Date: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00
Description: This collection of short stories by Ethel Lina White comprises 12 longer short stories of suspense and romance. It is new, and unique to MobileRead. Contents 1: Cheese 2: Waxworks 3: The Scarecrow 4: An Unlocked Window 5: White Cap 6: Falling Downstairs 7: Green Ginger 8: The Holiday 9: The Sham Shop 10: The Call of the Tiger 11: At Twilight 12: The Uninvited Guest

THE UNINVITED GUEST
and other stories

Ethel Lina White

1876-1944

Compiled and Edited by Terry Walker

April 2023

Contents

Introduction

1:  Cheese

2: Waxworks

3:  The Scarecrow

4: An Unlocked Window

5: White Cap

6: Falling Downstairs

7: Green Ginger

8: The Holiday

9: The Sham Shop

10: The Call of the Tiger

11: At Twilight

12: The Uninvited Guest

_____________

Introduction

ETHEL LINA WHITE  (1876-1944)  was a British civil servant from a well-off background who resigned in 1919 to embark on a full-time writing career. She wrote many short stories, and a series of successful crime and suspense novels, one of which, The Wheel Spins (1936), was filmed two years later by Alfred Hithcock as The Lady Vanishes.  Some Must Watch (1933) was filmed as The Spiral Staircase  in 1946 and 1975.

So far as I can establish, no collection of her short stories has ever been printed.  Some of her short stories  (for example, "Cheese"; "The Scarecrow") have been anthologised in print, but most appear not to have been republished.

Most of these stories have previously appeared in my "Past Masters" series of short story anthologies at MobileRead.

—Terry Walker

1: Cheese

Pearson’s Magazine Oct 1923

Published in the USA in Detective Story Magazine 16 Feb 1924 under the title "Bait for the Beast".

THIS STORY BEGINS with a murder. It ends with a mousetrap.

The murder can be disposed of in a paragraph. An attractive girl, carefully reared and educated for a future which held only a twisted throat. At the end of seven months, an unsolved mystery and a reward of £500.

It is a long way from a murder to a mouse-trap— and one with no finger-posts; but the police knew every inch of the way. In spite of a prestige punctured by the press and public, they had solved the identity of the killer. There remained the problem of tracking this wary and treacherous rodent from his unknown sewer in the underworld into their trap.

They failed repeatedly for lack of the right bait.

And unexpectedly, one spring evening, the bait turned up in the person of a young girl.

Cheese.

Inspector Angus Duncan was alone in his office when her message was brought up. He was a red-haired Scot, handsome in a dour fashion, with the chin of a prize-fighter and keen blue eyes.

He nodded.

'I'll see her.'

It was between the lights. River, government offices and factories were all deeply dyed with the blue stain of dusk. Even in the city, the lilac bushes showed green tips and an occasional crocus cropped through the grass of the public-gardens, like strewn orange-peel. The evening star was a jewel in the pale green sky.

Duncan was impervious to the romance of the hour. He knew that twilight was but the prelude to night and that darkness was a shield for crime.

He looked up sharply when his visitor was admitted. She was young and flower-faced—her faint freckles already fading away into pallor. Her black suit was shabby, but her hat was garnished for the spring with a cheap cowslip wreath.

As she raised her blue eyes, he saw that they still carried the memory of country sweets...Thereupon he looked at her more sharply for he knew that of all poses, innocence is easiest to counterfeit.

'You say Roper sent you?' he enquired.

'Yes, Maggie Roper.'

He nodded. Maggie Roper— Sergeant Roper's niece— was already shaping as a promising young Stores' detective.

'Where did you meet her?'

'At the Girls' Hostel where I'm staying.'

'Your name?'

'Jenny Morgan.'

'From the country?'

'Yes. But I'm up now for good.'

For good?... He wondered.

Alone?'

'Yes.'

'How's that?' He looked at her mourning. 'People all dead?'

She nodded. From the lightning sweep of her lashes, he knew that she had put in some rough work with a tear. It prejudiced him in her favour. His voice grew more genial as his lips relaxed.

'Well, what's it all about?'

She drew a letter from her bag.

'I'm looking for work and I advertised in the paper. I got this answer. I'm to be companion-secretary to a lady, to travel with her and be treated as her daughter— if she likes me. I sent my photograph and my references and she's fixed an appointment.'

'When and where?'

'The day after tomorrow, in the First Room in the National Gallery. But as she's elderly, she is sending her nephew to drive me to her house.'

'Where's that?'

She looked troubled.

'That's what Maggie Roper is making the fuss about. First, she said I must see if Mrs Harper— that's the lady's name— had taken up my references. And then she insisted on ringing up the Ritz where the letter was written from. The address was printed, so it was bound to be genuine, wasn't it?'

'Was it? What happened then?'

'They said no Mrs Harper had stayed there. But I'm sure it must be a mistake.' Her voice trembled. 'One must risk something to get such a good job.'

His face darkened. He was beginning to accept Jenny as the genuine article.

'Tell me,' he asked, 'have you had any experience of life?'

'Well, I've always lived in the country with Auntie. But I've read all sorts of novels and the newspapers.'

'Murders?'

'Oh, I love those.'

He could tell by the note in her childish voice that she ate up the newspaper accounts merely as exciting fiction, without the slightest realisation that the printed page was grim fact. He could see the picture: a sheltered childhood passed amid green spongy meadows. She could hardly cull sophistication from clover and cows.

'Did you read about the Bell murder?' he asked abruptly.

Auntie wouldn't let me.' She added in the same breath, 'Every word.'

'Why did your aunt forbid you?'

'She said it must be a specially bad one, because they'd left all the bad parts out of the paper.'

'Well, didn't you notice the fact that that poor girl— Emmeline Bell— a well-bred girl of about your own age, was lured to her death through answering a newspaper advertisement?'

'I— I suppose so. But those things don't happen to oneself.'

'Why? What's there to prevent your falling into a similar trap?'

'I can't explain. But if there was something wrong, I should know it.'

'How? D'you expect a bell to ring or a red light to flash "Danger?" '

'Of course not. But if you believe in right and wrong, surely there must be some warning.'

He looked sceptical. That innocence bore a lily in its hand, was to him a beautiful phrase and nothing more. His own position in the sorry scheme of affairs was, to him, proof positive of the official failure of guardian angels.

'Let me see that letter, please,' he said.

She studied his face anxiously as he read, but his expression remained inscrutable. Twisting her fingers in her suspense, she glanced around the room, noting vaguely the three telephones on the desk and the stacked files in the pigeonholes. A Great Dane snored before the red-caked fire. She wanted to cross the room and pat him, but lacked the courage to stir from her place.

The room was warm, for the windows were opened only a couple of inches at the top. In view of Duncan's weather-tanned colour, the fact struck her as odd.

Mercifully, the future is veiled. She had no inkling of the fateful part that Great Dane was to play in her own drama, nor was there anything to tell her that a closed window would have been a barrier between her and the yawning mouth of hell.

She started as Duncan spoke.

'I want to hold this letter for a bit. Will you call about this time tomorrow? Meantime, I must impress upon you the need of utmost caution. Don't take one step on your own. Should anything fresh crop up, 'phone me immediately. Here's my number.'

When she had gone, Duncan walked to the window. The blue dusk had deepened into a darkness pricked with lights. Across the river, advertisement-signs wrote themselves intermittently in coloured beads.

He still glowed with the thrill of the hunter on the first spoor of the quarry. Although he had to await the report of the expert test, he was confident that the letter which he held had been penned by the murderer of poor ill-starred Emmeline Bell.

Then his elation vanished at a recollection of Jenny's wistful face. In this city were scores of other girls, frail as windflowers too— blossom-sweet and country-raw— forced through economic pressure into positions fraught with deadly peril.

The darkness drew down overhead like a dark shadow pregnant with crime. And out from their holes and sewers stole the rats...

At last Duncan had the trap baited for his rat.

A young and pretty girl— ignorant and unprotected. Cheese.

When Jenny, punctual to the minute, entered his office, the following evening, he instantly appraised her as his prospective decoy. His first feeling was one of disappointment. Either she had shrunk in the night or her eyes had grown bigger. She looked such a frail scrap as she stared at him, her lips bitten to a thin line, that it seemed hopeless to credit her with the necessary nerve for his project.

'Oh, please tell me it's all perfectly right about that letter.'

'Anything but right.'

For a moment, he thought she was about to faint. He wondered uneasily whether she had eaten that day. It was obvious from the keenness of her disappointment that she was at the end of her resources.

'Are you sure?' she insisted. 'It's— very important to me. Perhaps I'd better keep the appointment. If I didn't like the look of things, I needn't go on with it.'

'I tell you, it's not a genuine job,' he repeated. 'But I've something to put to you that is the goods. Would you like to have a shot at £500?'

Her flushed face, her eager eyes, her trembling lips, all answered him.

'Yes, please,' was all she said.

He searched for reassuring terms.

'It's like this. We've tested your letter and know it is written, from a bad motive, by an undesirable character.'

'You mean a criminal?' she asked quickly.

'Um. His record is not good. We want to get hold of him.'

'Then why don't you?'

He suppressed a smile.

'Because he doesn't confide in us. But if you have the courage to keep your appointment tomorrow and let his messenger take you to the house of the suppositious Mrs Harper, I'll guarantee it's the hiding-place of the man we want. We get him— you get the reward. Question is— have you the nerve?'

She was silent. Presently she spoke in a small voice.

'Will I be in great danger?'

'None. I wouldn't risk your safety for any consideration. From first to last, you'll be under the protection of the Force.'

'You mean I'll be watched over by detectives in disguise?'

'From the moment you enter the National Gallery, you'll be covered doubly and trebly. You'll be followed every step of the way and directly we've located the house, the place will be raided by the police.'

'All the same, for a minute or so, just before you can get into the house, I'll be alone with— him?'

'The briefest interval. You'll be safe at first. He'll begin with overtures. Stall him off with questions. Don't let him see you suspect— or show you're frightened.'

Duncan frowned as he spoke. It was his duty to society to rid it of a dangerous pest and in order to do so, Jenny's cooperation was vital. Yet, to his own surprise, he disliked the necessity in the case of this especial girl.

'Remember we'll be at hand,' he said. 'But if your nerve goes, just whistle and we'll break cover immediately.'

'Will you be there?' she asked suddenly.

'Not exactly in the foreground. But I'll be there.'

'Then I'll do it.' She smiled for the first time. 'You laughed at me when I said there was something inside me which told me— things. But I just know I can trust you.'

'Good.' His voice was rough. 'Wait a bit. You've been put to expense coming over here. This will cover your fares and so on.'

He thrust a note into her hand and hustled her out, protesting. It was a satisfaction to feel that she would eat that night. As he seated himself at his desk, preparatory to work, his frozen face was no index of the emotions raised by Jenny's parting words.

Hitherto, he had thought of women merely as 'skirts.' He had regarded a saucepan with an angry woman at the business end of it, merely as a weapon. For the first time he had a domestic vision of a country girl— creamy and fragrant as meadowsweet— in a nice womanly setting of saucepans.

Jenny experienced a thrill which was almost akin to exhilaration when she entered Victoria station, the following day. At the last moment, the place for meeting had been altered in a telegram from 'Mrs Harper.'

Immediately she had received the message, Jenny had gone to the telephone-box in the hostel and duly reported the change of plan, with a request that her message should be repeated to her, to obviate any risk of mistake.

And now— the incredible adventure was actually begun.

The station seemed filled with hurrying crowds as she walked slowly towards the clock. Her feet rather lagged on the way. She wondered if the sinister messenger had already marked the yellow wreath in her hat which she had named as her mark of identification.

Then she remembered her guards. At this moment they were here, unknown, watching over her slightest movement. It was a curious sensation to feel that she was spied upon by unseen eves. Yet it helped to brace the muscles of her knees when she took up her station under the clock with the sensation of having exposed herself as a target for gunfire.

Nothing happened. No one spoke to her. She was encouraged to gaze around her...

A few yards away, a pleasant-faced smartly dressed young man was covertly regarding her. He carried a yellowish sample-bag which proclaimed him a drummer.

Suddenly Jenny felt positive that this was one of her guards. There was a quality about his keen clean-shaven face— a hint of the eagle in his eye— which reminded her of Duncan. She gave him the beginnings of a smile and was thrilled when, almost imperceptibly, he fluttered one eyelid. She read it as a signal for caution. Alarmed by her indiscretion, she looked fixedly in another direction.

