Castlemaine Murders Part 3

'You know, Miss Fisher, I've never been bored in your presence,' replied Dr Treasure, offering her a chair next to a table bearing an ominous, shrouded burden. He took her hand and kissed it.

Dr Treasure was an expert in many sciences, frequently consulted in the deepest secrecy by important persons, and very firmly married. Phryne found this refreshing. She could flirt with Dr Treasure without the risk of being invited to any impromptu game of swap-the-spouse. He was tall, with the curly blond hair, guileless blue eyes and rosy cheeks of the country boy he had been, and Phryne liked him very much.

'Well, we've laid him out-definitely a him, he's very well preserved,' observed the doctor, throwing back the covering. Phryne couldn't help noticing that it was a fine linen sheet and hoped that Mrs Treasure was not going to be told where her trousseau linen had gone. Although by now she could probably guess.

The corpse was, as the doctor had said, very well preserved. Horribly so. Even the fingernails were still on the clawed fingers. The face was still disfigured with the half-rotten papier-mache mask. The drum-tight leathery skin stretched over the great bones of the torso, ribs and pelvis, and even the shrunken remains of male organs were evident. Phryne did not blench, because she never did, but she did not find the sight agreeable. Jane stepped forward with every appearance of delight.

'Who is this?' asked Dr Treasure, a line appearing between his brows. What he was thinking, Phryne knew, was that naked men, however long dead, are no sight for young maidens. What he said, to his eternal credit, was, 'Miss Jane, is it? Pleasure to meet you. Have you been to an autopsy before?'

'No,' replied Jane. 'But I've read several reports. You begin with a Y incision, do you not? Throat to sternum then around the navel to the pubis?'

Dr Treasure blinked.

'Ah, well, yes, though the very first action is to view the body all over, to see what can be seen. That is what the word means. "Op", to see; "auto", for oneself.' The line between Dr Treasure's brows vanished. He smiled down on Jane's enthusiastic face. 'Do I detect a future colleague in the bud, as it were?'

'I want to study morbid psychology,' said Jane. 'But first I want to be a doctor.'

'And so you shall,' agreed Dr Treasure, equipping Jane with a large ap.r.o.n and blousing it at the waist so that it would not drag on the floor.

Phryne had wondered how Dr Treasure would react to Jane. She looked so small, so thin, and so schoolgirlish in her good blue churchgoing suit and her round felt hat. But the admirable Dr Treasure had recognised something akin to himself in the composed young woman which had removed all his objections.

A door closed and someone came in through the house entrance.

'Ah, Ayers, there you are,' said the doctor. 'May I introduce my most learned colleague Professor Ayers, the Egyptologist?'

Phryne smiled. Ayers was from Sydney University, expert in both the pharaonic debris and the beautiful boys that littered the desert. He was a slim, elegant man about the heft and height of Lawrence of Arabia. The last Phryne had seen of him he had been headed for the sandier bits of the world with a papyrus clue to the tomb of Khufu, builder of the great pyramid. Either he was back or he had never left.

'You've caught me making final arrangements,' he told her. 'Next month I'm off.'

'I wish you every success,' said Phryne warmly. 'Allow me to introduce my daughter Jane.'

Ayers bowed slightly in Jane's general direction. Professor Ayers evidently did not like children. Phryne noticed that Jane divined this instantly and changed position around the dead man, so that she was standing close to Dr Treasure. Phryne was impressed with Jane's sensitivity and also that she did not seem to return Professor Ayers' dislike.

'Well, here's our chap,' breezed Dr Treasure, aware of an atmosphere. 'Weighs in at fifteen pounds and is fifty-nine inches in extremis-and his extremis is more extreme than usual. Beautiful condition,' he continued, knocking on the corpse's chest with his knuckles. There was a hollow clonk.

'Would that be his height in life?' asked Jane.

'No, they shrink a bit,' replied Ayers. 'The corpse is desic-cated, which reduces the overall weight and the s.p.a.ce between the joints. Give him another four or five inches for a living height. My word,' he said, drawing closer to Jane's unwelcome proximity. 'He is magnificent, Treasure. What a find, Miss Fisher!'

