starfishstar

GO TO THE LIMITS OF YOUR LONGING

Fandom: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries

Summary: Exchanging letters with an ocean between them, Phryne and Jack discuss air travel, murder investigations, stock markets, poetry… and, finally, some personal truths.

Characters: Phryne/Jack, with a brief cameo by Mac, and mentions of Dot, Hugh, Mr B et al.

Words: 7,200

Notes: This fic had the great fortune of not one but two betas! Huge thanks to

prinzenhasserin, whose feedback on an earlier version pushed me to make this much more than it was, and to

nerakrose, whose comments on the final version gave me the confidence to consider it complete.

Read the fic on AO3, or here below:

~ ~ ~

9 September, 1929
Ayutthaya, Siam

Hello, Jack!

Truly, you didn’t think I could fly to the other side of the world and not send you one single letter, did you?

I write this from a night market in Siam, at an open-air tea shop under an awning, with everything all lit up by candles. The tea is sweet and thick, and we’re sitting on mats spread out beside the thoroughfare. The one dish I’ve had in our short time here might be the most divine thing I’ve ever tasted (imagine, please, a rich soup of coconut milk seasoned with something that is like, and yet wonderfully distinct from, ginger). So, naturally, Father is bellyaching that there’s nowhere here to get a proper meal.

You can imagine it, can’t you? I’ll spare you the details.

Tomorrow we rise early, refuel, and take once more to the skies. There’s so much more I could say, Jack, but I’ll keep this short for now, in the hope of leaving myself enough time to find somewhere to post this before we leave.

Be well, Jack. Think of me,

Phryne

12 September, 1929
Delhi, India

To Jack, far away, a few lines scribbled in haste –

I’ve always wanted to see Delhi, and now I’ve seen it – for about 8 hours, most of which I was of necessity sleeping. I shall have to return here someday. Perhaps you’ll join me?

Yours in haste and delight,

Phryne

16 September, 1929
Alexandria, Egypt

Oh, Jack. To have seen the pyramids at Giza from above. Even Father seems stunned into silence this evening. If only I could paint you a picture with words! The sprawl of the city, and the great golden expanse of the desert, and the old, old stones that hold their secrets so carefully.

Now we sit in a little roadside coffeehouse by the sea. The Mediterranean seems a jewel, after all that desert. (The Arabian Peninsula: a study in all possible shades of gold and yellow and tan and brown.)

I could say “I wish you were here,” but you know that, don’t you? You would make a delightful companion on this journey. (The favourable comparison to Father’s endless grouching needn’t even be made!) But more than that, I’d like to have you here for your own sake; I’d adore watching you take in the sights of the world. Wish I could send you a photograph of everything I see. Perhaps these notes can serve as a sliver of a substitute.

Tomorrow, onwards!

Think of me as I fly over the sea, on wing from Cleopatra’s home towards Antony’s,

Phryne

7 September, 1929
Melbourne, Australia

Dear Miss Fisher,

It’s very quiet here. I have City South to myself at the moment, as evening has fallen, but I’ve stayed behind to pen this letter.

It’s a daunting task you’ve left me, Phryne, to write to a world-gallivanting adventuress, with no way to know where in the world she is currently to be found. It was only yesterday that you left, although the time since then feels at once shorter, and far longer. I wonder if at this moment you’re still somewhere above the skies of Australia, or if you’ve already struck out to sea.

I hope you are well, and safe, and laughing with delight as you embark on your mad adventure. Although I must spare a pitying thought for your poor passenger, your father. I know all too well what it’s like to be in his seat, clinging on for dear life to the back of one of those same mad adventures.

I never realised before how loudly my office clock ticks away the time. I suppose usually, at this hour, you are here to chatter and laugh and fill the space with far happier noise.

But it cheers me to think of you, somewhere in the wind, with your scarf whipping behind you as you fly boldly into the unknown.

Fly safely, Phryne. I shall send this letter to your family’s London address and hope it reaches you there.

Yours always,

Jack

17 September, 1929
Melbourne, Australia

Dear Miss Fisher,

Many thanks for your letter from Siam. (The speed of its arrival was astonishing; the pilot who hand-delivered it to the City South station desk while I was out today is apparently a personal friend of yours? Please note how assiduously I am refraining from comment.)

My astonishment at your acquaintance with the purveyors of the airmail profession aside, properly I ought to begin this way:

I was very glad of your letter. Thank you for taking the time to send word that you had travelled safely up to that point. And I hope the onward journey has continued smoothly. Perhaps by now you’re refuelling in Egypt, or already crossing the Mediterranean.