Still— it helped her to know that even if she could not see him, he was there.

The minutes dragged slowly by. She began to grow anxious as to whether the affair were not some hoax. It would be not only a tame ending to the adventure but a positive disappointment. She would miss the chance of a sum which— to her— was a little fortune. Her need was so vital that she would have undertaken the venture for five pounds. Moreover, after her years of green country solitude, she felt a thrill at the mere thought of her temporary link with the underworld. This was life in the raw; while screening her as she aided him, she worked with Angus Duncan.

She smiled— then started as though stung.

Someone had touched her on the arm.

'Have I the honour, happiness and felicity of addressing Miss Jenny Morgan? Yellow wreath in the lady's hat. Red Flower in the gent's buttonhole, as per arrangement.'

The man who addressed her was young and bull-necked, with florid colouring which ran into blotches. He wore a red carnation in the buttonhole of his check overcoat.

'Yes, I'm Jenny Morgan.'

As she spoke, she looked into his eyes. She felt a sharp revulsion—an instinctive recoil of her whole being.

Are you Mrs Harper's nephew?' she faltered.

'That's right. Excuse a gent keeping a lady waiting, but I just slipped into the bar for a glass of milk. I've a taxi waiting if you'll just hop outside.'

Jenny's mind worked rapidly as she followed him. She was forewarned and protected. But— were it not for Maggie Roper's intervention— she would have kept this appointment in very different circumstances. She wondered whether she would have heeded that instinctive warning and refused to follow the stranger.

She shook her head. Her need was so urgent that, in her wish to believe the best, she knew that she would have summoned up her courage and flouted her fears as nerves. She would have done exactly what she was doing— accompanying an unknown man to an unknown destination.

She shivered at the realisation. It might have been herself. Poor defenceless Jenny— going to her doom.

At that moment she encountered the grave scrutiny of a stout clergyman who was standing by the book-stall. He was ruddy, wore horn-rimmed spectacles and carried the Church Times.

His look of understanding was almost as eloquent as a vocal message. It filled her with gratitude. Again she was certain that this was a second guard. Turning to see if the young commercial traveller were following her, she was thrilled to discover that he had preceded her into the station yard. He got into a taxi at the exact moment that her companion flung open the door of a cab which was waiting. It was only this knowledge that Duncan was thus making good his promise which induced her to enter the vehicle. Once again her nerves rebelled and she was rent with sick forebodings.

As they moved off, she had an overpowering impulse to scream aloud for help to the porters— just because all this might have happened to some poor girl who had not her own good fortune.

Her companion nudged her.

'Bit of all right, joy-riding, eh?'

She stiffened, but managed to force a smile.

'Is it a long ride?'

Ah, now you're asking.'

'Where does Mrs Harper live?'

Ah, that's telling.'

She shrank away, seized with disgust of his blotched face so near her own.

'Please give me more room. It's stifling here.'

'Now, don't you go taking no liberties with me. A married man I am, with four wives all on the dole.' All the same, to her relief, he moved further away. 'From the country, aren't you? Nice place. Lots of milk. Suit me a treat. Any objection to a gent smoking?'

'I wish you would. The cab reeks of whisky.'

They were passing St Paul's which was the last landmark in her limited knowledge of London. Girls from offices passed on the pavement, laughing and chatting together, or hurrying by intent on business. A group was scattering crumbs to the pigeons which fluttered on the steps of the cathedral.

She watched them with a stab of envy. Safe happy girls.

Then she remembered that somewhere, in the press of traffic, a taxi was shadowing her own. She took fresh courage.

The drive passed like an interminable nightmare in which she was always on guard to stem the advances of her disagreeable companion. Something seemed always on the point of happening— something unpleasant, just out of sight and round the corner— and then, somehow she staved it off.

The taxi bore her through a congested maze of streets. Shops and offices were succeeded by regions of warehouses and factories, which in turn gave way to areas of dun squalor where gas-works rubbed shoulders with grimed laundries which bore such alluring signs as DEWDROP or WHITE ROSE.

From the shrilling of sirens, Jenny judged that they were in the neighbourhood of the river, when they turned into a quiet square. The tall lean houses wore an air of drab respectability. Lace curtains hung at every window. Plaster pineapples crowned the pillared porches.

'Here's our "destitution."'

As her guide inserted his key in the door of No. 17, Jenny glanced eagerly down the street, in time to see a taxi turn the corner.

'Hop in, dearie.'

On the threshold Jenny shrank back.

Evil.

Never before had she felt its presence. But she knew. Like the fumes creeping upwards from the grating of a sewer, it poisoned the air.

Had she embarked on this enterprise in her former ignorance, she was certain that at this point, her instinct would have triumphed.

'I would never have passed through this door.'

She was wrong. Volition was swept off the board. Her arm was gripped and before she could struggle, she was pulled inside.

She heard the slam of the door.

'Never loiter on the doorstep, dearie. Gives the house a bad name. This way. Up the stairs. All the nearer to heaven.'

Her heart heavy with dread, Jenny followed him. She had entered on the crux of her adventure— the dangerous few minutes when she would be quite alone.

The place was horrible— with no visible reason for horror. It was no filthy East-end rookery, but a technically clean apartment-house. The stairs were covered with brown linoleum. The mottled yellow wallpaper was intact. Each landing had its marble-topped table, adorned with a forlorn aspidistra— its moulting rug at every door. The air was dead and smelt chiefly of dust.

They climbed four flights of stairs without meeting anyone. Only faint rustlings and whispers within the rooms told of other tenants. Then the blotched-faced man threw open a door.

'Young lady come to see Mrs Harper about the sitooation. Too-tel-oo, dearie. Hope you strike lucky.'

He pushed her inside and she heard his step upon the stairs.

In that moment, Jenny longed for anyone— even her late companion.

She was vaguely aware of the figure of a man seated in a chair. Too terrified to look at him, her eyes flickered around the room.

Like the rest of the house, it struck the note of parodied respectability. Yellowish lace curtains hung at the windows which were blocked by pots of leggy geraniums. A walnut-wood suite was upholstered in faded bottle-green rep with burst padding. A gilt-framed mirror surmounted a stained marble mantelpiece which was decorated with a clock— permanently stopped under its glass case— and a bottle of whisky. On a small table by the door rested a filthy cage, containing a grey parrot, its eyes mere slits of wicked evil between wrinkled lids.

It had to come. With an effort, she looked at the man.

He was tall and slender and wrapped in a once-gorgeous dressing-gown of frayed crimson quilted silk. At first sight, his features were not only handsome but bore some air of breeding. But the whole face was blurred— as though it were a waxen mask half-melted by the sun and over which the Fiend— in passing— had lightly drawn a hand. His eyes drew her own. Large and brilliant, they were of so light a blue as to appear almost white. The lashes were unusually long and matted into spikes.

The blood froze at Jenny's heart. The girl was no fool. Despite Duncan's cautious statements, she had drawn her own deduction which linked an unsolved murder mystery and a reward of £500.

She knew that she was alone with a homicidal maniac—the murderer of ill-starred Emmeline Bell.

In that moment, she realised the full horror of a crime which, a few months ago, had been nothing but an exciting newspaper-story. It sickened her to reflect that a girl— much like herself— whose pretty face smiled fearlessly upon the world from the printed page, had walked into this same trap, in all the blindness of her youthful confidence. No one to hear her cries. No one to guess the agony of those last terrible moments.

Jenny at least understood that first rending shock of realisation. She fought for self-control. At sight of that smiling marred face, she wanted to do what she knew instinctively that other girl had done—precipitating her doom. With a desperate effort she suppressed the impulse to rush madly round the room like a snared creature, beating her hands against the locked door and crying for help. Help which would never come.

Luckily, common sense triumphed. In a few minutes' time, she would not be alone. Even then a taxi was speeding on its mission; wires were humming; behind her was the protection of the Force.

She remembered Duncan's advice to temporise. It was true that she was not dealing with a beast of the jungle which sprang on its prey at sight.

'Oh, please.' She hardly recognised the tiny pipe. 'I've come to see Mrs Harper about her situation.'

'Yes.' The man did not remove his eyes from her face. 'So you are Jenny?'

'Yes, Jenny Morgan. Is— is Mrs Harper in?'

'She'll be in presently. Sit down. Make yourself at home. What are you scared for?'

'I'm not scared.'

Her words were true. Her strained ears had detected faintest sounds outside—dulled footsteps, the cautious fastening of a door.

The man, for his part, also noticed the stir. For a few seconds he listened intently. Then to her relief, he relaxed his attention.

She snatched again at the fiction of her future employer.

'I hope Mrs Harper will soon come in.'

'What's your hurry? Come closer. I can't see you properly.'

They were face to face. It reminded her of the old nursery story of 'Little Red Riding Hood.'

'What big eyes you've got, Grandmother.'

The words swam into her brain.

Terrible eyes. Like white glass cracked in distorting facets. She was looking into the depths of a blasted soul. Down, down... That poor girl. But she must not think of her. She must be brave—give him back look for look.

Her lids fell... She could bear it no longer.

She gave an involuntary start at the sight of his hands. They were beyond the usual size— unhuman— with long knotted fingers.

'What big hands you've got.'

Before she could control her tongue, the words slipped out.

The man stopped smiling.

But Jenny was not frightened now. Her guards were near. She thought of the detective who carried the bag of samples. She thought of the stout clergyman. She thought of Duncan.

At that moment, the commercial traveller was in an upper room of a wholesale drapery house in the city, holding the fashionable blonde lady buyer with his magnetic blue eye, while he displayed his stock of crêpe-de-Chine underwear.

At that moment, the clergyman was seated in a third-class railway carriage, watching the hollows of the Downs fill with heliotrope shadows. He was not quite at ease. His thoughts persisted on dwelling on the frightened face of a little country girl as she drifted by in the wake of a human vulture.

'I did wrong. I should have risked speaking to her.'

But— at that moment— Duncan was thinking of her.

Jenny's message had been received over the telephone wire, repeated and duly written down by Mr Herbert Yates, shorthand-typist—who, during the absence of Duncan's own secretary, was filling the gap for one morning. At the sound of his chief's step in the corridor outside, he rammed on his hat, for he was already overdue for a lunch appointment with one of the numerous 'only girls in the world.'

At the door he met Duncan.

'May I go to lunch now, sir?'

Duncan nodded assent. He stopped for a minute in the passage while he gave Yates his instructions for the afternoon.

'Any message?' he enquired.

'One come this instant, sir. It's under the weight.'

Duncan entered the office. But in that brief interval, the disaster had occurred.

Yates could not be held to blame for what happened. It was true that he had taken advantage of Duncan's absence to open a window wide, but he was ignorant of any breach of rules. In his hurry he had also written down Jenny's message on the nearest loose-leaf to hand, but he had taken the precaution to place it under a heavy paper-weight.

It was Duncan's Great Dane which worked the mischief. He was accustomed at this hour to be regaled with a biscuit by Duncan's secretary who was an abject dog-lover. As his dole had not been forthcoming he went in search of it. His great paws on the table, he rooted among the papers, making nothing of a trifle of a letter-weight. Over it went. Out of the window— at the next gust— went Jenny's message. Back to his rug went the dog.

The instant Duncan was aware of what had happened, a frantic search was made for Yates. But that wily and athletic youth, wise to the whims of his official superiors, had disappeared. They raked every place of refreshment within a wide radius. It was not until Duncan's men rang up to report that they had drawn a blank at the National Gallery, that Yates was discovered in an underground dive, drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes with his charmer.

Duncan arrived at Victoria forty minutes after the appointed time.

It was the bitterest hour of his life. He was haunted by the sight of Jenny's flower-face upturned to his. She had trusted him. And in his ambition to track the man he had taken advantage of her necessity to use her as a pawn in his game.

He had played her— and lost her.

The thought drove him to madness. Steeled though he was to face reality, he dared not to let himself think of the end. Jenny—country-raw and blossom-sweet— even then struggling in the grip of murderous fingers.

Even then.

Jenny panted as she fought, her brain on fire. The thing had rushed upon her so swiftly that her chief feeling was of sheer incredulity. What had gone before was already burning itself up in a red mist. She had no clear memory afterwards of those tense minutes of fencing. There was only an interlude filled with a dimly comprehended menace— and then this.