Phryne found the mummy more grotesque than magnifi-cent. Dr Treasure had removed the clothes and had been engaged in cleaning the leather face with linseed oil. He offered Phryne a swab. She politely declined. The way that the dark skin had torn like paper over one cheekbone was unsettling her. 'Where be your quips, your quiddities...' she asked herself. 'Imperial Caesar, dead and turned to clay might stop a hole to keep the wind away...'

She had been unaware that she had spoken aloud until Dr Treasure completed the quote: '"Oh that that flesh that held the world in awe, could patch a wall t' expel the winter's flaw...Go to my Lady, bid her paint an inch thick, to this end she must come. Make her laugh at that!" Dear me. Shake-speare always has a word for it, hasn't he?'

'Yes, it's so accommodating of him,' said Phryne rather tartly, and turned her back on the table.

Here were the chaps and the cowboy hat of his disguise. They felt new, or rather, not old enough to be original. They were filthy with dust and old spiders' webs.

'I think it's whitewash,' said Professor Ayers behind her.

'Whitewash indeed, and papier-mache. Curiouser and curiouser. Ayers, my dear fellow, who whitewashes a mummy?'

'And why?' murmured Jane. 'It's a bit like gilding fine gold or painting the lily, you know.'

'So you read Shakespeare as well, my young colleague. Very suitable. Can you get hold of this bit from your end? I think it will peel. So. Very nice.'

'I do hope you are going to tell us, Miss Fisher,' commented Professor Ayers. 'When you have an explanation, of course. I know it is going to be fascinating. Someone makes a mummy-you know, Treasure, some consideration ought to be given to the method of mummification. I am almost prepared to swear that this body was treated in an Egyptian fashion. Give me a probe and I'll be sure.'

There was an interval in which Phryne tried not to hear sinister sc.r.a.ping noises, and Ayers exclaimed, 'Exactly! No nasal sinus!'

'Ah,' said Jane.

'Ah,' said Dr Treasure.

'What does that signify?' asked Phryne after a pause in which the scientific drew their own conclusions and the unsci-entific wondered why they had come.

Dr Treasure hurried to explain. 'Well, you see, there are various ways of preserving a body-by freezing in permafrost, by smoking, by curing, by embalming and by desiccation. I don't think he's been smoke-cured, do you, fellows?'

'No singed bits,' said Jane, who had obviously been promoted to an honorary fellow.

'No soot,' agreed Professor Ayers.

'And if he had been properly embalmed he'd have more flesh on him,' Dr Treasure continued, 'to put it crudely. Embalming works by injecting a.r.s.enic...well, I suppose that is not relevant.' He had observed that he was not holding his audience. 'Of course, there are also the bodies of saints and so on who have been preserved incorrupt by some means, but they are supposed to be perfect and this chap only weighs fifteen pounds. So it's probable that he was preserved by desiccation, that is, he was dried out. We don't know yet if it was natural, which he could have done himself by dying considerately in a nice hot desert, or whether someone did it on purpose with a couple of bags of butcher's salt. Professor Ayers reminded me that in Egypt the brain was extracted through the nose...'

'With a thing like a b.u.t.ton hook,' added Jane helpfully.

'And has just ascertained that the nasal sinus is broken, which means...'

'Thank you,' said Phryne. 'I understand. Pray continue, gentlemen.'

Phryne turned back to the clothes. Jane was in her element. Phryne was not. The corpse disturbed her. She felt that this examination was somehow indecent.

The cloth of the shirt tore even under her very careful handling. There were traces of whitewash on the wide band of a cheap collarless blue and white checked flannel shirt, circa perhaps 1910. The trousers were older-moleskins, if she were any judge-and as fragile as old washleather. Phryne took up Dr Treasure's magnifying gla.s.s. Something was written or perhaps, yes, st.i.tched into the waistband. It was so blurred and broken that she could only guess at it. Was that a T? Followed, perhaps, by a B? A washing mark, maybe. Otherwise the moleskins were cobwebby, worn, dirty and fragmentary. There was scarcely enough trouser to keep even a mummy decent.

