Urn Burial Read Online Free Page A

‘Playing with a hockey ball and stick is Miss Judith Fletcher, a jolly girl in the English manner – abominable. Do not agree to play tennis with her, she will exhaust you as she exhausted me. She drinks only water, which she calls Adam’s Ale in that intolerably hearty manner, and should marry a . . . a farmer. Instead, her 20
    mother,’ he pointed out a middle-aged lady has-tening across the ground with a sunhat in her hands, ‘is determined that she should marry Gerald Randall, a flannelled fool, over there.’ Two young men were hitting a cricket ball between them in a rather desultory manner. One was slim and dark, the other tall and blond and both, indeed, were wearing flannel bags and jumpers.
    ‘His friend Jack Lucas is just such another – no brains at all and no appreciation of poetry.
    However, Mr Gerald plays the piano, passably, unless he attempts Liszt which cannot be recom-mended, anyway. He is absolutely passe´.’
    ‘Who, Gerald?’
    ‘Liszt,’ said the poet with strong conviction.
    ‘There is your Mr Lin with Tom Reynolds. It was brave of him to come, but braver of you to bring him.’
    ‘No courage was involved, I assure you.’ Phryne sighted a woman of steely bearing, formally dressed in a walking costume and her daytime pearls, and asked, ‘Who’s that?’
    ‘Evelyn – Mrs Reynolds. She seems to be looking for someone, Madame – could it be you?’
    ‘Probably. Excuse me, Mr Lodz. And thank you for your most illuminating lecture.’
    Evelyn Reynolds caught the end of this and said,
    ‘What have you been lecturing Miss Fisher on, Tadeusz?’
    ‘Why, poetry,’ he said with a gentle smile which should not have deceived her for a moment.
    ‘Poetry, but of course.’
    21
    Mrs Reynolds took Phryne’s hand in her small soft grasp and said expressionlessly, ‘Miss Fisher, how nice to meet you. Tom’s told me all about you.’
    ‘Mrs Reynolds.’ Phryne was cordial, for the moment.
    ‘Evelyn, please. I’m sure we are going to be friends.’
    ‘Possibly,’ said Phryne. ‘That depends on whether I can stay with you, Mrs Reynolds.’
    ‘Oh? What could prevent it?’
    Phryne held on to the ringed hand and smiled into the powdered face. Mrs Reynolds was good looking, with a chocolate-box prettiness which had faded into a general pleasantness. She had blue eyes, which were beginning to look rather worried. The Honourable Miss Fisher was her social catch of the season. Mrs Reynolds would be boasting about her visit for years.
    ‘Lin Chung. I understand that you don’t like Chinese,’ said Phryne flatly.
    ‘No, indeed, what can have given you that idea?
    I’m sure that some of them are admirable people.
    Look at the Chinese preachers and the missions and . . .’ She dried up.
    ‘I just want to make it perfectly clear. Lin Chung and I are a package for the present. You either get both of us or neither. If there is any doubt in your mind that you and your staff can treat him fairly and in a civilised fashion, then we are leaving today.’
    Mrs Reynolds resisted for a moment. Phryne felt 22
    the hand twitch. She was obviously weighing up what country society would say about her accommodating a Chinese who was having an affair with the much-publicised Miss Fisher against what the country would say if Miss Fisher left in a huff because Mrs Reynolds would not accommodate him. She capitulated. ‘Of course, of course, Miss Fisher, naturally. You need have no fears on that score.’
    ‘You’ve placed him at the very end of the house.
    Can you change his room?’
    ‘Not now, Miss Fisher, I would have to move someone else. I didn’t mean . . . I’ve got a full house, I’m sorry. But there is no objection to him –
    none at all, I assure you.’
    Phryne stared at her and believed it. There would be no further comment about her affair with Lin Chung. Now all she had to do was convince him. She took Mrs Reynolds’ arm and changed the subject.
    ‘Evelyn, you look worried. What’s the