And still Duncan had not intervened.

Her strength was failing. Hell cracked, revealing glimpses of unguessed horror.

With a supreme effort she wrenched herself free. It was but a momentary respite, but it sufficed for her signal— a broken tremulous whistle.

The response was immediate. Somewhere outside the door a gruff voice was heard in warning.

'Perlice.'

The killer stiffened, his ears pricked, every nerve astrain. His eyes flickered to the ceiling which was broken by the outline of a trap-door.

Then his glance fell upon the parrot.

His fingers on Jenny's throat, he paused. The bird rocked on its perch, its eyes slits of malicious evil.

Time stood still. The killer stared at the parrot. Which of the gang had given the warning? Whose voice? Not Glass-eye. Not Mexican Joe. The sound had seemed to be within the room.

That parrot.

He laughed. His fingers tightened. Tightened to relax.

For a day and a half he had been in Mother Bargery's room. During that time the bird had been dumb. Did it talk?

The warning echoed in his brain. Every moment of delay was fraught with peril. At that moment his enemies were here, stealing upwards to catch him in their trap. The instinct of the human rodent, enemy of mankind— eternally hunted and harried— prevailed. With an oath, he flung Jenny aside and jumping on the table, wormed through the trap of the door.

Jenny was alone. She was too stunned to think. There was still a roaring in her ears, shooting lights before her eyes. In a vague way, she knew that some hitch had occurred in the plan. The police were here— yet they had let their prey escape.

She put on her hat, straightened her hair. Very slowly she walked down the stairs. There was no sign of Duncan or of his men.

As she reached the hall, a door opened and a white puffed face looked at her. Had she quickened her pace or shown the least sign of fear she would never have left that place alive. Her very nonchalance proved her salvation as she unbarred the door with the deliberation bred of custom.

The street was deserted, save for an empty taxi which she hailed.

'Where to, miss?' asked the driver.

Involuntarily she glanced back at the drab house, squeezed into its strait-waistcoat of grimed bricks. She had a momentary vision of a white blurred face flattened against the glass. At the sight, realisation swept over her in wave upon wave of sick terror.

There had been no guards. She had taken every step of that perilous journey— alone.

Her very terror sharpened her wits to action. If her eyesight had not deceived her, the killer had already discovered that the alarm was false. It was obvious that he would not run the risk of remaining in his present quarters. But it was possible that he might not anticipate a lightning swoop; there was nothing to connect a raw country girl with a preconcerted alliance with a Force.

'The nearest telephone-office,' she panted. 'Quick.'

A few minutes later, Duncan was electrified by Jenny's voice gasping down the wire.

'He's at 17 Jamaica Square, SE. No time to lose. He'll go out through the roof...Quick, quick.'

'Right. Jenny, where'll you be?'

At your house. I mean, Scot— Quick.'

As the taxi bore Jenny swiftly away from the dun outskirts, a shrivelled hag pattered into the upper room of that drab house. Taking no notice of its raging occupant, she approached the parrot's cage.

'Talk for mother, dearie.'

She held out a bit of dirty sugar. As she whistled, the parrot opened its eyes.

'Perlice.'

It was more than two hours later when Duncan entered his private room at Scotland Yard.

His eyes sought Jenny.

A little wan, but otherwise none the worse for her adventure, she presided over a teapot which had been provided by the resourceful Yates. The Great Dane— unmindful of a little incident of a letter-weight— accepted her biscuits and caresses with deep sighs of protest.

Yates sprang up eagerly.

'Did the cop come off, chief?'

Duncan nodded twice— the second time towards the door, in dismissal.

Jenny looked at him in some alarm when they were alone together. There was little trace left of the machine-made martinet of the Yard. The lines in his face appeared freshly re-tooled and there were dark pouches under his eyes.

'Jenny,' he said slowly, 'I've— sweated— blood.'

'Oh, was he so very difficult to capture? Did he fight?'

'Who? That rat? He ran into our net just as he was about to bolt. He'll lose his footing all right. No.'

'Then why are you—'

'You.'

Jenny threw him a swift glance. She had just been half-murdered after a short course of semi-starvation, but she commanded the situation like a lion tamer.

'Sit down,' she said, 'and don't say one word until you've drunk this.'

He started to gulp obediently and then knocked over his cup.

'Jenny, you don't know the hell I've been through. You don't understand what you ran into. That man—'

'He was a murderer, of course. I knew that all along.'

'But you were in deadliest peril—'

'I wasn't frightened, so it didn't matter. I knew I could trust you.'

'Don't Jenny. Don't turn the knife. I failed you. There was a ghastly blunder.'

'But it was all right, for it ended beautifully. You see, something told me to trust you. I always know.'

During his career, Duncan had known cases of love at first sight. So, although he could not rule them out, he always argued along Jenny's lines.

Those things did not happen to him.

He realised now that it had happened to him— cautious Scot though he was.

'Jenny,' he said, 'it strikes me that I want someone to watch me.'

'I'm quite sure you do. Have I won the reward?'

His rapture was dashed.

'Yes.'

'I'm so glad. I'm rich.'  She smiled happily. 'So this can't be pity for me.'

'Pity? Oh, Jenny—'

Click. The mouse-trap was set for the confirmed bachelor with the right bait.

A young and friendless girl— comely and blossom-sweet.

Cheese.

___________________

2: Waxworks

Pearson’s Magazine, Dec 1930

The Australian Women's Weekly,  25 May 1935

This novelette was later expanded by the author into her novel Wax (1935)

SONIA made her first entry in her notebook:

"Eleven o'clock. The lights are out. The porter has just locked the door. I can hear his footsteps echoing down the corridor. They grow fainter. Now there is silence. I am alone."

She stopped writing to glance at her company. Seen in the light from the street lamp, which streamed in through the high window, the room seemed to be full of people. Their faces were those of men and women of character and intelligence. They stood in groups, as though in conversation, or sat apart, in solitary reverie.

But they neither moved nor spoke. When Sonia had last seen them in the glare of the electric globes, they had been a collection of ordinary waxworks, some of which were the worse for wear. The black velvet which lined the walls of the Gallery was alike tawdry and filmed with dust. The side opposite to the window was built into alcoves, which held highly moral tableaus, depicting contrasting scenes in the career of Vice and Virtue. Sonia had slipped into one of these recesses, just before closing time, in order to hide for her vigil.

It had been a simple affair. The porter had merely rung his bell, and the few courting couples which represented the public had taken his hint and hurried towards the exit.

No one was likely to risk being locked in, for the Waxwork Collection of Oldhampton had lately acquired a sinister reputation. The foundation for this lay in the fate of a stranger to the town—a commercial traveller—who had cut his throat in the Hall of Horrors.

Since then, two persons had, separately, spent the night in the Gallery and, in the morning, each had been found dead.

In both cases the verdict had been "Natural death, due to heart failure."

The first victim—a local alderman had been addicted to alcoholism, and was in very bad shape. The second his great friend—was a delicate little man, a martyr to asthma, and slightly unhinged through unwise absorption in spiritualism.

While the coincidence of the tragedies stirred up a considerable amount of local superstition, the general belief was that both deaths were due to the power of suggestion, in conjunction with macabre surroundings. The victims had let themselves be frightened to death by the Waxworks.

Sonia was there, in the Gallery, to test its truth.

She was the latest addition to the staff of the Oldhampton Gazette. Bubbling with enthusiasm, she made no secret of her literary ambitions, and it was difficult to feed her with enough work. Her colleagues listened to her with mingled amusement and boredom, but they liked her as a refreshing novelty. As for her fine future, they looked to young Wells—the Sporting Editor—to effect her speedy and painless removal from the sphere of journalism.

On Christmas Eve, Sonia took them all into her confidence over her intention to spend a night in the Wax works, on the last night of the old year.

"Copy there," she declared. "I'm not timid and I have fairly sensitive perceptions, so I ought to be able to write up the effect of imagination on the nervous system. I mean to record my impressions, every hour, while they're piping-hot."

Looking up suddenly, she had surprised a green glare in the eyes of Hubert Poke.

When Sonia came to work on the Gazette she had a secret fear of unwelcome amorous attentions, since she was the only woman on the staff. But the first passion she awoke was hatred.

Poke hated her impersonally, as the representative of a force, numerically superior to his own sex, which was on the opposing side in the battle for existence. He feared her, too, because she was the unknown element, and possessed the unfair weapon of charm.

Before she came, he had been the star turn on the Gazette. His own position on the staff gratified his vanity and entirely satisfied his narrow ambition. But Sonia had stolen some of his thunder. On more than one occasion she had written up a story he had failed to cover, and he had to admit that her success was due to a quicker wit.

For some time past he had been playing with the idea of spending a night in the Waxworks, but was deterred by the knowledge that his brain was not sufficiently temperate for the experiment. Lately he had been subject to sudden red rages, when he had felt a thick hot taste in his throat, as though of blood. He knew that his jealousy of Sonia was accountable. It had almost reached the stage of mania, and trembled on the brink of homicidal urge.

While his brain was still creaking with the idea of first-hand experience in the ill-omened Gallery, Sonia had nipped in with her ready-made plan.

Controlling himself with an effort, he listened while the sub-editor issued a warning, to Sonia.

"Bon idea, young woman, but you will find the experience a bit raw. You've no notion how uncanny these big deserted buildings can be."

"That's so," nodded young Wells. "I once spent a night in a haunted house."

Sonia looked at him with her habitual interest. He was short and thick-set, with a three-cornered smile which appealed to her.

"Did you see anything?" she asked.

"No. I cleared out before the show came on. Windy. After a bit, one can imagine anything."

It was then that Poke introduced a new note into the discussion by his own theory of the mystery deaths. Sitting alone in the deserted gallery, Sonia preferred to forget his words. She resolutely drove them from her mind while she began to settle down for the night.

Her first action was to cross to the figure of Cardinal Wolsey and unceremoniously raise his heavy scarlet robe. From under its voluminous folds she drew out her cushion and attaché case, which she had hidden earlier in the evening.

Mindful of the fact that it would grow chilly at dawn, she carried on her arm her thick white tennis coat. Slipping it on, she placed her cushion in the angle of the wall, and sat down to await developments.

The gallery was far more mysterious now that the lights were out. At either end it seemed to stretch away into impenetrable black tunnels. But there was nothing uncanny about it, or about the figures, which were a tame and conventional collection of historical personages. Even the adjoining Hall of Horrors contained no horrors, only a selection of respectable looking poisoners.

Sonia grinned cheerfully at the row of waxworks which were visible in the lamplight from the street.

"So you are the villains of the piece," she murmured. "Later on, if the office is right, you will assume unpleasant mannerisms to try to cheat me into believing you are alive. I warn you, old sports, you'll have your work cut out for you.... And now I think I'll get better acquainted with you. Familiarity breeds contempt."

She went the round of the figures, greeting each with flippancy or criticism. Presently she returned to her corner and opened her notebook ready to record her impressions.

"Twelve o'clock. The first hour has passed almost too quickly. I've drawn a complete blank. Not a blessed thing to record. Not a vestige of reaction. The waxworks seem a commonplace lot, without a scrap of hypnotic force. In fact, they're altogether too matey."

Sonia had left her corner, to write her entry in the light which streamed through the window. Smoking was prohibited in the building, and, lest she should yield to temptation, she had left both her cigarettes and matches behind her, on the office table.

At this stage she regretted the matches. A little extra light would be a boon. It was true she carried an electric torch, but she was saving it, in case of emergency.

It was a loan from young Wells. As they were leaving the office together he spoke to her confidentially.

"Did you notice how Poke glared at you? Don't get up against him. He's a nasty piece of work. He's so mean he'd sell his mother's shroud for old rags. And he's a cruel little devil, too. He turned out his miserable pup to starve in the streets, rather than cough up for the licence."

Sonia grew hot with indignation.

"What he needs to cure his complaint is a strong dose of rat poison," she declared. "What became of the poor little dog?"

"Oh, he's all right. He was a matey chap, and he soon chummed up with a mongrel of his own class."

"You?" asked Sonia, her eyes suddenly soft.

"A mongrel, am I?" grinned Wells. "Well, anyway, the pup will get a better Christmas than his first, when Poke went away and left him on the chain... We're both of us going to overeat and over drink. You're on your own, too. Won't you join us?"