There were no rags of undergarments, though they might have fallen entirely to dust, and no socks in the dusty boots. Poor TB, if he was TB, had not even been given a slave's loincloth before he had been dressed in these foul rags and displayed like a guy.

The boots were interesting. They looked too good to be wasted on a carnival figure, for all the walking he might do. Jane had suggested that they were not his boots because they had fallen off, but surely the total loss of flesh would explain that? If he had been about 64 inches tall he might have had a size...seven, perhaps, boot. Phryne borrowed some linseed swabs and cleaned one side of the left boot, noting that the soles had plenty of wear in them. Layers of dust came off and under it a splash of white and then a streak of red. Blood? No. Blood dried black. This was red clay. Under close examination she could see that both boot soles bore traces of red clay. Tenacious stuff, red clay. Phryne had once been smeared with clay during an injudicious foray into the sport called caving, and after trying to remove it from her hair had decided that it might be easier just to plaster the rest of herself with red clay and start a new fashion. Where was the nearest red earth? Not on the black soil plain. Towards Ballarat, perhaps, or Bendigo.

The boots did not have conventional cloth laces but were held together with strips of what Phryne thought might be kangaroo hide.

Then she took each boot, turned it upside down and shook it firmly. Nothing was going to make her put her hand inside. She evicted one puzzled spider, who summed up its change in circ.u.mstances with great speed for an arachnid and leapt for the bookcase. Otherwise there was nothing but more red dust. Phryne took a probe and pried at something stuck to the insole. A fragment of paper.

She drew it forth and used a delicate pair of tweezers to unroll it. Red paper, printed in black-would the mummy have been so courteous and far-sighted as to have included his name and address and possibly instructions for the future disposal of his remains?

Phryne flattened the paper at last and read 'Admit O... Marvels...' It was a ticket for the Carter show. Drat.

More information on the Carter show would be forth-coming from Mr Josiah Burton, who was coming to dinner that night. Phryne spared a moment to worry. She would not tolerate her scholarly and charming friend meeting with any affront in her own house. She must confront Eliza and make sure that if she could not cope with dwarves at dinner with the courtesy expected of an English gentlewoman then she could dine off a tray in her own apartments. A firm line was going to be necessary with Eliza, and Phryne was going to draw it as soon as she returned home.

There was absolutely nothing more to be got from the boots. No maker's tag, no markings, only a lot more red clay. Phryne had exhausted the possibilities of the clothes and therefore had to reluctantly return to the fascinated figures around the mummy.

He was bare now of paint and masking papier-mache and he shone slightly with linseed oil. Phryne controlled her distaste as Dr Treasure began to exhibit the glories of his subject to his distinguished guest.

'Except where you broke his ankle joint, so careless of you, Phryne, he is intact. He even has all his fingers and toes. If we rehydrate him a bit we might even be able to take his finger-prints. What a piece of work is man!'

'Indeed,' said Phryne.

'He has been preserved by someone using Egyptian methods,' said Dr Treasure. 'There is no Y incision but one cut along the right side of the abdomen, here closed with st.i.tches. This is where the viscera were removed. And the brain...but you already know about that.'

Professor Ayers coughed and continued: 'I presume that his abdomen was washed out with eucalyptus oil-there is still a faint scent of it about him-quite a good subst.i.tute for cypress oil. Then the body was stuffed to keep its shape.'

'What did they stuff it with?' asked Jane, agog.

'That we shall presently see,' promised Professor Ayers, almost smiling. Jane was proving an education for Professor Ayers. 'The Egyptians used rolls of linen, sawdust, any rubbish that was hanging around. The body was then laid in dry natron for seventy days.'

'As Herodotus says,' prompted Jane.

