It had a portico. It had a tower. It had a huge sanded area in front for carriages to turn around. It had a superb formal garden and swathes of greensward. The said greensward was dotted with white marquees. But there was room here to bivouac an army.
    The front of the house was congested with vehicles, including the cheeky blue Austin, Phryne noticed. There was a lot of shouting going on. Phryne directed Mr Butler to turn the big car for an instant getaway and alighted, savouring the gravel with her soft shoes. Dot and the baggage could stay where they were for the moment.
    Phryne sauntered through the expostulating throng and saw that the front door of the mansion was being held, at the risk of his life, by a single white-gloved entity whose patience was evidently growing ragged. He was assailed by a collection of public school boys who had clearly lunched far too well.
    ‘You must go and report to the red tent,’ insisted the butler for the thousandth time. ‘You cannot come into the house, gentlemen!’
    ‘Where’s old Gerald?’ asked one beery voice. ‘Ought to be here to greet us, he ought.’ He surged forward, or would have had not an unaccountably strong lady’s hand caught hold of his shoulder. He desisted from making any move, amazed.
    ‘Gentlemen,’ said Phryne sweetly. ‘The red tent,’ she said. ‘See? Just over there. You don’t want to cause trouble on such a nice afternoon,’ she told them. ‘You don’t want to be thrown out of the Last Best Party for 1928,’ she added, thinking, you horrible little worms. ‘Off you go, now,’ she said and, subdued by her governess-nanny-mother-knows-best tone, they went, shouldering each other like young bulls.
    The butler sagged a little and mopped his brow.
    ‘They should never have left you out here on your own,’ said Phryne sympathetically. ‘Can I lend you my chauffeur? Or perhaps I can summon a couple of footmen.’
    ‘They’ve just gone off for their tea,’ he said. ‘Thank you, Miss. They’ll be back soon. How can I help you?’
    Phryne exhibited her invitation.
    ‘Oh yes, you’re in the house,’ said the butler, ticking her off on his list. ‘Just up the stairs and to the right, Miss Fisher. And your baggage . . .?’
    ‘My maid and I can carry it,’ said Phryne. ‘Ah, here come your henchmen.’ Two large footmen were approaching from around the corner of the house, wiping their mouths. ‘They ought to suppress any further riot. Dot? Come along,’ she called, and Dot appeared with Phryne’s suitcase and one small bag.
    ‘Up the stairs and to the right,’ said Phryne as the butler opened the front door.
    It had been a very beautiful house. The hall was high, the proportions grand without being grandiose. The graceful staircase bisected a good-sized entrance, which had once been elaborately decorated. There were niches for tall Chinese vases and little sconces which had once illuminated specially treasured paintings of ancestors. The floor was meant to have a carpet, probably commissioned to be woven for the pleasing dimensions of the rooms. The windows with their restrained etchings were meant to be clean and the brass rails were meant to be polished. The whole was meant to be lit by a big, heavy, glittering chandelier dripping with candles, originally, then fuelled by gas, scattering diamonds of light over the pink of the painted plaster roses and the green of the vines.
    All that was gone, suppressed, violated. The plaster had been whitewashed a dead chalk. The floor was bare but for a scrubby strip of American cloth. The