"I'd love to."

ALTHOUGH the evening was warm and muggy the invitation suffused Sonia with the spirit of Christmas. The shade of Dickens seemed to be hovering over the parade of the streets. A red-nosed Santa Claus presided over a spangled Christmas tree outside a toy shop. Windows were hung with tinselled balls and coloured paper festoons. Pedestrians, laden with parcels, called out seasonable greetings.

"Merry Christmas."

Young Wells' three-cornered smile was his tribute to the joyous feeling of festival. His eyes were eager as he turned to Sonia.

"I've an idea. Don't wait until after the holidays to write up the Waxworks. Make it a Christmas stunt and go there to-night."

"I will," declared Sonia.

It was then that he slipped the torch into her hand. "I know you belong to the stronger sex," he said. "But even your nerve might crash. If it does, just flash this torch under the window. Stretch out your arm above your head, and the light will be seen from the street."

"And what will happen then?" asked Sonia.

"I shall knock up the miserable porter and let you out."

"But how will you see the light?"

"I shall be in the street."

"All night?"

"Yes. I sleep there." Young Wells grinned. "Understand," he added loftily, "that this is a matter of principle. I could not let any woman—even one so aged and unattractive as yourself—feel beyond the reach of help."

He cut into her thanks as he turned away with a parting warning.

"Don't use the torch for light, or the juice may give out. It's about due for a new battery."

As Sonia looked at the torch, lying by her side, it seemed a link with young Wells. At this moment he was patrolling the street, a sturdy figure in old tweed overcoat, with his cap pulled down over his eyes. As she tried to pick out his footsteps from among those of the other passersby it struck her that there was plenty of traffic, considering that it was past twelve o'clock.

"The witching hour of midnight is another lost illusion," she reflected.

"Killed by night clubs, I suppose."

It was cheerful to know that so many citizens were abroad, to keep her company. Some optimists were still singing carols. She faintly heard the strains of "Good King Wenceslas." It was in a tranquil frame of mind that she unpacked her sandwiches and thermos.

"IT'S Christmas Day," she thought, as she drank hot coffee. "And I'm spending it with Don and the pup."

At that moment her career grew misty, and the flame of her literary ambition dipped as the future glowed with the warm firelight of home. In sudden elation, she held up her flask and toasted the waxworks.

"Merry Christmas to you all! And many of them."

The faces of the illuminated figures remained stolid, but she could almost swear that a low murmur of acknowledgement seemed to swell from the rest of her company—invisible in the darkness.

She spun out her meal to its limit, stifling her craving for a cigarette. Then, growing bored, she counted the visible waxworks, and tried to memorise them.

"Twenty-one, twenty-two... Wolsey, Queen Elizabeth, Guy Fawkes. Napoleon ought to go on a diet. Ever heard of eighteen days, Nap? Poor old Julius Caesar looks as though he'd been sunbathing on the Lido. He's about due for the melting-pot."

In her eyes they were a second-rate set of dummies. The local theory that they could terrorise a human being to death or madness seemed a fantastic notion.

"No," concluded Sonia. "There's really more in Poke's bright idea."

Again she saw the sun-smitten office—for the big unshielded window faced south—with its blistered paint, faded wallpaper, ink-stained desks, typewriters, telephones, and a huge fire in the untidy grate. Young Wells smoked his big pipe, while the sub-editor—a ginger, pigheaded young man—laid down the law about the mystery deaths.

And then she heard Poke's toneless dead man's voice.

"You may be right about the spiritualist. He died of fright—but not of the waxworks. My belief is that he established contact with the spirit of his dead friend, the alderman, and to learned his real fate."

"What fate?" snapped the sub-editor.

"I believe that the alderman was murdered," replied Poke.

He clung to his point like a limpet in the face of all counter-arguments.

"The alderman had enemies," he said. "Nothing would be easier than for one of them to lie in wait for him. In the present circumstances, I could commit a murder in the Waxworks, and get away with it."

"How?" demanded young Wells.

"How? To begin with, the Gallery is a one-man show and the porter's a bonehead. Anyone could enter and leave the Gallery without his being wise to it."

"And the murder?" plugged young Wells.

With a shudder Sonia remembered how Poke had glanced at his long knotted fingers.

"If I could not achieve my object by fright, which is the foolproof way," he replied, "I should try a little artistic strangulation."

"And leave your marks?"

"Not necessarily. Every expert knows that there are methods which show no trace."

Sonia fumbled in her bag for the cigarettes which were not there.

"Why did I let myself think of that, just now?" she thought. "Really too stupid."

As she reproached herself for her morbidity, she broke off to stare at the door which led to the Hall of Horrors.

When she had last looked at it, she could have sworn that it was tightly closed.... But now it gaped open by an inch.

She looked at the black cavity, recognising the first test on her nerves. Later on, there would be others. She realised the fact that, within her cool, practical self, she carried an hysterical neurotic passenger, who would doubtless give her a lot of trouble through officious suggestions and uncomfortable reminders.

She resolved to give her second self a taste of her quality, and so quell her at the start.

"That door was merely closed," she remarked, as, with a firm step she crossed to the Hall of Horrors and shut the door.

"One o'clock. I begin to realise that there is more in this than I thought. Perhaps I'm missing my sleep. But I'm keyed up and horribly expectant. Of what? I don't know. But I seem to be waiting for—something. I find myself listening—listening. The place is full of mysterious noises. I know they're my fancy.... And things appear to move. I can distinguish footsteps and whispers, as though those waxworks which I cannot see in the darkness are beginning to stir to life."

Sonia dropped her pencil at the sound of a low chuckle. It seemed to come from the end of the Gallery, which was blacked out by shadows.

As her imagination galloped away with her she reproached herself sharply.

"Steady, don't be a fool. There must be a cloak-room here. That chuckle is the air escaping in a pipe—or something. I'm betrayed by my own ignorance of hydraulics."

In spite of her brave words she returned rather quickly to her corner.

WITH her back against the wall she felt less apprehensive. But she recognised her cowardice as an ominous sign.

She was desperately afraid of someone—or something—creeping up behind her and touching her.

"I've struck the bad patch," she told herself. "It will be worse at three o'clock and work up to a climax. But when I make my entry, at three. I shall have reached the peak. After that every minute will be bringing the dawn nearer."

But of one fact she was ignorant. There would be no recorded impression at three o'clock.

Happily unconscious, she began to think of her copy. When she returned to the office—sunken-eyed, and looking like nothing on earth—she would then rejoice over every symptom of groundless fear.

"It's a story all right," she gloated, looking at Hamlet. His gnarled, pallid features and dark, smouldering eyes were strangely familiar to her.

Suddenly she realised that he reminded her of Hubert Poke.

Against her will, her thoughts again turned to him. She told herself that he was exactly like a waxwork. His yellow face—symptomatic of heart-trouble—had the same cheesy hue, and his eyes were like dull black glass. He wore a denture which was too large for him, and which forced his lips apart in a mirthless grin.

He always seemed to smile—even over the episode of the lift—which had been no joke.

It happened two days before. Sonia had rushed into the office in a state of molten excitement, because she had extracted an interview from a personage who had just received the Freedom of the City. This distinguished freeman had the reputation of shunning newspaper publicity, and Poke had tried his luck, only to be sent away with a flea in his ear.

At the back of her mind, Sonia knew that she had not fought level, for she was conscious of the effect of violet-blue eyes and a dimple upon a reserved but very human gentleman. But in her elation she had been rather blatant about her score.

She transcribed her notes, rattling away at her typewriter in a tremendous hurry, because she had a dinner engagement. In the same breathless speed she had rushed towards the automatic lift.

She was just about to step into it when young Wells had leaped the length of the passage and dragged her back.

"Look where you're going," he shouted.

Sonia looked—and saw only the well of the shaft. The lift was not waiting in its accustomed place.

"Out of order," explained Wells before he turned to blast Hubert Poke, who stood by.

"You almighty chump, why didn't you grab Miss Fraser, instead of standing by like a stuck pig?"

At the time Sonia had vaguely remarked how Poke had stammered and sweated, and she accepted the fact that he had been petrified by shock and had lost his head.

FOR the first time she realised that his inaction had been deliberate. She remembered the flame of terrible excitement in his eyes and his stretched ghastly grin.

"He hates me," she thought. "It's my fault. I've been tactless and cocksure."

Then a flood of horror swept over her.

"But he wanted to see me crash. It's almost murder."

As she began to tremble the jumpy passenger she carried reminded her of Poke's remark about the alderman.

"He had enemies."

Sonia shook away the suggestion angrily.

"My memory's uncanny," she thought. "I'm stimulated and all strung up. It must be the atmosphere.... Perhaps there's some gas in the air that accounts for these brain-storms. It's hopeless to be so utterly unscientific. Poke would have made a better job of this."

She was back again to Hubert Poke. He had become an obsession.

Her head began to throb and a tiny gong started to beat in her temples. This time she recognised the signs without any mental ferment.

"Atmospherics. A storm's coming up. It might make things rather thrilling. I must concentrate on my story. Really, my luck's in."

She sat for some time, forcing herself to think of pleasant subjects—of arguments with young Wells and the tennis tournament. But there was always a point when her thoughts gave a twist and led her back to Poke.

Presently she grew cramped and got up to pace the illuminated aisle in front of the window. She tried again to talk to the waxworks, but this time it was not a success.

They seemed to have grown remote and secretive, as though they were removed to another plane, where they possessed a hidden life.

Suddenly she gave a faint scream. Someone—or something—had crept up behind her, for she felt the touch of cold fingers upon her arm.

"Two o'clock. They're only wax. They shall not frighten me. But they're trying to. One by one they're coming to life.:.. Charles the Second no longer looks sour dough. He is beginning to leer at me. His eyes remind me of Hubert Poke."

Sonia stopped writing, to glance uneasily at the image of the Stuart monarch. His black velveteen suit appeared to have a richer pile. The swart curls which fell over his lace collar looked less like horsehair. There really seemed a gleam of amorous interest lurking at the back of his glass optics.

Absurdly, Sonia spoke to him in order to reassure herself.

"Did you touch me? At the first hint of a liberty, Charles Stuart, I'll smack your face. You'll learn a modern journalist has not the manners of an orange girl."

Instantly the satyr reverted to a dummy in a moth-eaten historical costume.

Sonia stood, listening for young Wells' footsteps. But she could not hear them, although the street now was perfectly still. She tried to picture him, propping up the opposite building, solid and immovable as the Rock of Gibraltar.

But it was no good. Doubts began to obtrude.

"I don't believe he's there. After all, why should he stay? He only pretended, just to give me confidence. He's gone."

She shrank back to her corner, drawing her tennis coat closer for warmth. It was growing colder, causing her to think of tempting things—of a hot water bottle and a steaming teapot.

PRESENTLY she realised that she was growing drowsy. Her lids felt as though weighted with lead, so that it required an effort to keep them open.

This was a complication which she had not foreseen. Although she longed to drop off to sleep, she sternly resisted the temptation.

"No. It's not fair. I've set myself the job of recording a night spent in the Waxworks. It must be the genuine thing."

She blinked more vigorously, staring across to where Byron drooped like a sooty flamingo.

"Mercy, how he yearns! He reminds me of—No, I won't think of him... I must keep awake... Bed... blankets, pillows... No."

Her head fell forward, and for a minute she dozed. In that space of time she had a vivid dream.

She thought that she was still in her corner in the Gallery, watching the dead alderman as he paced to and fro, before the window. She had never seen him, so he conformed to her own idea of an alderman—stout, pompous, and wearing the dark-blue, fur-trimmed robe of his office.

"He's got a face like a sleepy pear," she decided. "Nice old thing, but brainless."

And then, suddenly, her tolerant derision turned to acute apprehension on his account, as she saw that he was being followed. A shape was stalking him as a cat stalks a bird.

Sonia tried to warn him of his peril, but, after the fashion of nightmares, she found herself voiceless. Even as she struggled to scream, a grotesquely long arm shot out and monstrous fingers gripped the alderman's throat.

In the same moment she saw the face of the killer. It was Hubert Poke.

SHE awoke with a start, glad to find that it was but a dream. As she looked around her with dazed eyes, she saw a faint flicker of light. The mutter of very faint thunder, together with a patter of rain, told her that the storm had broken.

It was still a long way off. for Oldhampton seemed to be having merely a reflection and an echo.