Yes, I confess to the atlas lying open beside my desk, drawing my curious eye each day as I wonder about your progress.

Next I ought to share news of Melbourne, I suppose, but little else here has changed. We’ve just today wrapped up a case that took us out to Wyndham. (“We” being myself and the temporary constable filling in whilst Collins is away on honeymoon. I hope you will not think me too terribly biased if I say that the replacement is a poor match for the original.)

Speaking of which, Constable and Mrs Collins are due to arrive back in a few days, a much anticipated return. It has certainly been quiet in their absence. And in your absence, as well. I find myself expecting at every turn to catch a flurry of lace and feathers from the tail of my eye. Although, dare I say, it has been exceedingly restful to be able to complete paperwork in the evenings here at the station without constant interruptions.

By which I mean to say: fly safely, Phryne. And know that you are missed.

Yours always,

Jack

19 September, 1929
somewhere in a cow pasture in Normandy, France

Admittedly, I may not get a chance to post this until we reach England, but I thought I’d scribble a few lines to you, Jack, whilst I’m grounded against my will.

Well, I suppose I should say: against my will but not against my better judgement. The weather looks poor over the Channel, so we’ve elected to wait until morning, despite how much I’m itching to arrive at last. A kind farming family is putting us up for the night.

It’s delightful to have a chance to exercise my French again. And it’s strange and lovely to be here. Lovely because the fields are in their early-autumn splendour, lush and ready for harvest time. Strange because I can’t look on rural France without thinking of battlefields and blood and horrible clamour, yet we’re a world and a decade away from that, aren’t we?

May it continue so for a while yet.

Tomorrow, across the Channel, and then commences the next adventure. A far less thrilling one, yet fully as much of a challenge: putting the family’s affairs back into order, getting things stable enough that I can dare to leave them again. It may take some time, though I wish it wouldn’t, and I can’t be certain exactly how long I’ll need to be here. But at least I’ll have an address again – Mother and Father’s London address that I wrote out for you before I left – and perhaps you could see your way to writing now and again to your very favourite lady detective, as she languishes in English exile.

I hope these letters have found their way to you, Jack, despite the many distances they’ve had to cross. Know that you’ve been in my thoughts across all these many continents!

Affectionately yours,

Phryne

20 September, 1929
London, England

Dear Jack,

I’ve arrived! In London now, I won’t bore you with it. The city is wearing its drab and wet October guise – it’s autumn here – and I miss, oh, everything. And I’ll be stuck here for some while yet, because Father’s finances are a tangle and I have sworn NOT to leave this country until they are safely detangled, as well as safely placed out of Father’s easy reach. The whole mess doesn’t bear thinking about, but it’s what I’m now forced to think about every single day. How unbearably tedious.

Yes, I received your letter! Dated from the very day after I left Melbourne. Dear Jack, you needn’t have worried; it was here waiting for me when I arrived. It has been very dear to me, kept always near, on the table beside my bed. Perhaps you might send another, to keep it company?

Tell me something of your days back home in Melbourne, Jack. Narrate for me your latest dramatic successes, the crimes you’ve solved, and don’t be modest. How is everyone? How are Dot and Hugh? No, don’t answer that, I’ll write to Dot next. Tell me about you, Jack. How are you?

Know that I’m thinking of you, there far away in the Antipodes. A terribly apt word, that is, for you truly are at the antipode of where I am: the world’s opposite foot, a mirroring pinprick on the far side of the globe. How strange that I am once again half a world away from home.

And now I find myself wondering if London and Melbourne are anywhere close to being true antipodes. A line drawn from Melbourne straight through the globe, where would it land? If I had an atlas to hand, of course, it wouldn’t be hard to calculate. But you’re the man with the maps. For now, I’ll continue to imagine England as your antipode, the point on the globe that reaches straight through the world to you.

With all my warmth from London,

Phryne

4 October, 1929
Melbourne, Australia

Dear Miss Fisher,

I had been saving each of your letters from the varied stops along your route with the intention of replying to them all at once. But I’d hardly sat down to do so today, when your letter from London dropped very nearly atop its predecessor, the one from the picturesquely described Norman cow pasture.

It is a great relief to receive the news that you’ve arrived safely at your destination, thank you.

And now (since you asked) I have looked into the matter and must regrettably inform you that Melbourne’s antipode is not in fact London, but rather a far-flung patch of ocean somewhat west of the Azores.

That said, I think we may safely continue to take poetic licence on the matter, for the world is very large, and we are indeed mere pinpricks on its surface. (Incidentally, London’s antipode, too, lands in water – in the ocean southeast of New Zealand. This exercise does make one realise just how much of the planet is water.)

