She would have run if there had been anywhere to run, but she was still Miss Lee, who prided herself on her control.
Inside her, someone was weeping hysterically.
The journey seemed to last for years. Miles of disinfected corridors were passed. They reached the Governor's office, and she stood at attention before it as the wardress negotiated entry. It was not until she smelt Nuit D'Amour perfume in the Governor's office that she began to hope. No one in prison smelt of anything but soap. The scent emanated from a small woman with Dutch-doll hair, a jewel-blue dress and cloche and a handful of papers. She was flanked by a plain young woman in beige linen and a policeman with a forgettable face.
'Miss Lee, I've come to take you home,' said Phryne.
'You've found the murderer?' Miss Lee fought down elation.
'We soon will. But the police know that it isn't you. Have you got everything? Good. Here is the order for release, here is Jack Robinson to confirm that there are no charges against you and that you are a pure and stainless soul, and here is my companion, Dot, who is going to stay with you for today I know you would rather be alone, but we still have a few ends to tie up. This way, Miss Lee,' said Phryne.
Miss Lee found herself holding out her hand to the Governor, and almost thanked her for having her.
'Goodbye, Miss Lee,' said the thin woman, and smiled bleakly. 'Congratulations.'
'Thank you,' gasped Miss Lee, who had regained her honorific with her freedom.
It was not until the last set of prison doors shut behind her that she found herself wondering if she would ever get to the fifth declension—res, fides and spes.
'Well, you're out of that horrible place and you're a free woman again,' said Phryne. 'Anything you want, just name it.'
'I want a bath,' said Miss Lee promptly. 'A real bath with real soap. I want a boiled egg and some bread and butter and a cup of real tea. Then I want to go and walk around the city.'
'It's yours,' said Phryne. 'Dot will look after you. She will also tell you everything that has happened.'
'Where will you be?' asked Miss Lee, bewildered by the speed of events. An hour ago she had been a condemned prisoner. Now she was sitting in a very expensive red saloon car and the suburbs were speeding past.
'I have to go and talk to a chemist,' said Phryne.
Bert put down his empty glass and licked a little foam from his upper lip.
'That hit the spot, eh, mate?'
'Too right.'
The pub was filling rapidly as the temperature outside climbed. The Albion was a spacious pub, built in the days when a public house with any pretensions to gentility had to have fourteen foot ceilings, brass taps and a polished wooden bar you could skate down. It had no floor coverings, but the black and white tiles were cool in the heat. Bert, in his reflective moments, considered that if heaven didn't have a well-appointed pub where a man could sit down over a beer for a yarn with the other angels, then he didn't want to go there.
'Mate,' Cec nudged him. 'Looks like trouble.'
Even in Arcadia, thought Bert resignedly, and looked where Cec indicated. A bulky middle-aged man was raising his voice to carry over the hum of peaceful voices. His dark face was flushed with beer. He had been in the pub for a while. Five empty glasses were on his table and his ashtray was full of butts. The fact that these had not been cleared away spoke volumes of the Management's desire not to retain him as a customer.
'What I mean to say is the rotten cow shouldn't ha' sacked me just like that,' declared the drinker, sharing his grievance with the pub at large. 'Just because I lost his flamin' dustcoat. It was an old rag anyway. It's going against the dignity of the working man to make him wear a dustcoat.'
'That was six months ago,' said the barman resignedly. 'You gotta get over this, Jack.'
'I ain't had a job that lasted more than a few days since,' complained Jack. 'This country's going down the gurgler, that's where it's going. Things ain't been the same since the war—that's what done for us fighting men.'
'You weren't in the Great War,' said a nearby drinker. 'You spent your whole time in the bloody pay corps while we was sweatin' blood at Pozieres.'
'About now,' said Bert to Cec, and ordered another beer.
'How will it go?' asked Cec. Bert was never wrong about the progress of a fight.
'He'll scream at the digger that he was too in the fighting,' predicted Bert.
'I fought all right!' yelled Jack.
'Then some other coot will put his oar in ...' said Bert.
'No, you bloody wasn't. Anyway, Alderton, what's happened to all that money you was flashing around? Lost it on the gees?' asked another drinker, evidently devoid of the sense of self-preservation so essential in tete-a-tetes in Australian hotels, or else fancying his chances.
'Then Alderton will stand up and offer to fight everyone ...' said Bert.
'I'll fight any man in this pub!' howled Black Jack Alderton, pulling off his coat.
'And then someone will king-hit him,' said Bert.
The soldier from Pozieres rose to the challenge. He was small, with a gamecock walk and big hands, so pale that the inexperienced might have thought that he was afraid. But Bert knew that he was flooded with cold rage. His dad had always told him that the red-faced were blusterers, not to be taken seriously. 'But if you see a bloke who's pale and shaking, son,' Bert's father had instructed, 'then run like blazes, because he might flamin' kill you.' Bert watched with interest, hoping that he would not have to interfere.
Without any preparation or parley, the soldier walked up to the big man and hit him matter-of-factly on the point of the chin. A beautiful punch, thought Bert. Perfectly placed, delivered with just the right amount of force and exactly what was needed to restore the peace of the Albion. Mr Alderton was jarred off his heels and went down with a crash.
'Silly coot,' someone remarked.
'That's our man,' said Bert to Cec.
'What do you want to do?'
'I reckon that the barman is about to assist Mr Alderton into the street. Perhaps we can do it for him,' said Bert.
No one commented as they shouldered through the crowd, lifted Mr Alderton by the heels and shoulders, and carried him out. The barman opened the door for them.
'What are you goin' ter do with him?' he asked, curiously.
'Sell him to the white slave trade,' grunted Bert, manoeuvring the body down the worn front steps.
'Well, I hope you get a good price for damaged goods,' said the barman. 'Don't bring him back, will yer?' he added, and closed the door.
Bert and Cec placed Mr Alderton gently on the cobbles of the lane next to the hotel. The man was already beginning to stir and groan. Bert knew that he was also about to throw up. This looked like a good place to do it in—the lane had a suitable gutter running down the middle of it and water was available from a nearby tap.
'We want you to answer some questions,' he said.
'Jus' go away and let me die,' groaned the patient.
'Not yet,' said Bert. 'You get to die later. There might be a quid in it,' he hinted. One bloodshot eye peeled open.
'How much?'
An unpleasant interlude followed. The ex-driver was in such a bad way that Cec was forced to go into the pub and buy a hip flask of brandy to bring Black Jack up to his usual operating level, which was not very high.
'Now go over it for us,' said Bert patiently.
'More brandy.'
'Not yet, you'll be seein' snakes, and I want you with us. Do you remember delivering a box to the bookshop in the Eastern Market last Thursday?'