'I'm home,' she said to herself, recalled to reality. Nothing was more real than an Anzac. It seemed to leave no room for any other taste. 'I'm here in my own flat and I've got my life back, my shop and my city. I'll never leave you again,' she promised the room, and took another biscuit.
Dot met her at the door, coinciding with a huge bunch of flowers preceding Mr Abrahams, and a babble of journalists.
'I don't know how they found out, Miss, but do you want to talk to them or shall I call the cops?' asked Dot, scowling at a mannerless young man with a notebook and a strong sense of the Freedom of the Press.
'I'll talk to one of them,' said Miss Lee, perfectly collected. 'Come in, Mr Abrahams, what lovely flowers.' She scanned the assembled multitude and picked out a young woman who was being squashed. Cameras flashed and she blinked.
'You,' said Miss Lee, 'if you please. No, not you, the lady.' The journalist fought her way to the front with some fine hip and shoulder work doubtless learned from a childhood shared with bigger brothers. Miss Lee allowed her to enter, and shut the door on a groan of disappointment and more flashes.
Dot went to interview the landlady about a vase, Mr Abrahams sat down in the boarder's parlour, and Miss Lee asked the journalist, 'What do you want to know?'
'How do you feel about being released?' gasped the girl, who was in possession of a scoop and was wondering how she had managed it. Her chief was going to eat his words. He said that women could not hold their own in the rough and tumble of journalism, and she had fought for this assignment. He had only sent her because all his male journalists were out.
'Very happy,' said Miss Lee.
'And ... er ... what are you intending to do now?'
'I shall go back to running my shop, of course.'
'You know that the police have said that they are confident of finding the real murderer? Have you read Jack Robinson's statement?'
She gave Miss Lee a cutting, and she read it and smiled.
'Very clear,' she approved. 'Detective Inspector Robinson has admitted his mistake like a gentleman.'
'Do you have a theory about the murder?'
'No,' said Miss Lee. 'I really don't know anything about it.'
'Is there anything you would like to say about it all?' asked the girl, sensing that she needed a quote.
'Many people have worked very hard to expose this mistake. Miss Fisher the detective and Mr Abrahams, my landlord.'
'And what would you like to say to all the people who believed so firmly in your innocence?' asked the journalist.
'Thank you,' said Miss Lee, sitting down rather abruptly. 'Just thank you.'
'And that's all,' said Dot, returning with a vase full of red roses and a strong feeling that Miss Lee was not as calm as she sounded. Dot shoved the young woman into the street and shut the door with a slam.
'I do mean thank you,' said Miss Lee to Mr Abrahams. He took her hand and kissed it.
'What else should I do?' he asked, gesturing with the other hand. 'I see a lady in trouble, falsely accused yet, I should ignore it? Believe me, it was nothing. So, now, I have to go. That son of mine should be coming to tell me the whole megillah. I just came to see you're all right. Mi?' he asked on a rising inflection.
'Yes,' said Miss Lee, realizing that this was the case. 'I'm all right.'
Phryne was mildly worried about Simon as the day wore on. His sulk seemed to be lasting a little too long. But spoiled young men will be spoiled young men and would come around in time. Or not.
Phryne had conducted a council of war with Bert, Cec and Jack Robinson. A plan of action was settled upon. Conclusive evidence was needed to make sure that no stain remained on Miss Lee's character, not to mention to ensure the safety of Phryne, Dr Treasure and the students.
'Someone is hunting for that formula,' said Phryne. 'He is so desperate now that he will follow up any hint or rumour. I intend to supply the hint and spread the rumour. The paper is in Miss Lee's shop, I will say. The student did as he was bid, and placed the paper in a book before he was murdered.'
'But he must know that we have the formula!' objected Robinson.
'This is a nasty twisty mind, Jack dear. If we have it, why hasn't he found it? He can't get to Dr Treasure, I fervently hope.' Jack Robinson nodded. 'He can't get anything from me, either, not even outright assault worked. Miss Lee doesn't know anything, the students aren't telling, and he hasn't been able to get into the bookshop, has he? It was a goodish plan, if you like elaborate schemes,' said Phryne, who didn't. 'All he had to do was wait. The formula was hidden so that no one could find it. He just had to wait until he could walk into the shop and buy the volume. He didn't know that Miss Lee would be charged—he didn't care, may the fire in his stomach boil his brains. It works for him, either way. Either she is released and comes back to her shop tomorrow, or she is sold up and he buys the book from the sale.'
'So tomorrow he just has to go in and purchase it,' said Robinson. 'We can't arrest a man for buying a book—not that sort of book, anyway. He could just claim that he had a taste for Walter Scott or whichever it was. Or was missing Volume 9 from his 1911 Hansard.'
'Yes, that's the flaw. We need to precipitate the action.'
'And how do we do that?' asked Bert, with deep suspicion.
'We announce, in certain company, that Miss Lee has donated a big box of unsold books to the Fiji and Island Mission. She's a Methodist, you know. It's credible because she did exactly that two months ago, though what the South Sea Islanders are going to make of Volume 3 of The Proceedings of The Royal Society for 1896, Hansard, Walter Scott's Letters and the Rev. Walters' Sermons is more than she or I can imagine. She's packed it in the shop and stored it in the undercroft for the carrier, and it's going off to Tonga tomorrow.'
'And has this been done?' asked Jack Robinson. Phryne looked at Dot, who nodded.
'Yes, clearly marked and all sealed up, except for the one which had the poison, of course. The hard bit was getting her to agree to send them useless books, she said that wasn't charity but rubbish collection. But I talked her round by saying she could unpack it later and send some good ones instead.'
'Good. I suggest that my carters carry this box down to the undercroft before the market closes tonight. Then we wait,' said Phryne.
'Is this an endgame, Miss Fisher?' asked Robinson, detaching Molly from his shoe. She had relinquished her attack on leather, but was working her way through his shoelaces.
'No, not chess, Jack. It's more like snakes and ladders,' Phryne replied.
Simon had left Phryne's house in a bad mood. He felt that he was being excluded from the action, which was about to get interesting. He also felt that his undoubted beauty was being insufficiently appreciated. He called on Yossi, but he was at work. He ended up, after some desultory wanderings, in the Kadimah, where there was always someone to talk to.
The Kaplans welcomed him gloomily and he filled his teapot and threw in a pinch of tea.
'It's terrible,' said David.
'Oy,' agreed Solly. 'Tell us something we don't know.'
'Yossi's work lost and the guns for Zion, where will we get them now?' asked Abe, drawing Hebrew letters in spilt tea.
'The rabbi's angry with us,' David informed Simon. 'He won't even see us.'
'Shut the door and yelled at us to go away and repent of our sins,' affirmed Abe.
'Because we were using holy text for secular purposes,' concluded Solly.
'Oy,' said Simon. 'And my lover threw me out this morning and told me to go away and play like a boy.'
'You are a boy,' Abe pointed out. 'And the pleasures of the flesh are a snare.'