You asked for tales of my dramatic exploits, but I’m afraid there isn’t much to tell that’s so very dramatic. Since I last wrote, we’ve solved a murder in Docklands and one, in fact, on the Ballarat train. You would have found that latter case quite interesting, I think; I’ll enclose a clipping of the newspaper article about it.

Constable Collins continues to rise to the challenges of his new rank. Just today, he caught a serial burglar who had been troubling us for some time. He is an asset to the force, and I sent him home tonight with words of praise.

He and Mrs Collins have settled into their new life together, and seem very happy. Mrs Collins, I know, has written to you as well, but she’s asked me to express again their great gratitude for your offer that they stay on as caretakers at your house in your absence. I think Mrs Collins harbours something of a worry that this arrangement is perhaps not strictly necessary from your side, given that Mr Butler is there to look after things as well. (I can’t imagine your calculations failed to take into account that this is allowing the Collinses to save properly towards a home of their own.) But whatever your motivations, both Collinses are greatly appreciative, and Mrs Collins says she looks forward very much to one day being able to offer you hospitality in her home in return.

It’s evening now and the station is quiet, which allows me this moment to put pen to paper. Evenings, in general, have been quiet. I’ve been reading a great deal.

I try to imagine what your days must be like, Phryne, and I’m afraid my imagination fails me. My knowledge of London is too limited. And I can never decide if I should picture you attending soirées, or arranging tête-à-têtes with top bankers. Both, most likely. I’ve heard the unsettling financial news from London, and I hope those troubles won’t affect your family too starkly.

Melbourne is certainly less colourful without you. I’ve run into Dr Macmillan a few times recently, and your red raggers Bert and Cec as well, and that is one point on which we all can agree.

I hope you are well, and happy, and at this very moment laughing somewhere.

Yours always,

Jack

19 October, 1929
London, England

Dear Jack, you infuriating man!

You tell me about Hugh, you tell me about Dot and Mac and Bert and Cec, but you don’t tell me about you. You’ve been reading, you say; all right then, what are you reading? You tell me you’ve solved another murder on the Ballarat train (thank you for the article, it laid out the case quite clearly – dare I take this to mean the journalistic standard of that publication is improving?) but you don’t tell me what fills your hours and your thoughts.

All right, I’ve read that last paragraph back and I hear how it sounds. I didn’t mean to scold. But you must understand, Jack darling, that I have grown quite spoilt. I’ve become accustomed to spending evenings in your company, where exchanging our thoughts is as easy as opening our mouths and letting the words fly out. A few dry lines on paper, arriving with gaps of many weeks between them, are a very poor substitute.

That, though, is not your fault. I do realise that.

Still, Jack, please share something of yourself with me, so that I won’t feel so very far away.

Here’s something from my side of the world: I sent Mother and Father away for a few weeks to the countryside, to allow me the breathing room to sort out some things here unimpeded. They think they had the idea themselves to go away for a bit, but perhaps you won’t be entirely surprised if I tell you it was my machinations that led them to it.

I wish I had parents who could be relied on, who didn’t have to be tricked and cajoled into doing what anyone else could surely see is common sense. I’m disappointed in them for being so silly, and then directly on the heels of that I’m guilt-stricken for being such an ungracious daughter.

There, that’s something true about me.

I see you’ve heard about the London Stock Exchange crash, and by now you’ll likely have heard of the growing unease that’s roiling up in America as well. I don’t know where all of this is headed. Frankly, it doesn’t seem as if anyone knows. It’s a very interesting time in which to be trying to bring one’s family into financial stability, I must say.

Oh, Jack, everything I care about feels so terribly far away, and I’m so very tired. Send me something happy, please. No, scratch that, send me anything at all – it doesn’t matter what you write, you know any words from you will make me smile.

Yours too, as you very well know,

Phryne

5 November, 1929
Melbourne, Australia

Dear Phryne,

You asked what I’ve been reading; I’ve been reading Rilke. In English translation, for the most part, but also stumbling my way through the German original to what small degree I’m able. Certain passages I return to again and again, such as this one:

You, sent out beyond your recall,
go to the limits of your longing.
Embody me.

Flare up like a flame
and make big shadows I can move in.

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final.
Don’t let yourself lose me.

