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“And what are we drinking to?” Jack asked, eyes on Phryne as he crossed the parlor to accept a drink from her father, Baron Henry Fisher.
Jack hadn’t been expecting her father at Wardlow this evening — a long-awaited dinner with Phryne had been rescheduled. But with one look Jack could see, behind the façade of pleasantries, that Phryne had not been expecting her father that evening either.
“To magic,” Henry stated, holding his drink aloft and handing a second to Jack. “To mermaids. To my wonderful daughter. To leopards changing their spots.”
Jack watched Phryne’s reaction on the last phrase, realizing that the unlikelihood of certain nearby leopards doing any such thing must have been the topic of conversation before he arrived.
“And to miracles,” Phryne answered through gritted teeth, confirming Jack’s observation. She downed her drink in one gulp. “Father’s not staying for dinner,” she added.
“Dinner,” Henry chimed. “Certainly, I have time to stay for dinner. I haven’t spent nearly enough time with Inspector Robinson. You’re staying, I hope, Inspector?”
Jack looked to Phryne for guidance on the next answer. Of course, he was staying for dinner. He was the one invited to dinner.
In a split second, Phryne shifted, seeming to calculate that acquiescing to her father was the better course at this particular juncture than open conflict. She summoned a pleasant, polite tone on top of her sardonic one. “I’ll speak with Mr. Butler,” she said. “Let him know we’ll be three this evening.”
Jack stepped towards her, “Stay here. I’ll convey the message.”
“I’ll do it,” she replied. “Speak with Father.” She moved in closer to him and placed a hand on his lapel, whispering, “Don’t you dare leave while I’m gone.”
“I wouldn’t think of it, Miss Fisher,” he rumbled, holding her gaze, blissfully unaware that Henry was watching them intently.
After a long moment — the kind of moment that might have led to a kiss if things had progressed differently on a previous night — Phryne slipped out of the parlor.
Jack stared too long at the parlor door as it closed behind her.
“Another drink, Inspector?” Henry asked, his tone light and easy. Conjuring bonhomie among men of all stripes was an instinctual skill that he had honed to a pinnacle before he ever attained the improbable heights of Baron.
Jack nodded as Henry poured, his instinct towards circumspection working as an appropriate layer of armor against Henry’s garrulousness.
“Please, sit down, Jack,” Henry continued, gesturing to one of the gold arm chairs as if he owned the room. “I’m sure she’ll be right back.”
Jack took a seat at the piano bench instead.
Henry understood the act as one of mild but firm opposition.
“There’s no need to be on guard, Inspector,” he said. “Despite what Phryne may have told you, I mean her no harm.”
“She’s told me very little,” Jack replied.
“I doubt that,” Henry said. “From what I can see, you’re the most important man in her life.”
Jack smiled slightly but didn’t answer.
Henry continued talking. “Not that I’ve ever been the most important man in her life, or that she’s ever needed one. Still, a father likes to imagine that his daughter...”
Henry let the sentence trail off.
Jack refused to pick up the baton.
“Do you have children, Jack?” Henry asked.
“No.” Jack replied simply. His polite company answer — we were never blessed — seemingly giving away too much in this exchange.
“Married?” Henry continued.
“Not at present.” A bit of a smirk edged its way into Jack’s reply.
“Do you intend to marry my daughter?” Henry stood up as he asked this, feigning nonchalance as he headed to the drinks cart in the corner of the room.
“All due respect, Baron Fisher,” Jack replied, drawing the words out slowly, “I’m not sure that’s any of your business.”
“I’m back.” Phryne’s voice rung out strong and clear as she opened the parlor doors. “Not sure what’s any of his business.”
“Nothing, darling,” Henry answered quickly. “I was asking Jack about a jewelry store robbery I heard of at the Windsor bar.”
“Jack doesn’t work in robbery,” Phryne replied, suspicions raised, as she instinctively moved to join Jack at the piano.
“No, of course not,” Henry smiled. “Silly me.”
Henry watched as Jack and Phryne looked at one another, communicating worlds of understanding in single glances.
He interrupted. He couldn’t help himself. “Is dinner sorted, Phryne?”