'So after the poor helpless body was gutted, stuffed and salted like a fish, what did they do with it?' asked Phryne. The scent of linseed oil and leather was giving her highly inappro-priate memories of a cricketer to whom she had been very close. Extremely close. In the pavilion, if she remembered correctly. Before a county match. Thinking of s.e.x in a.s.socia-tion with this human wreck she considered improper.

'After desiccation it was washed in wine-here I believe they used turpentine-and then anointed with resin and bandaged. Here we see no bandages or amulets but I believe my thesis is sound.'

'So do I,' said Dr Treasure.

'There's a mark on his forearm,' said Jane. 'Here.'

'You've got good eyes!' exclaimed Professor Ayers rather enviously. 'Take the gla.s.s, Miss Jane. What can you see?'

'A bruise? No, wait, it's all colours,' replied Jane excitedly. 'I don't suppose, Professor, you could just call me Jane? I'm not used to being called Miss. I'm just Jane.'

Ayers unbent. His previous experience of children of the female persuasion (loud, vain, greedy) had not prepared him for eager, intelligent, educated Jane.

'Very well. Colours? What do you make of it then...er, Jane?'

'It's a tattoo, isn't it?' she asked. She looked into his face for signs of agreement. Not, Phryne thought, for approval.

'I believe that it may be,' said Ayers. He took the gla.s.s and bent over the twisted forearm. 'Chinese, I think. The Chinese have always done the best tattoos. Much superior in application and artistry than the crude western ones in harsh blue ink. Well, Treasure? Don't be shy. Show the ladies your illumination.'

Blushing, Dr Treasure rolled up his sleeve. There was a fish on his upper arm. Jane took the gla.s.s and examined it minutely. So did Phryne.

'Where did you get it?' she asked.

'Hong Kong. In my uproarious youth I was the doctor on a cruise ship. I don't show it to just anyone, you know. Some fellows consider tattooing to be rather low. I wouldn't have it done now, of course, but with tattoos there must be no regrets, for they're perfectly indelible. Isn't it pretty?'

'Gorgeous,' said Phryne truthfully. It was a carp, all floating fins, done in delicate etchings of orange, gold and black. She tore her lascivious mind away from wondering if the rest of Dr Treasure matched the muscular and lightly tanned arm and considered the tattoo on the mummy.

It was some sort of crest or coat of arms. The shape made this clear. Two supporters of a fish-tailed kind, then a quartered shield topped with a helmeted head. The plumes had survived intact, as had the tails of the mermen (if they were mermen), but the shield was stained, or perhaps the flesh under it had been bruised. Heraldry had never interested Phryne, but she knew her sister Eliza had made a close study of it. Eliza knew Debrett's Peerage almost by heart. Phryne found a pencil and tried to sketch the design exactly as she could see it.

It was blurred. Ayers finally shook his sleek head and rubbed his eyes. 'No, I can't make out any more. I have a friend who has been getting interesting results from photographing disputed ma.n.u.scripts through different filters. I'll ask him to call and bring his plate camera. Now, what more have we to see?'

The autopsy now required that the body be turned over and every inch scrutinised before any cutting was done. Phryne was uncharacteristically wishing that she belonged to the cla.s.s who could be sent to make tea. Dr Treasure might have been reading her mind.

'Phryne, could you do me a service? Would you go into the house and ask my wife to tell Mrs Bernstein to make tea for us? Coffee for Professor Ayers and for Jane... what can I offer, my dear and most promising colleague?'

'Ginger ale, Miss Phryne, if you please,' said Jane decisively.

Phryne went.

The house was a haven, comfortably if shabbily furnished with things which someone's relatives hadn't had room for but couldn't bear to throw away. Nothing matched but nothing jarred. The parlour contained, reading right to left, a woman playing the piano, a small girl dancing uncertainly, a baby making a spirited attempt to gum a biscuit and a large dog of the labrador persuasion. He was sitting under the highchair, salivating quietly, in the sure and certain knowledge that fairly soon, infant grasp and concentration being what they were, the biscuit would be his. All looked up at Phryne's entrance.