It’s nearly summer here; for you, winter must be on its way. Christmas will be upon us soon, and then a new year, a new decade. I write this from my office at City South, where I am surrounded by familiar things, but most of all I am surrounded by reminders: the corner of my desk where you have so often perched; a stack of file folders full of your notes – by which I mean notes that I wrote, while you merrily dictated the text and swung your legs from the aforementioned desk corner; a scarf you once forgot here and which still rests, folded, atop the mantel.

If I have held back from describing these things, and the array of sensations that accompanies the sight of them, it is because I have not wished to place any demands on you. You are far away, with your own concerns. You should not be held back by the thought of things you cannot, at present, do anything about.

But the truth, Phryne, since you asked for something true, is that your absence is a presence here with me every day. Everything is the same here, and yet nothing at all is the same.

Because you are missing.

You have responsibilities that unavoidably keep you far from Australia; I have responsibilities that keep me just as firmly here. Perhaps it would not be too forward of me to admit that I’ve been pursuing the possibility of a leave of absence, but a request of that type must go through approval at every level and, as you know, bureaucracy is a system that moves slowly if it moves at all.

Although I am not in London, please know that it’s not for any lack of longing.

Let everything happen to you, Phryne. Don’t hold back from the beauty or the terror. Just don’t go so far away that you are lost to me entirely.

Yours always,

Jack

22 November, 1929
London, England

Dear, dear, beloved Jack,

Your beautiful letter could not have arrived with more perfect timing. I was feeling down again today, and now I’m dancing and whirling about my room, clutching your words to my chest, confusing the poor cat.

Jack, you remain a never-ending source of mystery. Here you are, penning polite messages of news and good wishes, and all the time you’ve been reading passionate Rilke behind my back!

I can picture you at it, you know: sitting at your desk late in the evening, once you’ve finally completed the day’s paperwork to your punctilious satisfaction. The lamp lit, because you’ve stayed late enough that it’s dark outside, even now in summer. A book open before you on the desk, a small hardbound volume, and your hair just beginning to come loose and fall down over your forehead, as you read with utter concentration.

How I long to reach over and lift that stray lock of hair out of your eyes, Jack. I want it more than anything.

And you, quietly plotting to obtain leave to travel, without ever saying a word!

But against my own wishes, I must say: I hope you won’t upend your life merely because I’ve been complaining about things here. I can survive a few months of London, as I have survived many things before, and eventually I’ll be free to return to Melbourne. Don’t let me selfishly take you away from where you belong.

I asked you to come, and I want you to come, but I would never ask you to sacrifice everything.

Only, please…keep writing.

Until then, I shall continue to picture you there, at your desk in the lamplight, reading Rilke with all the fervour you bring to everything you do.

Thinking of you always,

Phryne

TO: Chief Commissioner of Police

FROM: City South Police Station

Dear Sir,

Please find attached the further paperwork you requested, in support of my request, dated 8 September, 1929, for an extended unpaid leave of absence from duty. As I hope the attached documents will show, I have put together a comprehensive plan that I believe will enable the continued smooth running of operations of City South station in my absence, through the appointment of a temporary replacement for my role, in conjunction with the reliable support of a long-serving constable attached to City South station, who has trained under my personal supervision and in whom I have the utmost confidence.

If you have concerns or questions about the execution of the above plan, please do not hesitate to contact me.

I remain very respectfully yours,

Det. Inspector Jack Robinson

6 December, 1929
Melbourne, Australia

Dear Phryne,

It seems to me I’ve been remiss in not asking more about the day-to-day of your life there, and the tasks you are undertaking for your family. The American stock market crash is proving itself no small, passing trouble, and I can only imagine the difficulties that must bring with it.

How is your work proceeding? Does it seem you’ll be able to achieve your goals? If anyone can succeed despite this atmosphere of panic and instability, I do believe it will be you. There aren’t many things I can picture about your London life, but the absolute competence of Phryne Fisher is one thing I can conjure in my mind’s eye without the slightest difficulty.

And to address your concerns of the previous letter: I hope you know that when I finally make it to London, far from being a hardship, it will be for perfectly selfish reasons of my own. Have no concern on that account, Phryne. You asked for a romantic overture, and you shall have one. Even if the grandness of the gesture is rather spoilt by having to narrate in advance every tedious, halting step in the planning of it.

My longing to see you spans oceans, to their furthest limits and beyond. You are the flame, and I follow you. Please let there be no doubt about that.

Be safe. Be well. Be happy. Until I can be near you once again.