"It'll clear the air," thought Sonia.

Then her heart gave a violent leap. One of the waxworks had come to life. She distinctly saw it move, before it disappeared into the darkness at the end of the Gallery.

She kept her head, realising that it was time to give up.

"My nerve's crashed," she thought. That figure was only my fancy. I'm just like the others. Defeated by wax."

Instinctively, she paid the figures her homage. It was the cumulative effect of their grim company, with their simulated life and sinister associations, that had rushed her defences.

Although it was bitter to fail, she comforted herself with the reminder that she had enough copy for her article, she could even make capital out of her own capitulation to the force of suggestion.

With a slight grimace she picked up her notebook. There would be no more on-the-spot impressions. But young Wells, if he was still there, would be grateful for the end of his vigil, whatever the state of mind of the porter.

She groped in the darkness for her signal-lamp. But her fingers only scraped bare polished boards.

The torch had disappeared.

In a panic, she dropped down on her knees, and searched for yards around the spot where she was positive it had lain.

It was the instinct of self-preservation which caused her to give up her vain search.

"I'm in danger," she thought. "And I've no one to help me now. I must see this through myself."

She pushed back her hair from a brow which had grown damp.

"There's a brain working against mine. When I was asleep, someone —or something—stole my torch."

Something? The waxworks became instinct with terrible possibility as she stared at them. Some were merely blurred shapes—their faces opaque oblongs or ovals. But others—illuminated from the street—were beginning to reveal themselves in a new guise.

Queen Elizabeth, with peaked chin and fiery hair, seemed to regard her with intelligent malice. The countenance of Napoleon was heavy with brooding power, as though he were willing her to submit. Cardinal Wolsey held her with a glittering eye.

Sonia realised that she was letting herself be hypnotised by creatures of wax—so many pounds of candles moulded to human form.

"This is what happened to those others." she thought. "Nothing happened. But I'm afraid of them. I'm terribly afraid.... There's only one thing to do I must count them again."

She knew that she must find out whether her torch had been stolen through human agency; but she shrank from the experiment, not knowing which she feared more—a tangible enemy or the unknown.

AS she began to count, the chilly air inside the building seemed to throb with each thud of her heart.

"Seventeen, eighteen." She was scarcely conscious of the numerals she murmured. "Twenty-two, twenty-three."

She stopped. Twenty-three? If her tally were correct, there was an extra waxwork in the Gallery.

On the shock or the discovery came a blinding flash of light, which veined the sky with fire. It seemed to run down the figure of Joan of Arc like a flaming torch. By a freak of atmospherics, the storm, which had been a starved, whimpering affair of flicker and murmur, culminated, and ended in what was apparently a thunder-bolt.

The explosion which followed was stunning; but Sonia scarcely noticed it in her terror.

THE unearthly violet glare had revealed to her a figure which she had previously overlooked.

It was seated in a chair, its hand supporting its peaked chin, and its pallid, clean-shaven features nearly hidden by a familiar broad-brimmed felt hat, which—together with the black cape—gave her the clue to its identity.

It was Hubert Poke.

Three o'clock.

Sonia heard it strike, as her memory began to reproduce, with horrible fidelity, every word of Poke's conversation on murder.

"Artistic strangulation." She pictured the cruel agony of life leaking—bubble by bubble, gasp by gasp; it would be slow—for he had boasted of a method which left no tell-tale marks.

"Another death," she thought dully. "If it happens everyone will say that the Waxworks have killed me. What a story.... Only, I shall not write it up."

THE tramp of feet rang out on the pavement below. It might have been the policeman on his beat; but Sonia wanted to feel that young Wells was still faithful to his post.

She looked up at the window, set high in the wall, and, for a moment, was tempted to shout. But the idea was too desperate. If she failed to attract outside attention, she would seal her own fate, for Poke would be prompted to hasten her extinction.

"Awful to feel he's so near, and yet I cannot reach him," she thought. "It makes it so much worse."

She crouched there, starting and sweating at every faint sound in the darkness. The rain, which still pattered on the skylight, mimicked footsteps and whispers. She remembered her dream and the nightmare spring and clutch.

It was an omen. At any moment it would come....

Her fear jolted her brain. For the first time she had a glimmer of hope.

"I didn't see him before the flash, because he looked exactly like one of the waxworks. Could I hide among them, too?" she wondered.

She knew that her white coat alone revealed her position to him. Holding her breath, she wriggled out of it, and hung it on the effigy of Charles II. In her black coat, with her handkerchief-scarf tied over her face, burglar fashion, she hoped that she was invisible against the sable-draped walls.

Her knees shook as she crept from her shelter. When she had stolen a few yards, she stopped to listen.... In the darkness, someone was astir. She heard a soft padding of feet, moving with the certainty of one who sees his goal.

Her coat glimmered in her deserted corner.

In a sudden panic, she increased her pace, straining her ears for other sounds. She had reached the far end of the Gallery, where no gleam from the window penetrated the gloom. Blindfolded and muffled, she groped her way towards the alcoves which held the tableaux.

Suddenly she stopped, every nerve in her body quivering. She had heard a thud, like rubbered soles alighting after a spring.

"He knows now." Swift on the trail of her thought flashed another. "He will look for me. Oh, quick!"

She tried to move, but her muscles were bound, and she stood as though rooted to the spot, listening. It was impossible to locate the footsteps. They seemed to come from every quarter of the Gallery. Sometimes they sounded remote, but, whenever she drew a freer breath, a sudden creak of the boards close to where she stood made her heart leap.

At last she reached the limit of endurance. Unable to bear the suspense of waiting, she moved on.

Her pursuer followed her at a distance. He gained on her, but still withheld his spring. She had the feeling that he held her at the end of an invisible string.

"He's playing with me, like a cat with a mouse," she thought.

If he had seen her, he let her creep forward until the darkness was no longer absolute. There were gradations in its density so that she was able to recognise the first alcove. Straining her eyes, she could distinguish the outlines of the bed where the Virtuous Man made his triumphant exit from life, surrounded by a flock of his sorrowing family and their progeny.

Slipping inside the circle, she added one more mourner to the tableau.

THE minutes passed, but nothing happened. There seemed no sound save the tiny gong beating inside her temples. Even the raindrops had ceased to patter on the skylight.

Sonia began to find the silence more deadly than noise. It was like the lull before the storm. Question after question came rolling into her mind.

"Where is he? What will he do next? Why doesn't he strike a light?"

As though someone were listening-in to her thoughts, she suddenly heard a faint splutter as of an ignited match. Or it might have been the click of an exhausted electric torch.

With her back turned to the room, she could see no light. She heard the half-hour strike, with a faint wonder that she was still alive.

"What will have happened before the next quarter?" she asked.

Presently she began to feel the strain of her pose, which she held as rigidly as any artist's model. For the time— if her presence were not already detected—her life depended on her immobility.

As an overpowering weariness began to steal over her, a whisper stirred in her brain:

"The alderman was found dead on a bed."

The newspaper account had not specified which especial tableau had been the scene of the tragedy, but she could not remember another alcove which held a bed. As she stared at the white dimness of the quilt she seemed to see it blotched with a dark, sprawling form, writhing under the grip of long fingers.

To shut out the suggestion of her fancy, she closed her eyes. The cold, dead air in the alcove was sapping her exhausted vitality, so that once again she began to nod. She dozed as she stood, rocking to and fro on her feet.

Her surroundings grew shadowy. Sometimes she knew that she was in the alcove, but at others she strayed momentarily over strange borders.... She was back in the summer, walking in a garden with young Wells. Roses and sunshine....

She awoke with a start at the sound of heavy breathing. It sounded close to her—almost by her side. The figure of a mourner kneeling by the bed seemed to change its posture slightly.

Instantly maddened thoughts began to flock and flutter wildly inside her brain.

"Who was it? Was it Hubert Poke? Would history be repeated? Was she doomed also to be strangled inside the alcove? Had Fate led her there?"

She waited, but nothing happened. Again she had the sensation of being played with by a master-mind&mdash:dangled at the end of his invisible string.

Presently she was emboldened to steal from the alcove, to seek another shelter. But though she held on to the last flicker of her will, she had reached the limit of endurance. Worn out with the violence of her emotions and physically spent from the strain of long periods of standing, she staggered as she walked.

She blundered round the gallery, without any sense of direction, colliding blindly with the groups of wax-work figures. When she reached the window her knees shook under her and she sank to the ground—dropping immediately into a sleep of utter exhaustion.

SHE awoke with a start as the first grey gleam of dawn was stealing into the Gallery. It fell on the row of waxworks, imparting a sickly hue to their features, as though they were creatures stricken with plague.

It seemed to Sonia that they were waiting for her to wake. Their peeked faces were intelligent and their eyes held interest, as though they were keeping some secret.

She pushed back her hair, her brain still thick with clouded memories. Disconnected thoughts began to stir, to slide about.... Then suddenly her mind cleared, and she sprang up—staring at a figure wearing a familiar black cape.

Hubert Poke was also waiting for her to wake.

He sat in the same chair, and in the same posture, as when she had first seen him, in the flash of lightning. He looked as though he had never moved from his place—as though he could not move. His face had not the appearance of flesh.

As Sonia stared at him, with the feeling of a bird hypnotised by a snake, a doubt began to gather in her mind. Growing bolder, she crept closer to the figure.

It was a waxwork—libellous representation of the actor—Kean.

Her laugh rang joyously through the Gallery as she realised that she had passed a night of baseless terrors, cheated by the power of imagination. In her relief she turned impulsively to the waxworks.

"My congratulations," she said. "You are my masters."

They did not seem entirely satisfied by her homage, for they continued to watch her with an expression half benevolent and half sinister.

"Wait!" they seemed to say.

Sonia turned from them and opened her bag to get out her mirror and comb. There, among a jumble of notes, letters, lipsticks and powder compresses, she saw the electric torch.

"Of course!" she cried. "I remember now, I put it there. I was too windy to think properly.... Well, I have my story. I'd better get my coat."

The Gallery seemed smaller in the returning light. As she approached Charles Stuart, who looked like an umpire in his white coat, she glanced down the far end of the room, where she had groped in its shadows before the pursuit of imaginary footsteps.

A waxwork was lying prone on the floor. For the second time she stood and gazed down upon a familiar black cape—a broad-brimmed conspirator's hat. Then she nerved herself to turn the figure so that its face was visible.

She gave a scream. There was no mistaking the glazed eyes and ghastly grin. She was looking down on the face of a dead man.

It was Hubert Poke.

THE shock was too much for Sonia. She heard a singing in her ears, while a black mist gathered before her eyes. For the first time, in her life she fainted.

When she recovered consciousness she forced herself to kneel beside the body and cover it with its black cape. The pallid face resembled a death-mask, which revealed only too plainly the lines of egotism and cruelty in which it had been moulded by a gross spirit.

Yet Sonia felt no repulsion—only pity. It was Christmas morning, and he was dead, while her own portion was life triumphant. Closing her eyes, she whispered a prayer of supplication for his warped soul.

Presently, as she grew calmer, her mind began to work on the problem of his presence. His motive seemed obvious. Not knowing that she had changed her plan, he had concealed himself in the Gallery, in order to poach her story.

"He was in the Hall of Horrors at first," she thought, remembering the opened door. "When he came out he hid at this end. We never saw each other, because of the waxworks between us; but we heard each other."

She realised that the sounds which had terrified her had not all been due to imagination, while it was her agency which had converted the room into a whispering gallery of strange murmurs and voices. The clue to the cause of death was revealed by his wrist-watch, which had smashed when he fell. Its hands had stopped at three minutes to three, proving that the flash and explosion of the thunderbolt had been too much for his diseased heart— already overstrained by superstitious fears.

SONIA shuddered at a mental vision of his face, distraught with terror and pulped by raw primal impulses, after a night spent in a madman's world of phantasy.

She turned to look at the waxworks. At last she understood what they seemed to say:

"But for us, you would have met— at dawn."

"Your share shall be acknowledged, I promise you," she said, as she opened her notebook.

"Eight o'clock. The Christmas bells are ringing and it is wonderful just to be alive. I'm through the night, and none the worse for the experience, although I cracked badly after three o'clock. A colleague who, unknown to me, was also concealed in the Gallery has met with a tragic fate, caused, I am sure, by the force of suggestion. Although his death is due to heart-failure, the superstitious will certainly claim it is another victory for the Waxworks."