“Hmm?” she replied without taking her eyes away from Jack.
“I’m starving. Will dinner be ready soon?”
“Go ahead, Father,” she said. “We’ll join you in a moment.”
This once, Henry did as he was told.
“One minute, Baron,” Bert called out from the lobby of The Grand. “I need to ask Miss Fisher something about this spot I’m supposed to be taking you to in Lilydale.”
Henry sighed and dropped his bag, but in all honesty, he couldn’t get lathered up about the delay. Staid, suburban Lilydale would be just as empty and uninviting whether he reached the destination in three hours or four.
He watched as Bert had a brief conversation with the woman at the front desk, who then pointed in the direction of the ballroom.
Now curious, he followed behind Bert, running nearly smack in to the younger man as he stopped short in the doorway.
“Shhsh,” Bert admonished, stepping aside to allow Henry to see what he had seen — Inspector Robinson and Miss Fisher waltzing elegantly around the old ballroom in broad daylight, utterly lost in one another.
Henry watched, rapt, as an expression of pride made its way unbidden across his face. Suddenly, it struck him that this might be the closest he’d ever come to seeing his daughter dance at her own wedding.
Bert tapped Henry on the arm with his hat and jerked his head in the direction of the main entrance. “Come on, Baron. We’ll figure things out in Lilydale.”
One more look, and Henry followed along.
“I courted my wife here — Phryne’s mother,” Henry said to Bert as they made their way down the dark hallway. “Did she ever tell you that?”
“No, sir,” Bert said evenly.
“She never speaks of me, does she?”
“Miss Fisher? She told me to get you to Lilydale.”
“Yes,” Henry muttered. “Lilydale.”
“You can tell me in the car if you like,” Bert said as they reached curb where the cab was waiting. “About your wife? It’s a long drive.”
Henry settled in the back seat. He swore he could still hear the strains of the waltz from the ballroom phonograph echoing as Bert drove away.
It was only a few weeks later, but it felt like a lifetime.
Henry watched as Jack sought Phryne out in the courtyard of the church after the wedding. He didn’t know Phryne’s companion all that well — he didn’t know the Constable she married well at all. Still, it was lovely ceremony and there was a joy in the close-knit group that even he could feel.
They sorted driving arrangements, and Henry found himself standing with Jack as they waited for cars to pull around.
“Don’t let her get away,” Henry said to Jack, then hopped into a car alone before Jack could respond.
Don’t let me be the cause of her unhappiness, is what Henry meant. She'll never forgive me. He peered from the cab window into the night sky, and swore he saw a second shooting star.
Many years later, in a relatively small ballroom at the Windsor Hotel, a man and woman took to the dance floor for their first dance as a married couple. The wedding was intimate; the couple together for ages but only now formalizing the partnership that their friends and family had witnessed for so long.
The bride gave herself away. Her father wasn’t there, and even if he had been, the bride had no use for such conventions.
The dance was a waltz. It was what the man knew best. They moved effortlessly, laughing and holding one another close. “I suppose I’m the one who changed my spots,” she said as the song ended.
He kissed his wife and led her to a quiet table. “What do you mean, love?”
“That night, back at Wardlow, after the cavalcade of mysteries. My father toasted to leopards changing their spots. Do you remember?”
“Not precisely.”
“He meant himself. I didn’t believe him, of course. But I’m the one who changed. I couldn’t have imagined getting married then.”
“He could.”
He saw she didn’t follow the leap of thought.
“He could imagine us getting married. Even then. He asked me, when you were out of the room.”
“Asked what your intentions were?” she purred. “How fatherly. What did you answer?”
“Well, you were rather out of sorts with him at the time.”
“What did you answer?”
“That it was none of his business.” His eyes sparkled. She knew immediately that the answer, back then, was to prove his loyalty. And he had.
She laughed — her full, warm, beautiful laugh. “It was a little bit his business though, wasn’t it? Part of me wishes he was here.”
“Would you care for another waltz, Miss Fisher?” he asked with a wide smile — the use of that name — Henry’s name — a nod to so many unspoken things.
“More than anything,” she answered. “More than anything.”