Yours always,

Jack

23 December, 1929
London, England

My dear Jack,

Thank you for your kind concern on the financial matters. Things here are proceeding as well as can be expected, which is to say, slowly but on the whole satisfactorily. I do wish sometimes that you were here to talk it all over with. Our conversations have always had a clarifying effect, and I sorely miss having someone sensible with whom to discuss my decisions. Father’s financial advisors when I first arrived here were mostly useless, though I’ve found better ones since then. Still, your input would be an awfully pleasant thing to have.

(And don’t try to tell me you don’t know enough about finances! You have good sense, and that’s what matters.)

As for the great stock market crash in America, its effects continue to ripple across the world. My family haven’t been affected too terribly, at least so far. I worry more about what it will mean for Australia, with prices for exports already dropping, and politics always in turmoil. Strange times, Jack. These are very strange times, and what can we do but try to keep living through (and despite) them?

Speaking of which, I’m sure you’ll be amused to hear that I’ve recently solved a mystery here. No, I can’t seem to avoid them. (Nor, particularly, do I try to!) In this case, it was a friend of a friend of Mother’s, who had been receiving threatening letters and came to Mother for help. Together, the three of us were able to sort it out. (Jealous ex-lover, the usual story.) An easy case, really, but what a joy it was to have something other than financial business to occupy my brain again.

I’ve been reading more of Rilke, and I can see why you like him. He’s got an intensity that reminds me of you: an intellect that won’t be satisfied with simple answers and a passion to know things down to their truest heart.

And I hope you know your romantic overture is deeply appreciated, no matter how long it takes.

Tell Mac I miss her dreadfully. And Dot and Hugh. And, oh, everyone. I’m so grateful to be able to see Jane at least. She’s excelling at her studies, as I knew she would do. I’m feeling terribly clever, now, for having sent her to school in Europe! I’ve brought her over here to London for the holidays, and I needn’t give her back until halfway through January, and we’re having the most glorious time.

Happy Christmas, Jack! I hope you’re getting a few days free around the holiday.

And though I’m writing this to you in the old year, surely by the time the letter reaches you it will already be the new. So I shall imagine my way into the future and say: Happy new year, Jack! Did you ring in the year with anyone, make a lot of noise? Go to a party? Were you outside to hear the bells ring?

Wishing you every imaginable good thing in this new year (and new decade!),

Phryne

9 January, 1930
Melbourne, Australia

Dear Phryne,

Thank you for your new year’s wishes. I wish the same for you, and I hope this year that’s just begun will bring you everything you desire. I hope you celebrated its arrival well, although I hesitate to ask for details.

You asked how I spent New Year’s Eve, although I suppose you must know the answer already, since you correspond regularly with Mrs Collins as well. The Collinses hosted a small dinner for a few of their friends, and were kind enough to invite me as well. Mrs Collins clearly felt somewhat uncomfortable playing hostess in your home, but she said you’d absolutely insisted that she should throw a party, since you weren’t there to do it yourself. We sat together at the kitchen table, with Mr Butler as a member of the party, all very egalitarian – I’m sure you would have approved. (Although now that I think of it, you likely would have insisted that Mrs Collins use the dining room instead.)

At any rate, we passed a very nice evening together and yes, before you ask, you were much talked about.

I also saw Dr Macmillan yesterday, and she sends her greetings. No, to be perfectly accurate she sends her love, and also some strongly worded sentiments about your continued absence from Melbourne. I hesitate to reproduce the language here, but you can imagine the intent.

Know that you are missed, in many words and in many ways.

Yours always,

Jack

TO: Chief Commissioner of Police

FROM: City South Police Station

Dear Sir,

I am writing to enquire whether a date has been set for the hearing concerning my request for an unpaid leave of absence from duty. I have been preliminarily informed that the hearing would be held sometime within the next month or two.

I also wish to express my appreciation for your willingness to consider my request. I realise it is an unorthodox one, and am grateful.

Very respectfully yours,

Det. Inspector Jack Robinson

22 January, 1930
London, England

Received your letter today, Jack – thank you for the new year’s greetings!

Oh, bosh, you and your not asking for details! I’ll have you know I spent New Year’s Eve very quietly, too quietly, with Mother and Father. They do seem content with each other again, so at least there’s that. Whilst their daughter taps her foot impatiently and wishes for time to speed on.

I’ve yet to find a worthy substitute here for my own dear Adventuresses Club back home, but I’ve recently made the acquaintance of two women pilots and have had some rollicking times with them. I think, perhaps, that you wouldn’t appreciate too detailed an account of the stunt flying they’ve been teaching me, so I’ll simply say that it’s proved a welcome distraction from the tedium of banking.

Speaking of which, I’m very nearly late for a meeting with Father’s solicitor, so this letter will of necessity be unusually short. I shall think of it as an opportunity to send it on its way to you all the sooner.

