Read Death Before Wicket: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries 10 for Free Online Page A

Now, Chas, listen carefully. I’ve paid the rent and I won’t ask for it back. Are you sure that the woman in that photograph is Darlo Annie?’
    ‘Like I said, fairly sure. She’s pretty, isn’t she? Bit like Nellie Cameron. Darlo Annie’s got blonde hair and big china-blue eyes—that help?’
    Phryne looked at Dot, who nodded.
    ‘Might have helped, at that,’ she agreed. ‘Thanks, Chas. I’ll see you tonight at Theo’s—where is Theo’s?’
    ‘Thirty-four Campbell Street—only gets going after about midnight. Any cabbie’ll take you there,’ said Chas, searching for a razor amongst a mess of belongings. ‘If I see Darlo Annie I’ll try and keep her with me—if you can give me a pound for her time. I’m a bit short this week. Though now I don’t have to worry about the rent I can buy a new tube of cerulean blue.’
    Phryne handed over a pound, returned the kewpie doll she had been holding all the time and escorted a very miserable Dot down the stairs.
    ‘I’ll go to Theo’s after I return from the University,’ she said. ‘I can at least find out if Darlo Annie is your sister Joan. If so, what do you want me to say to her?’
    ‘You aren’t going to take me with you?’
    ‘No, Dot dear, I think I’ll get on better on my own.’
    ‘Tell her—tell her I still care about her and ask her to come home,’ said Dot, dragging in a huge breath. ‘Whatever she’s done, she’s still my sister.’
    ‘Bravo, Dot. Now let’s get out of here. If I’m going to be trawling Bohemia tonight, I’ll need a nap.’
    The Hotel Australia seemed even more of a cool, clean haven after Woolloomooloo, Darlinghurst, heat and dirt. Phryne bathed and lay down to sleep, and Dot sat up to watch the harbour and worry. The children would be all right. If Jim Thompson had abandoned them Dot could afford to pay for their keep until they could be conveyed to Melbourne and lodged with her mother. She knew that Phryne would lend her the money. But how could a good girl like Joan have been transformed into Darlo Annie, leaving a good husband and two innocent little ones for a life of vice?
    And even if she had done so, where was she?
    The harbour was transformed into one great mirror by a flash of bright sunlight, and Dot’s eyes filled with tears.
    Phryne woke refreshed, drank coffee, and dressed for the Vice Chancellor’s dinner. Her gown, in deference to academic sensibilities, was modest, for Phryne. The loose lines of a sapphire-blue silk Poitou tunic swooped decorously to the floor, leaving her slim arms bare. Phryne slid one thick silver bracelet above her elbow. It was a copy of one found in a grave at Mycenae, figured with gorgon faces, and might amuse the Professor of Classics. She donned dark stockings and shoes and long sapphire earrings. Dot laid a silver fillet with a panache made of peacock feathers on her sleek black head. Phryne surveyed herself in the glass. The eyes of the feathers reflected her own green gaze. She blew her reflection a kiss. A pleasant ensemble, she considered: not daring, but delightful.
    She had managed an invitation to this dinner in honour of a retiring professor through three telephone calls and one rather boozy lunch. James Cobbett, the Reader in English Literature at the University of Melbourne, had succumbed to her wiles with gratifying speed, bolstered by Phryne’s undoubted social position and wealth. The University was a closed community, Phryne knew, and one to which she had no natural entree. She had attended no university herself. She had no academic bent. She was, however, beautiful, intelligent, well-read and rich, and the Reader had wondered what Sydney would make of her. He hoped that it wouldn’t be an endowment of a chair. After all, her namesake had already given Sydney a library.
    Phryne left Dot with firm injunctions to call Room Service, dine well, and drink two glasses of wine. The VC’s Daimler was comfortable and scented with cigars. Phryne was content to