___________________

3: The Scarecrow

Pearsons, Nov 1928

Anthology: Serpents in Eden, 2016

"THIS IS death!" thought Kay.

It had come so suddenly that she felt no fear. The first pang of horror had not yet stirred within her brain. She was numb with sheer surprise.

A moment ago, she had been laughing into the eyes of a man whom she believed to be her friend. They were dull eyes, dark in colour.

Suddenly, they had grown dense as mud, and then burst into a green flame. Even as she stared, hypnotised by the change, his fingers shot out and gripped her throat.

The supper-room was of discreet arrangement. Other couples were whispering on the other side of the screen. The orchestra jerked out jazz in a deafening blare.

Kay had one moment of stark realisation. Rescue seemed hopeless. The fingers around her neck were clamped like an iron vice. Already everything was beginning to swim.

"The end!" she thought.

Then it grew dark.

THAT WAS OVER three years ago. Today, Kay was, apparently, not a penny the worse for her experience. She carried no scar on her throat, and only the least bruise on her nerves.

A waiter— who had miraculously chanced to glance round the screen— had been her salvation. Afterwards, she had a conversation with the head doctor of the mental hospital where Waring was confined.

"It was such a shock," she said, "when he suddenly turned on me, because I always thought he liked me— quite."

"May I ask the exact nature of your relations?" inquired the doctor.

"He'd asked me to marry him," answered Kay frankly, "and I had refused him. But we went on being friends. I had not the slightest idea that he harboured any grudge."

Dr. Perry smiled down at her, for he liked her type; a healthy bobbed-haired girl with resolute brown eyes.

"I hope you will try to forget all this bad business," he said. "Remember, you've now nothing to fear."

And now, for the first time in three years, Kay was afraid.

It was all William's fault.

William was the man to whom she was engaged. He was a doctor in the nearest town, and he rang her up whenever he had a chance. The wire was their blessed line of communication, and Kay rushed to the telephone the instant she heard the preliminary tinkle.

She was about to broadcast a kiss, when she was arrested by his words.

"Look here, Kay. I've news. But—don't be alarmed! There's nothing in the world to be frightened about."

And then, of course, she began to feel afraid.

"What's the matter?" she asked.

"Well— Waring's escaped."

Involuntarily, Kay glanced out of the window. In front of her was an expanse of bare fields, with low hedges, running to meet the white skyline. It looked windswept and very empty.

She laughed, to show William Tree that she was not afraid.

"Well, if he comes here, I shall be in the soup."

William hastened to reassure her.

"I'll be over with you as soon as my old stinkpot will bring me. Don't worry about Waring! I'll fix everything all right."

Smiling, Kay hung up the receiver. It was a definite comfort to know that she would soon be seeing William. As he resembled an ardent pugilist rather than a soothing young physician, the mere sight of him would be bracing.

She lit a cigarette and sat down to think. But her thoughts were curded with memories of the old hectic life, when she had been an art student at Chelsea, and the harmless flirtations, which had culminated in the tragedy of Waring.

Again she saw the tawdry restaurant revolving around her in mad circles of light and colour, as the fingers tightened round her throat.

She shuddered. It was unpleasant to reflect that, at this moment, Waring was in her neighbourhood— hiding behind outhouse or hayrick— picking up her trail. He might be twenty miles away—or he might be near.

Unpleasant, too, to dwell on her isolation. She and her mother were alone on the chicken-farm, for they could afford no outside labour. And her mother— called by maternal request 'Milly'— was, at this juncture, hopeless.

In other respects, however, she was the mainstay of their speculation, for, while Kay did the rough land-work, she tended the incubators, with excellent results. The worst thing about her was her appearance; a featherweight of a woman with hollow rouged cheeks, she looked ridiculous in the trousers which were her idea of a smart country outfit.

Kay shook her head in decision.

"Milly musn't know."

She walked to the window and looked out over the checkerboard of fields. The nearest bungalow was more than a quarter of a mile away. She could see the telegraph wires which bordered the main road, and also her own solitary line, shaking in the wind.

But, with the bareness, came a sense of security. She was grateful for the absence of undergrowth with its sinister suggestion of concealment.

Suddenly, as her eyes wandered on, her heart gave a sharp double-knock and then seemed to stop.

Standing amid the young trees of the cherry orchard, was a man.

THE NEXT MOMENT she burst into a peal of laughter.

Her man was a scarecrow.

She had made him the preceding evening—shamelessly neglecting her chores and her proper share of work, in the thrill of a new job. Her artistic training had assisted in his manufacture, so that he was a padded masterpiece of reality.

To help the illusion, the scarecrow was not dressed in the usual rags. In the absence of these— and reflecting that weather could not spoil it, during the short time that the cherries were ripening—Kay had clothed her dummy in a weatherproof left behind him at the bungalow by her brother, who was on a ship.

Its collar was turned up to meet nearly the broad-brimmed slouch hat. Big boots, with padded leggings and stuffed gloves completed the outfit.

IT WAS ALMOST dark when her task was completed. This was the first time she had seen the scarecrow by daylight.

It had given her a distinct shock. Her nerves were still quivering, as she stood gazing out of the window. The scarecrow was so grotesquely lifelike. In the distance, he seemed to assume a real personality. His movements appeared to be independent of the wind. As she watched it, she almost expected to see it walk from the orchard.

She began to grow nervous.

"I'm sure I never made that," she murmured. "It looks alive."

There was no time for idling, for she had yet to visit the egg-house. But, even as she took out the key, she knew that work was impossible, unless she first satisfied herself about the scarecrow.

She was surprised at her own distaste. As she swung open the gate leading into the orchard, she recoiled instinctively at the sight of the figure lurking amid the dwarf trees.

It seemed to be waiting for her. At any moment—she expected it to spring.

"Absurd!" she said aloud.

Screwing up her will-power, she ran towards it, like a young war-charger. And, as she came nearer, it lost its lifelike outlines, and became—quite definitely—a stuffed dummy.

"Thank Heaven!"

In that half-sob of relief, Kay learnt the measure of her fear.

Then, at the sound of a familiar hoot from the lane, she dropped the key of the egg-house on the grass, and rushed back to the bungalow. She reached it, just as the dilapidated car chugged to the door.

Although not given to demonstration, they hugged each other.

"I'm still here," laughed Kay, releasing herself. "You'll never get rid of me, and you'd better give up hoping."

Then Milly appeared, and before Kay could warn him, William had blurted out the situation.

"You've both of you got to clear out this instant, and come back with me into the town," he commanded. "It's only a question of hours. Dr. Perry and his staff are out, combing the district."

Kay— a big bonny girl in breeches though she appeared— was ready enough to go. The opposition came from an unexpected quarter— the fragile Milly.

"The idea!" she exclaimed. "Do you expect me to leave my chicks and incubators, at this critical stage? It's monstrous."

William and Kay beat themselves, in vain, against the wall of her resolution. She refused to hear argument.

"All I know is," she declared, "that every penny I possess is wrapped up in this farm. And as for Waring, I'm not frightened of him. I always found him most quiet and unassuming. In fact, quite impossible. Besides, I had some experience in that Chelsea riot of Kay's."

As William groaned, Kay's face suddenly lit up.

"Milly's right," she asserted. "We're safer here. To begin with, we don't know that he will want to attack me again. And if he does, how can he possibly find us here?"

William smoked in silence for a time.

"That's true," he said presently. "Presuming it is a case of l'idée fixe, he can't know where you are. The only way he can find out is through me."

"You?" cried Kay.

"Yes. He connects us. He was jealous of me before he went off his rocker. He'll probably make a bee-line for Chelsea. Do the people at your old studio know your address?"

Kay shook her head.

"There have been relays of tenants since then. The tide has long ago washed away all traces of poor undistinguished me."

"Good. Well, he'll do a bit of lurking there— and then he'll stalk me."

Kay promptly clapped his cap upon his head.

"Then back you go, my lad, before you give the show away."

Even as she spoke, a shadow chased away her smile.

"You don't think he's already followed you here?" she asked.

"Not he," said William. "He's not had time to get back from his Chelsea lurk. I believe if I do a bit of lurking myself, he'll step into my trap, and then you'll be safe again."

KAY HELD his arm rather tightly as they walked towards his car; and William's kiss, too, was lingering— and his voice slightly husky.

"Bless you and keep you safe! I— I don't like the idea of leaving you two women alone, without a man."

Kay began to laugh.

"But we have got a protector. One of the best. He scared me, and he'd scare off anyone."

Still laughing, she ran him round to the orchard-gate, and pointed to the scarecrow.

"Look! There's our man."

TOWARDS EVENING, the wind rose yet higher, driving before it sheets of torrential rain. In spite of her common sense, Kay dreaded the hours of darkness. Their ugly matchbox bungalow seemed no protection against the perils of the night. She heard footsteps in every gust of wind— voices in every howl. Sleep was out of the question, and she made no attempt to go to bed.

"If I have to die, I'll die in my boots," she resolved.

Rather to her surprise, the valiant Milly shared her vigil, although she asserted that her anxiety was on the score of the roofs of the chicken houses. Together, the two women sat in the lamplit sitting-room, listening to the rattle of corrugated iron, the slash of the rain against the windows, and the shrieking of the wind.

And, as Kay waited, those tense moments of ordeal at the Chelsea restaurant took deferred payment of her nerves. The menace of Waring overshadowed his reality. He seemed always to be just the other side of the wall, outside the window, outside the door; watching, waiting, listening—gloating over her distress.

As the hours passed slowly and the uproar increased, she felt that she would almost welcome his actual presence—as something she could get at grips with—rather than this long drawn-out torture of suspense.

Presently, a sigh from Milly distracted her attention, and she saw that her mother had fallen asleep—one rouged cheek pressed against the tablecloth.

She stirred the fire, and, having glanced at the clock, nerved herself to unbolt the window.

To her relief, the night was over. Vivid white gashes striped the torn sky.

"The dawn!" she cried joyfully.

She thought vaguely of making fresh tea; but—overpowered with sudden weariness— she sank into the nearest chair and dropped into a deep sleep.

Dr. William Tree also spent a bad night. On his homeward way, his ancient boneshaker struck permanently, so that he had to accept a tow back to the town.

His first action had been to ring up the sanatorium. Dr. Perry, who was obviously distraught with worry, had no news beyond the fact that it was believed that Waring had been recognised on the London express.

"Chelsea," murmured William.

He went to bed feeling annoyed and worried, and lay listening to the buffets of the wind. Several times, he thought that someone was making a forcible entry through his window; and it struck him that his own jerry-built villa, on the fringe of the town, must be a fortress in comparison with the lonely bungalow, exposed to the full fury of the storm.

About seven o'clock, he felt he could ring up Kay, without shortening her sleep, and he dashed to the telephone.

After waiting impatiently for several minutes, the operator spoke down the wire.

"Sorry, but the line's out of order."

William's heart grew leaden with apprehension.

"Why?" he snapped. "What's wrong?"

"It's the gale," explained the operator. "There are lines down all over the country."

William accepted the explanation, but he did not like it.

His young practice was still in the flopping stage and his case-book was awkwardly spaced. It would be impossible to get out to the bungalow until the late afternoon; but he decided to express a letter which would reach Kay that morning, to cheer her with news of his intended visit.

He dashed off his note, meaning to cycle with it to the post office, before breakfast. Just as he was on the point of leaving the surgery, however, his ears caught the exaggerated sound of laurel-bushes scraping against the thin outside wall of the villa.

In a flash, he concealed himself behind the door and waited.

The lower sash of the open window was lifted still higher, and a man slipped into the room. William had a vision of a furtive figure and an unshaven blur of face, as the intruder tiptoed to the mantelshelf and pounced on the letter addressed to Kay.

It made William sick to listen to his exultant pants and chuckles, as he gloated over his prize. He felt his own muscle, and thanked his Maker for endowing him with supernormal strength.

TEN MINUTES LATER, Dr. Perry was listening to his breathless but triumphant message.

"Dr. Tree speaking. I'm holding your man here. How soon can you lift him?"

"Immediately," was the prompt answer. "I can just catch the express. That'll be quicker than car, and bring me in at nine-thirty. Hold him, whatever you do. He's cunning and slippery as an eel."