Sending you more fond thoughts than you can imagine,

Phryne

11 January, 1930
FROM THE DESK OF: Dr Elizabeth Macmillan, Women’s Hospital, Melbourne

Phryne, my dear heart, and I say this in the gentlest way I’m able, but what the bloody hell do you think you’re doing over there in London all this time? It’s been four months (and counting…) and I know you’re not there for your own enjoyment. I mean, really, hang your damn father, if he can’t handle his own life like an adult.

Sorry, don’t speak ill of one’s elders, etc. etc.

But really, Phryne, are you happy over there? Because you were rather deliriously (some might say obnoxiously) happy when you were here. And then you threw it all in to dash off to London, and bafflingly have remained there ever since.

Come on, darling. Is all this really necessary?

And I can’t believe I’m saying this, for far be it from me to be overly concerned about the delicate emotions of a man, but your lovelorn inspector is looking positively ragged these days. I hear he’s been trying for months to get leave to travel to you, but so far it’s all still tied up in the usual red tape and foolishness. But the point is, he’s trying his damnedest. And I’ve grudgingly come to respect that.

What are you going to do, by the way, if he does manage to get there? Is that a possibility you’re prepared for?

Meanwhile, you’ll scarcely believe it, but your old Mac has managed to stumble her way into a romance of her own. Her name’s Athena (yes, really) and I think she might be the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known, as well as stunningly kind and terrifyingly clever. I can’t believe my good fortune, Phryne. You don’t hear me say that often, I know. But right now I can’t help but dare to say it.

Well, you’ll meet her when you come back. If you ever come back.

Happy new year, dear. I hope I’ve now yelled at you enough for you to remember just how much you miss me. Come home soon, won’t you?

Yours forever and ever etc.,

Mac

25 January, 1930
London, England

Dear Mac,

Oh, I’m so glad to know of this new love of yours, this goddess-namesake woman! No one deserves it more than you do, truly, and I wish you every happiness. When I’m back in Melbourne, let’s all go out and get terribly drunk together and we’ll dance through the night and into the next afternoon at the very least.

And you’re right, of course you’re right. (Perhaps you wrote solely for the satisfaction of making me say those words?) So: You’re right, it’s not my job to manage everything for my parents if they can’t manage for themselves. And yet, well, you know how it is. How I am. I can’t seem to step away, when I see a place where I could help.

It isn’t forever. It’s tedious, and it’s wearying, but it isn’t forever. And then I shall be able to return home to Melbourne (home! how beautiful to be able to call it that once again!) and life can return to being as it should be.

And then, as you say, there’s Jack.

Mac, what do you take me for? Of course I’ve thought about what will happen when I see him again. Of course I’ve thought (constantly) about what it will all mean if he travels halfway around the world for my sake. And of course I’m terrified of it.

Terrified of doesn’t mean not wanting. But what if I can’t live up to it? Jack is maddeningly slow and cautious and careful, but once he decides on a thing, he’s dedicated to it completely. And I? What am I except flighty, and bruised by bad experience, and not entirely trusting of anything that can’t be 100% controlled by my own two hands?

Love is not a thing that ought to be controlled by one person alone, even I know that.

Did I say “love”? Yes, all right, I said the word. But is that enough, the mere strength of feeling for somebody? Or will I destroy this beautiful thing in the very process of trying to get it to lift off from the ground?

Yours in a tortured agony of feeling and confusion and longing to be home again,

Phryne

25 January, 1930
London, England

Jack, I’m writing without even waiting to receive your latest letter, though I know that one is surely somewhere on its way to London even now. How reckless of me! But my thoughts are spilling out in all directions and I can’t seem to contain them in any sensible or patient way.

I wish you were here. I try not to say that, normally, for I don’t want to demand something of you that’s not yours to give. (Your time, and your absence from Melbourne’s police force, for I know better than anyone how much you are needed there!) But you are the constant refrain of my thoughts.

Every day, I imagine what it would be like to have you here, to walk with you through London and show you the places that are dear to me. I want to kiss you on the Embankment, Jack, for everyone to see. I wonder if you would let me?

Silent friend of many distances, feel
how your breath is enlarging space.
Among the rafters of dark belfries
let yourself ring.

Yes, that’s Rilke again. I can’t seem to help reading him and working myself into a perfectly maudlin mood.

I’m afraid, Jack. I trust your heart, but I don’t know that I trust mine. You are so steadfast, but I am a bird in flight, afraid to land anywhere too long, for fear of the predator that may pounce from behind. (To torture a metaphor too far.) I’ve never trusted my own happiness.