'No, no, please don't stop,' she said quickly. 'You make a charming picture.'

'You're Miss Fisher, aren't you? So nice to meet you again,' said Mrs Treasure. She was a plump, dark-haired woman in a stylish crepe dress. She had the air of effortless serenity usually only possessed by small dark people wearing saffron robes. 'Do meet my family,' she said, beginning to play her simple tune again. 'I am Anne Treasure, the dancer is my daughter Phoebe and the baby is my son Charles. And the dog is called Huggy Bear. As you might have gathered, I did not name him. Can I help you with anything or are you seeking refuge from the laboratory?'

'They want tea, coffee for Professor Ayers and ginger ale for my daughter Jane, and I wanted to get out of there,' confessed Phryne.

'Well, if you can take over the piano,' said Mrs Treasure, 'I shall give the order. And I think a nice gin and tonic is indicated for us. If it wasn't for the sustaining power of gin, I would never have survived child rearing. As long as you keep playing, Phoebe will keep dancing,' she added as Phryne slipped into the seat beside her.

It might have been a threat or it might have been a promise, but Phryne picked out the notes for the tune, which she recog-nised after a while as Ravel's Bolero, and Phoebe kept dancing. The baby duly dropped his biscuit on Huggy Bear, who gave an adroit twist and 'clop' of jaws. The biscuit never hit the floor. Charles missed it. Or perhaps he was taking exception to Phryne's uncertain touch on the keyboard. Just when he was reddening with intent to roar, Mrs Treasure came back.

'Mrs Bernstein will bring the tray,' she said. 'I will mix us a drink, so essential on such a warm day. I'm not going to ask about Mark's work-I never do. You may stop playing now, Miss Fisher, thank you. Phoebe, go with Miss Fraser, now, it's time for your nap.'

A large competent woman in a navy wrapper had appeared at the door. She bore the struggling baby off in mid roar. Phoebe followed, still dancing. Huggy Bear fell in behind. There might, he felt, be more biscuits.

'I like your house,' said Phryne, sipping. The crowded bookshelves held no skulls and there were no anatomical diagrams on the walls, which was an improvement on Dr Treasure's ideas of domestic design.

Mrs Treasure laughed pleasantly. She had a rich, cultured voice.

'My dear, the furniture is all castoffs. No point in having good furniture if you have children. One would be forever telling them not to bounce on the couch. Too fatiguing for me and too irritating for them. Do smoke if you wish. Mark is always trying to bring horrible things in jars into the house, and I am always telling him to take them back to the labora-tory, so that's enough friction for one household. But he is a dear good fellow.'

'Yes, he is,' agreed Phryne.

It was pleasant to sit in a room which was not scented with science, but she knew she could not remain long. Someone was doubtless dying to tell her something new about their beloved mummy. Phryne enjoyed her drink and her Sobranie and waited for the tray which a severe woman brought to the door of the laboratory, where there was a table. 'And no further,' she declared. 'Not after them rats!'

'Rats?' asked Phryne when Mrs Bernstein had safely gone.

'She went in once just as Mark dropped a cage in which he had a few white rats. They rather swarm, rats, especially when they are dropped. Apparently one ran over her foot. After that she won't go near the laboratory.'

'Thank you for the drink,' said Phryne, picking up the tray and opening the door into science.

'Do come again,' said Mrs Treasure, seeming to mean it.

Phryne laid down the tray and announced, 'Tea.'

'We have made progress,' Jane proclaimed, taking her gla.s.s of ginger ale.

'We certainly have,' beamed Dr Treasure. 'We have been over the whole body and made a small incision to see what he is packed with. Most amazing, Phryne, you won't believe this. Tea? Ah, yes, tea. Thank you.'

'What won't I believe?' asked Phryne, cushioned against further shocks by a comfortable gin.

'First, we have the bullet. It was still in the skull, jammed in under the jaw. It's not a bullet, Phryne. It's a ball. Like they used in the old days. And what's more...' Dr Treasure paused to sip and lost his place. Professor Ayers leapt into the gap.