William rang off, and then called up a colleague to take his morning round. Deciding to postpone his meal, since it was doubtful whether the brain-specialist had yet breakfasted, he sank into a chair, to wait, in lethargic relief, after his strain.

Presently, he glanced at the clock. It was twenty minutes past nine. His responsibility was nearly over. He decided to walk to the gate, in five minutes' time, in order to greet Dr. Perry.

He drew a deep breath at the thought. Heaven alone knew what it would mean for his peace of mind, when he knew that Waring was safe back in the sanatorium.

He looked up, with a start of surprise, as his housekeeper opened the door and Dr. Perry hurried into the dining-room.

"Got him safe?" he asked.

"Boxed and barred."

"Good."

The specialist wiped his brow and accepted a cup of coffee.

"A couple of my men are coming along directly," he explained. "I hadn't time to wait for them. The instant I got your message I dropped everything and came. He'll take some shifting."

"He's a bit of a man-eater," admitted William. "I'm very sorry I didn't meet you, Doctor. I fully intended to."

As he spoke, he glanced at the clock. It was still twenty minutes past nine.

"Hullo!" he exclaimed. "Clock's stopped. What time d'you make it?"

The specialist glanced at his watch.

"Twenty to ten. A clock that stops just about the right time could be a source of real mischief," he added thoughtfully.

"Quite," agreed William. "Was your train late?"

"I didn't catch the express, after all. Lost it by a minute. I came by car, but I stepped on the gas."

He stopped to watch the rain which was pelting against the window. It reminded him of something.

"By the way," he said, "when the rain came on, I couldn't stop to put up the hood. And, as I didn't want the seats to get soaked standing outside, I took the liberty of running the car into your garage."

William's face turned grey.

"The garage?" He spoke with an effort. "But— it was locked."

"Not locked. A bar across the staples."

"I know."

William leapt to his feet.

"Hurry, man!" he cried. "You've let Waring out!"

As he dashed through the door, his eye fell upon the clock, and he reflected bitterly, that had he been waiting at the gate, as had been his intention, the tragedy would have been averted.

For a stopped clock— the most harmless object in its futility— can, on occasion, become potent with the powers of life and death.

WHEN THE TWO MEN reached the shed— which served for garage— the double doors were wide open and the car had gone.

They stared at each other, in stunned horror.

"Didn't you see him when you ran your car in?" asked William.

"No. It was dark and he was possibly hiding behind the door. Why—in Heaven's name— didn't you lock the door?"

"Key was lost, and I hadn't bothered about it, because no one would want my old stinkpot. And the garage seemed the safest place for Waring, as it was without windows. I'd warned my housekeeper and the surgery-boy—and there was no one else."

"But why didn't you truss him up?"

William shrugged wearily.

"What with? I keep bandages in my surgery, not rope. We had the devil of a dust-up. By sheer luck, I knocked him out, and when he was groggy, managed to drag him to the garage."

"But— later?"

"Later? I was all in. Think I'd risk a second fight in the garage, and probably get knocked out myself? I thought I'd wait for you and your men to tackle him. The chances were a thousand to one against anyone letting him out, and he'd be there now, but for that infernal clock."

Dr. Perry shrugged his shoulders impatiently.

"Well, there's no time to waste. We can trace him through the car. That is, if he's not too cunning to dump her, once he's got clear away."

SUDDENLY, William's mind recovered from its shock. He had a ghastly recollection of his letter to Kay shaking in the fever of Waring's clutch.

"My God!" he cried. "He's gone after the girl!"

It taxed Dr. Perry's specialised training to calm his frenzy, and restrain him from riding off on his old push-bicycle, in pursuit. He was still shaken by his brain-storm, when the car—hired, by telephone, from the nearest garage—splashed over the muddy road, on its way to the bungalow.

The sky was blotched with heavy clouds, which travelled over the heavens and burst in local storms, like slanting black wires. Sometimes, a white gleam of light would pass, like a searchlight, over the fields. The scene was unearthly and foreboding as a bad dream.

William sat in dumb agony, wrenching his thoughts from the fear that they might be too late. Yet he was stung by the irony of the rescue. They two were responsible for the situation. They had unloosened a ravening Waring upon a defenceless Kay. One had supplied her address and the other had given him liberty and a car.

At last, they reached the bungalow, set amid its cropping chicken-coops and pens.

William rose up in his seat and then gave a shout of joy.

"They're safe! Hullo!"

He pointed to a rising slope, where two figures were outlined against a livid sky; one, in trousers and incongruous dangling green earrings—the other in short wine-red skirt and sweater, facing the wind with the vigour and radiance of youth.

Dr. Perry gave them but one glance.

He, too, had risen in his seat and his keen eye had espied a far-off object in a tributary lane.

"The car. Ditched. Look out, Tree! He must be somewhere near."

"If he is, we'll soon have him out," responded William cheerfully, leaping from the car.

"What's that?" asked Dr. Perry sharply, as they passed through the gate.

William laughed.

"Took you in, too? That's Kay's scarecrow."

"A mighty realistic one." Dr. Perry gave it a longer look. "Come, there's not much cover here."

It was the work of a few minutes to search the chicken-houses, although William stopped in the middle, to greet Kay and her mother and to explain the situation.

Fortified by daylight and the presence of two men, both remained calm.

"He might have slipped into the bungalow, while we were out," said Kay. "It's plain he's nowhere here. Come and look!"

Dr. Perry, however, lingered. His eye swept over field and low hedge. There was no ditch or furrow, and hardly cover for a fox.

Then his glance was once again caught and arrested by the scarecrow.

He touched William's arm and spoke in a low voice.

"I'd like a closer inspection of that gentleman."

The two men advanced warily: but, as they drew nearer the scarecrow, the illusion of humanity faded.

Dr. Perry laughed.

"A fine take-in," he confessed. "Your young friend has some idea of anatomy. Studied art, you say? Well, now for the bungalow."

The scarecrow hung mute and lifeless. It had played its part in the grim conspiracy. It had held the eye and distracted the attention of those who might have made a closer search.

Directly the voices had faded behind the closed doors of the bungalow, there was a stir, followed by a disruption, in a large pile of leaves, rotting into mould.

From under the heap, emerged an earth-stained figure, which writhed its way swiftly over the grass, to its ally— the scarecrow.

A MINUTE LATER, the scarecrow hung again on its supporting poles. The collar of its weatherproof met the brim of its hat; its hands and legs looked no more lifelike than the padded gloves and breeches, which were buried with the rest of the straw, under the leaf-mould.

There was only one difference. A button— wrenched off, in the mad haste— was missing from the middle of the coat.

But the scarecrow was content. It had only to wait. It must not stir a muscle, lest someone should be watching from the bungalow. Its two enemies were there. And to hang from the pole, like a bat, was easy, for while the body was slack, the mind could wander.

The scarecrow knew that she was here. It had heard her voice as it lay under the pile of leaf-mould. But there was another voice beside, and he wanted her—alone.

It knew it had but to wait, and she would come. On the ground, beside it, lay a key. She was always dropping keys. Once, she had dropped the key of her flat in the scarecrow's studio, and, because it had grasped the obvious implication, she had made a terrible scene.

She would fool men no more. The scarecrow was waiting for her to come. Two minutes would suffice— and then, its enemies might come.

They would find nothing left of any use to them.

INSIDE THE bungalow, voices were raised in discussion and laughter. Only Dr. Perry chafed at the delay, for he was anxious to pick up the trail. Milly— who had donned femininity with high-heeled French shoes and a long red cigarette-holder— tried to charm him in vain.

"Waring can't be far off," he asserted. "You and I'd better move on, Tree."

William shook his head.

"If he's lurking around, I'm not going to leave Kay."

"Oh, I feel quite safe now." Kay laughed happily. "But I'll own up, I simply can't face another night."

"You shan't," declared William. "If he's not caught by then, I'll sleep in the sitting-room. But it will be safer to catch him. Perhaps, I'd better look around for about half an hour."

Dr. Perry clinched his decision.

"Wisest course, Tree. We're bound to get him if we're systematic. I'll follow the road in the car, while you beat the fields."

"In this rain, and without a coat?" protested Kay indig-
nantly.

Then her face cleared.

"I have it. The scarecrow is wearing Roly's old Burberry. You'd better have that."

"Righto. That's a clinking dummy of yours, Kay."

She gurgled.

"I loved making it. And I feel a worm to strip it, when it protected us so nobly through that horrible night."

William walked to the door, but turned, on the threshold, at Kay's voice.

"I just want to see you, one minute, in the kitchen."

He knew what she meant. He had not kissed her yet. With a sheepish beam on his face, he hastened to follow her into the adjoining room.

Fate must be blind, for how otherwise, could she deliberately fight against the helpless? Even while the lovers lingered— Kay's cheek pressed against William's tweed shoulder— the wind shook the last drop from the inky cloud.

William— self-conscious but aloof— appeared from the kitchen, in obedience to Dr. Perry's hail.

"Sorry to keep you waiting. Kay wanted something nailed up. Hullo! It's stopped raining. Good egg! I won't bother about that coat now, Kay. Sooner we're off the better."

Milly kissed her hand to the men, and then called to Kay.

"When you've seen them off, just take these eggs to the egg-house, angel."

"All right."

Kay picked up the basket and then turned to the empty nail on the wall.

"Now, what have I done with that blessed key?" she cried, "I know I had it yesterday."

"Always losing keys," laughed William.

"Think back," advised Milly.

Kay proceeded to think back, to Dr. Perry's ill-concealed annoyance. But, suddenly, she gave a cry of triumph.

"I know. I was just going to date those eggs, yesterday, when I heard William's stinkpot. I must have left it in the orchard."

She walked with the men to the orchard, and the scarecrow heard her voice. At the sound of her laughter, it tensed its muscles. The waiting was nearly over.

HER HAND ON the gate, she turned to wave farewell to the two men. She felt happy in William's presence, and in the warm glow of her relief. The night held no more terrors for her. William would be there. Even the sun was going to shine for her.

Her joy was visible in the radiance of her smile. The brightening light bronzed her brown hair. William thought he had never seen a sweeter picture.

"Do look at my scarecrow," she said with a chuckle. "It's waiting to make love to me. Wouldn't you like to touch it and see if it's alive?"

Both men laughed as they shook their heads.

"You don't get us twice," said William. "We've been had, both of us."

"I'm not surprised," said Kay. "He scared me, and I made him. Good-bye— and don't be long!"

The men turned away and she opened the orchard gate, just as the sun broke through the cloud.

It travelled over the field and fell upon the scarecrow. As it did so, a spark of fire glinted from the gap in its coat, where the button was missing.

Kay only noticed her key. She was running towards it, when she felt William's hand upon her arm.

"Come back!" His voice was low and tense. "Perry, make ready! That scarecrow's wearing a watch-chain."

___________________

4: An Unlocked Window

Pearson’s Magazine, March 1926

Filmed for an episode of the  "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" TV show

“HAVE YOU locked up, Nurse Cherry?”

“Yes, Nurse Silver.”

“Every door? Every window?”

“Yes, yes.”

Yet even as she shot home the last bolt of the front door, at the back of Nurse Cherry’s mind was a vague misgiving.

She had forgotten— something.

She was young and pretty, but her expression was anxious. While she had most of the qualities to ensure professional success, she was always on guard against a serious handicap.

She had a bad memory.

Hitherto, it had betrayed her only in burnt Benger and an occasional overflow in the bathroom. But yesterday’s lapse was little short of a calamity.

Late that afternoon she had discovered the oxygen-cylinder, which she had been last to use, empty— its cap carelessly unscrewed.

The disaster called for immediate remedy, for the patient, Professor Glendower Baker, was suffering from the effects of gas-poisoning. Although dark was falling, the man, Iles, had to harness the pony for the long drive over the mountains, in order to get a fresh supply.

Nurse Cherry had sped his parting with a feeling of loss. Iles was a cheery soul and a tower of strength.

It was dirty weather with a spitting rain blanketing the elephant-grey mounds of the surrounding hills. The valley road wound like a muddy coil between soaked bracken and dwarf oaks.

Iles shook his head as he regarded the savage isolation of the landscape.

“I don’t half like leaving you— a pack of women— with him about. Put up the shutters on every door and window, Nurse, and don’t let no one come in till I get back.”

He drove off—his lamps glow-worms in the gloom.

