Epilogue

"Not in a million years."

"Phryne …"

"Don't be ridiculous, Jack."

"Phryne …"

"WHAT?"

"Nothing, dear."

A short silence followed, because Detective Chief Inspector Jack Robinson was a brave man, but calling Miss Fisher "dear" when she was in full-on protective mode was usually a sign that the battle lines had been drawn. It wasn't the end of the argument; it was very much the beginning.

"Jane is walking out with your junior detective over my dead body. She's far too young."

There was silence, for a little while.

"Fair enough."

There was a somewhat-more-pregnant silence.

"Do I need to re-write my will again?" she asked cautiously.

He smiled into the darkness. There was no other man on earth who would have had Miss Fisher consider rewriting her will. It wasn't the most obvious way to prove one's worth, but he'd take it.

"Of course not."

There was another silence while Miss Fisher pondered the problem.

"Oh."

Light dawned.

There was then a pause while she further pondered his position. Then she edged across the bed, and under his arm.

"Are you suggesting that you are prepared to give your life for me?"

He gave her shoulders a gentle squeeze.

"Are you suggesting that something might have changed in the past few minutes?"

Silence reigned. In fact, it has to be said, if there had been orb, sceptre and a few archbishops available to do the necessary, Silence would have been crowned King all over again.

A small voice muttered, "no."

After an interlude that wasn't particularly edifying, someone sniffed and someone else reached for a handkerchief.

"I don't know why I'm crying so much lately. I was a bottomless watering-can over Aunt Prudence and her Richard. I think I'll sleep in tomorrow. Maybe go and see Mac for a tonic of some kind."

"I'm not sure whether you're going to want to hear this, but I'm pretty sure I know why you're crying so much." He edged up in the bed, and removed the hanky from her grasp, to gain her full attention.

"Six weeks."

Her brow furrowed. Then her face fell.

"Oh, no."

"I think, probably, yes."

She buried her face in his chest. "Once! I was going to do it once, Jack! We've been so careful!"

He knew she'd be aware of the way his heart had sped when she confirmed his suspicion. Was he to pretend he wasn't thrilled?

She groaned. The fact that she did so into a point somewhere just below his sternum meant that the emotion affected him violently and the rest of the household not at all.

He raised her head.

"Anything you want me to do, I'll do twice over – because I know that, like the first time you did this, it wasn't your choice."

She glared at him, but integrity won through.

"Of course it was my choice. It might not have been this time, but it took two of us. And who knows?" she said resignedly. "This time it might be a boy."

She rolled onto her side and strolled a finger across his chest as she thought out loud.

"Boys are useful for all sorts of things."

He nodded.

"Fetching," he suggested.

"Carrying"

"Fighting"

"Calming"

She laughed, and he breathed a sigh of relief. "I never thought to hear you wish for a calming influence in your life, Miss Fisher."

She raised an eyebrow. "It's funny what having a daughter threatened with death row will do for a woman," she admitted. "And I didn't want to go through another pregnancy, Jack."

She bit her lip, and his hand stopped in its progress around her profile.

He paused. "If you don't want to … I'm sure there's a safe way … Mac …"

He knew he wasn't making sense, or making sentences, but he was trying to give voice to the torment he faced. There could be no child if the price was Phryne's unwilling suffering – no matter if he, a policeman, was suggesting breaking laws upheld equally by State and Church – and, incidentally, his own heart.

She framed his face with her hands.

"Jack, love, don't be daft. Aren't we all about saving lives, you and I? After Janey, how could I possibly? No."

She was no more coherent than he had been, but the meaning was clear. She offered a semblance of a grin.

"Look on the bright side."

He looked. The side he saw was indeed bright.

She reached across, and drew open her bedside drawer. Rummaging inside, she found a neat little case in practical plastic that he'd learned to love and loathe in equal measure.

"We can do without this for a while."

They'd exchanged smiles before. Lots of them. But this one had memories of bad times won, good times forgone, all with the interference of Miss Stopes.

Just occasionally, Miss Stopes could be cast to the four winds, and wished good sailing. Rarely had she been so gladly and carelessly bidden farewell as when the case was flung back into the drawer.