Can you really put up with a person who thinks like that? Can anyone?

Some days I think I’ll chuck it all in, leave the family to fend for themselves for once, and fly home to you now, now, now, this very instant. Other days, I think we’d all be better off if I simply stayed away.

But I am desperate to see your dear face again. There are days when I can think of little else.

So maybe that means something, too.

Phryne

26 January, 1930
London, England

Jack…

I must apologise for yesterday’s letter. Please, please, if you have any kind feeling for me at all, would you just ignore it? Tear it up or throw it in the fire, something suitably dramatic.

Blame it on the wine at dinner yesterday. Or blame it on Mac, sending me her cursedly perceptive letters and riling up sentiments that are perhaps better allowed to lie still.

I’m mortified to think of all that I wrote to you, and I wish I hadn’t rushed out to post it last night in a flurry of dramatic fervour. Better if I’d waited until today. (For then I should have decided not to post it at all.)

When the cooler mind of the daylight hours prevails, I know it was unfair to inflict all my own self-doubts on you. Please do let’s go on talking about normal things instead. Tell me about your work, and about all the glories of Melbourne in summer. Have you been to the beach? Any particularly intriguing cases lately? Does Hugh continue to distinguish himself in the line of duty? I hear from Dot endlessly about how much he admires and looks up to you. Hugh is such a darling (and has impeccable taste, in his choice of both spouse and role model).

Let’s talk about such pleasant things as that, and leave the other ones be.

Trying not to hide my head in mortification at last night’s careless words,

Phryne

8 February, 1930
FROM THE DESK OF: Dr Elizabeth Macmillan, Women’s Hospital, Melbourne

Phryne dear, please don’t be such a fool. You are eminently capable of all you desire, so: trust yourself.

Devotedly and exasperatedly,

Mac

10 February, 1930
Melbourne, Australia

Dear Phryne,

Thank you for your letter, or rather for your sequence of letters, which came tumbling onto my desk all within days of one another.

Please don’t be ashamed of a single word you’ve written. It’s my honour to be entrusted with your words. And I shall try to respond to every one of them with the care that they deserve.

But first, Phryne, I must offer you an apology: I should not have said what I did about New Year’s Eve. You have a right to celebrate in any way and with anyone you choose. I should not have implied otherwise, even in jest.

The truth, as uncomfortable as it is to admit it, is that those words arose directly from my own self-doubts.

Even now, after all this time of our acquaintance and all that I have learnt from you (and I have learnt more from you than you can know), even now I’m not certain I’m liberal-minded enough to love you and yet allow you the freedom you deserve.

Yes, I do mean freedom, and yes, I wish you always to have it. I fully believe that you are capable of living such a life: one in which you bestow your affections freely and honestly on many people, and bring them (and yourself) no harm, only joy. When I’m able to set aside my own jealous feelings, I can see that it’s a beautiful thing. You are a liberal-minded woman, and that is one of the many admirable qualities that do you such credit.

For your sake, I want to be a similarly liberal-minded man. Please believe that, for I truly do. I only fear that I may not be capable of changing so thoroughly from my natural state as – surely you would be the first to say it – a rather staid and old-fashioned man.

Can you accept that of me? That I’m trying, but it’s possible I may fail? I’d offer you everything in the world if I could, but I’m loath to make promises I may yet fail to keep.

Because you, Phryne, deserve the best of everything.

Please know that there is nothing you could demand of me that I would not freely give. You may fear your heart, but I do not. You’re the furthest thing from flighty that I have ever known. (Propensity for donning fine plumage notwithstanding.)

There can be no doubt that swallows soar high and travel far, but they are known for the trueness of their hearts.

Yours always,

Jack

25 February, 1930
London, England

Jack, darling, let me say first that I want you exactly as you are. Old-fashioned, perhaps, although not nearly as staid as you think you are, and possessed of an ocean-deep heart.

You say you want to give me freedom, and there’s a great irony: because I, for my own part, want to give you fidelity. I really do, Jack. I’d like to be true to you in the ways that are important to you. Your desires are not less important than mine, and I would never want you to give them up for me. In fact, I would hate myself if you did.

But I don’t know, either, whether I’m capable of changing so utterly. As you know very well – you would perhaps say “all too well” – I’ve never wanted to tie myself to one person. It’s not for lack of caring, I hope you know that. It’s simply a need in myself, to be able to live my life without always looking over my shoulder, without always tailoring my actions because someone disapproves. I spent enough of my younger years living that way, I promise you.

