DEATH BEFORE WICKET - Poisoned Pen Press (UK)

1 Kerry Greenwood
‘Joanie!’ exclaimed Dot, pushing through the crowd.
‘Dot?’ Joan appeared bewildered. ‘So you got here, after all.
Who told you I was in this place? Does Jim know? Are the children
all right?’ she demanded, grabbing her sister’s arm.
‘Mrs. Ryan is minding them, but you might have a bit of
difficulty with Jim. He…well, the night I saw him, he was pretty
crook,’ said Dot.
‘Men,’ said Joan. Dot nodded.
‘I’ll call us a taxi and we can go back to the hotel. You need
a bath and some clothes. You can borrow some of mine. Come
along, Joanie.’ Dot guided her sister into the street and summoned
a cruising cab. She gave the address, glared the driver into
silence and ushered Joan into the hotel and, finally, into Phryne’s
bath with a good deal of Phryne’s lavender bath salts.
Joan sank herself abruptly underwater and rose to scrub her
body until her fair skin flushed red, as though she was scrubbing
off something more than ordinary dirt. Then she selected
a severe suit from her sister’s wardrobe while Dot read a note
which had been left on the hall table.
Joan wondered what her sister was doing as Dot tiptoed to the
bedroom door, opened it a crack, seemed to be counting, then
screwed up the note and dropped it into the wastepaper basket.
‘Well, she’s got herself out of trouble again,’ Joan heard Dot
say with quiet pride. ‘Joanie? You decent?’ Dot wondered to
hear a shake in her sister’s voice as Joan assured her that she
was, indeed, decent.
‘I know what you’ve been doing,’ declared Dot, as Joan tried
on a pair of low-heeled black shoes.
‘Do you?’ Joan seized a towel and muffled her head in it,
sick with apprehension. Dot had always been the good girl.
God knew what she’d say about this escapade. Or what she’d tell
Mum, who’d brought them up to be children of Mary.
‘Yes, Mrs. Hart told me. Dolly Hart.’
Joan’s astonished face emerged from the towel. ‘Dot, how
on earth did you meet Dolly Hart? For a good girl you’ve got
some strange friends!’