And yet, because you matter to me, I’ve got this mad desire to try to cross that distance between our two opposite poles. Is that enough, do you think, that we both want to try?

With you, I’d like to try.

I miss you terribly, Jack. Whatever else may be true, please never doubt that.

To the limits of longing and beyond,

Phryne

TELEGRAM RECEIVED, LONDON, 13 MARCH, 1930

THE HONOURABLE PHRYNE FISHER CARE OF BARON HENRY FISHER

DEAR PHRYNE LEAVE OF ABSENCE OBTAINED STOP NEXT ENGLAND BOUND STEAMER LEAVES MELBOURNE IN THREE DAYS STOP SHALL I COME QUERY

JACK ROBINSON

TELEGRAM RECEIVED, MELBOURNE, 13 MARCH, 1930

DETECTIVE INSPECTOR JACK ROBINSON CITY SOUTH POLICE STATION

JACK YES COME FLARE UP LIKE A FLAME

ALL MY LONGING

PHRYNE

Dearest Jack,

How impossible, how wonderful, to be able to gaze at you right here beside me. Not across an ocean or a continent, but here.

And it seems this letter-writing has become a habit: for as I look at you sleeping, I feel the same old urge to put my thoughts down on paper, to save for you until you wake.

I wonder if it will embarrass you, when you read this, to know how much I love simply to look at you? Will it discomfit you to know I find you beautiful? I’m drawn to your face, your deep eyes, your strong shoulders and clever hands. But even more, as I hope you know, to your heart.

And now here you are on the other side of the world, and I can scarcely believe my good fortune. It was a very long time to do without your company. I’m so glad you’ve come, Jack.

I meant what I said to you last night: I want you in my bed, but that doesn’t mean you have to be there, if it’s not what you want. I’ll adore you regardless. But oh, how glad I was, when you said with such certainty that there was nowhere you’d rather be.

I’ll not write any more detail than that, for I know how you’ll blush when you read this. But I want you to know, you delight me in every way.

You’re waking now, so I’ll leave this letter. Writing is nice, but the ink-and-paper Jack can’t hold a candle to the flesh-and-blood Jack beside me. And with the Jack beside me, I don’t want to waste a moment.

Yours always,

Phryne

~ ~ ~

End notes:

The first poetry excerpt (“You, sent out beyond your recall…”) is from Das Stunden-Buch by Rainer Maria Rilke (1905); the translation used here is by Joanna Macy and Anita Barrows. (Although, no, this particular translation definitely did not exist in Jack and Phryne’s era!) Believe it or not, I was introduced to that particular snippet via a children’s book: Flora & Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures by the wonderful Kate DiCamillo. A character in the book quotes it, and “go to the limits of your longing” spoke to me instantly of Phryne and Jack.
The sonnet that Phryne quotes from (“Silent friend of many distances…”) is the final poem in Rilke’s Sonnets to Orpheus. I used David Young’s 1987 translation. (My library doesn’t hold any Rilke translations that are old enough to be Phryne-and-Jack contemporary!)
Also, looking at all this has reminded me how very, very thorny Rilke is to translate. Wow.
~ ~ ~
Now, 1920s air travel!
Oh, the striving towards historical verisimilitude… I almost didn’t write this fic, because I got so stuck on trying to research, with complete accuracy, 1920s international mail delivery times, so I could date each of these letters with precise accuracy. But that quest for perfection was starting to look like no story at all. So instead, the dates on these letters are very much approximations, a latitude that allowed this story to exist. :-)
But! Here are some fun Things I Learned About Early Airmail, in that research quest:
• The first Australians to fly from Great Britain to Australia did it in 1919, and it took almost a month. The route I’ve imagined for Phryne is loosely modelled after theirs.
• By the mid-1930s, London to Brisbane (12,722 miles) was the longest air route in the world, and took over 10 days. (Still with many, many stops along the way, and emergency landings were pretty common.) So I imagine Phryne’s journey in the late 1920s fell somewhere between, less than a month but definitely more than 10 days?
• Let’s talk airmail! The first American airmail delivery was in 1911. The first Australian airmail delivery was in 1914, from Melbourne to Sydney. It was WWI, of course, that led to innovations in aircraft such that airmail service became a practicable thing. After the war, formalised systems of airmail gradually spread around the world; in Australia it began in 1921. (In Germany in the 1920s and 1930s, mail was carried by zeppelins!) By 1932, mail flights between e.g. Cape Town and London took *only* ten days. There was airmail operating between London and Australia from late 1934, and passengers were carried as well from early 1935.