Darkness and rain. And the sodden undergrowth seemed to quiver and blur, so that stunted trees took on the shapes of crouching men advancing towards the house.

Nurse Cherry hurried through her round of fastening the windows. As she carried her candle from room to room of the upper floors, she had the uneasy feeling that she was visible to any watcher.

Her mind kept wandering back to the bad business of the forgotten cylinder. It had plunged her in depths of self-distrust and shame. She was overtired, having nursed the patient single-handed, until the arrival, three days ago, of the second nurse. But that fact did not absolve her from blame.

“I’m not fit to be a nurse,” she told herself in bitter self-reproach.

She was still in a dream when she locked the front door. Nurse Silver’s questions brought her back to earth with a furtive sense of guilt.

Nurse Silver’s appearance inspired confidence, for she was of solid build, with strong features and a black shingle. Yet, for all her stout looks, her nature seemed that of Job.

“Has he gone?” she asked in her harsh voice.

“Iles? Yes.”

Nurse Cherry repeated his caution.

“He’ll get back as soon as he can,” she added, “but it probably won’t be until dawn.”

“Then,” said Nurse Silver gloomily, “we are alone.”

Nurse Cherry laughed.

“Alone? Three hefty women, all of us able to give a good account of ourselves.”

“I’m not afraid.” Nurse Silver gave her rather a peculiar look. “I’m safe enough.”

“Why?”

“Because of you. He won’t touch me with you here.”

Nurse Cherry tried to belittle her own attractive appearance with a laugh.

“For that matter,” she said, “we are all safe.”

“Do you think so? A lonely house. No man. And two of us.”

Nurse Cherry glanced at her starched nurse’s apron. Nurse Silver’s words made her feel like special bait— a goat tethered in a jungle, to attract a tiger.

“Don’t talk nonsense,” she said sharply.

The countryside, of late, had been chilled by a series of murders. In each case, the victim had been a trained nurse. The police were searching for a medical student— Sylvester Leek. It was supposed that his mind had become unhinged, consequent on being jilted by a pretty probationer. He had disappeared from the hospital after a violent breakdown during an operation.

Next morning, a night-nurse had been discovered in the laundry— strangled. Four days later, a second nurse had been horribly done to death in the garden of a villa on the outskirts of the small agricultural town. After the lapse of a fortnight, one of the nurses in attendance on Sir Thomas Jones had been discovered in her bedroom— throttled.

The last murder had taken place in a large mansion in the very heart of the country. Every isolated cottage and farm became infected with panic. Women barred their doors and no girl lingered late in the lane, without her lover.

Nurse Cherry wished she could forget the details she had read in the newspapers. The ingenuity with which the poor victims had been lured to their doom and the ferocity of the attacks all proved a diseased brain driven by malignant motive.

It was a disquieting thought that she and Nurse Silver were localized. Professor Baker had succumbed to gas-poisoning while engaged in work of national importance and his illness had been reported in the Press.

“In any case,” she argued, “how could— he— know that we’re left tonight?”

Nurse Silver shook her head.

“They always know.”

“Rubbish! And he’s probably committed suicide by now. There hasn’t been a murder for over a month.”

“Exactly. There’s bound to be another, soon.”

Nurse Cherry thought of the undergrowth creeping nearer to the house. Her nerve snapped.

“Are you trying to make me afraid?”

“Yes,” said Nurse Silver, “I am. I don’t trust you. You forget.”

Nurse Cherry coloured angrily.

“You might let me forget that wretched cylinder.”

“But you might forget again.”

“Not likely.”

As she uttered the words— like oil spreading over water— her mind was smeared with doubt.

Something forgotten.

She shivered as she looked up the well of the circular staircase, which was dimly lit by an oil-lamp suspended to a cross-bar. Shadows rode the walls and wiped out the ceiling like a flock of sooty bats.

An eerie place. Hiding-holes on every landing.

The house was tall and narrow, with two or three rooms on every floor. It was rather like a tower or a pepper-pot. The semi-basement was occupied by the kitchen and domestic offices. On the ground-floor were a sitting-room, the dining-room and the Professor’s study. The first floor was devoted to the patient. On the second floor were the bedrooms of the nurses and of the Iles couple. The upper floors were given up to the Professor’s laboratorial work.

Nurse Cherry remembered the stout shutters and the secure hasps. There had been satisfaction in turning the house into a fortress. But now, instead of a sense of security, she had a feeling of being caged.

She moved to the staircase.

“While we’re bickering,” she said, “we’re neglecting the patient.”

Nurse Silver called her back.

“I’m on duty now.”

Professional etiquette forbade any protest. But Nurse Cherry looked after her colleague with sharp envy.

She thought of the Professor’s fine brow, his wasted clear-cut features and visionary slate-grey eyes, with yearning. For after three years of nursing children, with an occasional mother or aunt, romance had entered her life.

From the first, she had been interested in her patient. She had scarcely eaten or slept until the crisis had passed. She noticed too, how his eyes followed her around the room and how he could hardly bear her out of his sight.

Yesterday he had held her hand in his thin fingers.

“Marry me, Stella,” he whispered.

“Not unless you get well,” she answered foolishly.

Since then, he had called her “Stella.” Her name was music in her ears until her rapture was dashed by the fatal episode of the cylinder. She had to face the knowledge that, in case of another relapse, Glendower’s life hung upon a thread.

She was too wise to think further, so she began to speculate on Nurse Silver’s character. Hitherto, they had met only at meals, when she had been taciturn and moody.

To-night she had revealed a personal animus against herself, and Nurse Cherry believed she guessed its cause.

The situation was a hot-bed for jealousy. Two women were thrown into close contact with a patient and a doctor, both of whom were bachelors. Although Nurse Silver was the ill-favoured one, it was plain that she possessed her share of personal vanity. Nurse Cherry noticed, from her painful walk, that she wore shoes which were too small. More than that, she had caught her in the act of scrutinizing her face in the mirror.

These rather pitiful glimpses into the dark heart of the warped woman made Nurse Cherry uneasy.

The house was very still; she missed Nature’s sounds of rain or wind against the window-pane and the cheerful voices of the Iles couple. The silence might be a background for sounds she did not wish to hear.

She spoke aloud, for the sake of hearing her own voice.

“Cheery if Silver plays up to-night. Well, well! I’ll hurry up Mrs. Iles with the supper.”

Her spirits rose as she opened the door leading to the basement. The warm spicy odour of the kitchen floated up the short staircase and she could see a bar of yellow light from the half-opened door.

When she entered, she saw no sign of supper. Mrs. Iles— a strapping blonde with strawberry cheeks— sat at the kitchen-table, her head buried in her huge arms.

As Nurse Cherry shook her gently, she raised her head.

“Eh?” she said stupidly.

“Gracious, Mrs. Iles. Are you ill?”

“Eh? Feel as if I’d one over the eight.”

“What on earth d’you mean?”

“What you call ‘tight.’ Love-a-duck, my head’s that swimmy—”

Nurse Cherry looked suspiciously at an empty glass upon the dresser, as Mrs. Iles’s head dropped like a bleached sunflower.

Nurse Silver heard her hurrying footsteps on the stairs. She met her upon the landing.

“Anything wrong?”

“Mrs. Iles. I think she’s drunk. Do come and see.”

When Nurse Silver reached the kitchen, she hoisted Mrs. Iles under the armpits and set her on unsteady feet.

“Obvious,” she said. “Help get her upstairs.”

It was no easy task to drag twelve stone of protesting Mrs. Iles up three flights of stairs.

“She feels like a centipede, with every pair of feet going in a different direction,” Nurse Cherry panted, as they reached the door of the Ileses’ bedroom. “I can manage her now, thank you.”

She wished Nurse Silver would go back to the patient, instead of looking at her with that fixed expression.

“What are you staring at?” she asked sharply.

“Has nothing struck you as strange?”

“What?”

In the dim light, Nurse Silver’s eyes looked like empty black pits.

“To-day,” she said, “there were four of us. First, Iles goes. Now, Mrs. Iles. That leaves only two. If anything happens to you or me, there’ll only be one.”

AS NURSE CHERRY put Mrs. Iles to bed, she reflected that Nurse Silver was decidedly not a cheerful companion. She made a natural sequence of events appear in the light of a sinister conspiracy.

Nurse Cherry reminded herself sharply that Iles’s absence was due to her own carelessness, while his wife was addicted to her glass.

Still, some unpleasant suggestion remained, like the sediment from a splash of muddy water. She found herself thinking with horror of some calamity befalling Nurse Silver. If she were left by herself she felt she would lose her senses with fright.

It was an unpleasant picture. The empty house— a dark shell for lurking shadows. No one on whom to depend. Her patient— a beloved burden and responsibility.

It was better not to think of that. But she kept on thinking. The outside darkness seemed to be pressing against the walls, bending them in. As her fears multiplied, the medical student changed from a human being with a distraught brain, to a Force, cunning and insatiable— a ravening blood-monster.

Nurse Silver’s words recurred to her.

“They always know.” Even so. Doors might be locked, but they would find a way inside.

Her nerves tingled at the sound of the telephone-bell, ringing far below in the hall.

She kept looking over her shoulder as she ran downstairs. She took off the receiver in positive panic, lest she should be greeted with a maniac scream of laughter.

It was a great relief to hear the homely Welsh accent of Dr. Jones.

He had serious news for her. As she listened, her heart began to thump violently.

“Thank you, doctor, for letting me know,” she said. “Please ring up directly you hear more.”

“Hear more of what?”

Nurse Cherry started at Nurse Silver’s harsh voice. She had come downstairs noiselessly in her soft nursing-slippers.

“It’s only the doctor,” she said, trying to speak lightly. “He’s thinking of changing the medicine.”

“Then why are you so white? You are shaking.”

Nurse Cherry decided that the truth would serve her best.

“To be honest,” she said, “I’ve just had bad news. Something ghastly. I didn’t want you to know, for there’s no sense in two of us being frightened. But now I come to think of it, you ought to feel reassured.”

She forced a smile.

“You said there’d have to be another murder soon. Well— there has been one.”

“Where? Who? Quick.”

Nurse Cherry understood what is meant by the infection of fear as Nurse Silver gripped her arm.

In spite of her effort at self-mastery, there was a quiver in her own voice.

“It’s a— a hospital nurse. Strangled. They’ve just found the body in a quarry and they sent for Dr. Jones to make the examination. The police are trying to establish her identity.”

Nurse Silver’s eyes were wide and staring.

“Another hospital nurse? That makes four.”

She turned on the younger woman in sudden suspicion.

“Why did he ring you up?”

Nurse Cherry did not want that question.

“To tell us to be specially on guard,” she replied.

“You mean— he’s near?”

“Of course not. The doctor said the woman had been dead three or four days. By now, he’ll be far away.”

“Or he may be even nearer than you think.”

Nurse Cherry glanced involuntarily at the barred front door. Her head felt as if it were bursting. It was impossible to think connectedly. But—somewhere— beating its wings like a caged bird, was the incessant reminder.

Something forgotten.

The sight of the elder woman’s twitching lips reminded her that she had to be calm for two.

“Go back to the patient,” she said, “while I get the supper. We’ll both feel better after something to eat.”

In spite of her new-born courage, it needed an effort of will to descend into the basement. So many doors, leading to scullery, larder and coal-cellar, all smelling of mice. So many hiding-places.

The kitchen proved a cheerful antidote to depression. The caked fire in the open range threw a red glow upon the Welsh dresser and the canisters labelled ‘Sugar’ and ‘Tea.’ A sandy cat slept upon the rag mat. Everything looked safe and homely.

Quickly collecting bread, cheese, a round of beef, a cold white shape, and stewed prunes, she piled them on a tray. She added stout for Nurse Silver and made cocoa for herself. As she watched the milk froth up through the dark mixture and inhaled the steaming odour, she felt that her fears were baseless and absurd.

She sang as she carried her tray upstairs. She was going to marry Glendower.

The nurses used the bedroom which connected with the sick chamber for their meals, in order to be near the patient. As the night-nurse entered, Nurse Cherry strained her ears for the sound of Glendower’s voice. She longed for one glimpse of him. Even a smile would help.

“How’s the patient?” she asked.

“All right.”

“Could I have a peep?”

“No. You’re off duty.”

As the women sat down, Nurse Cherry was amused to notice that Nurse Silver kicked off her tight shoes.

“You seem very interested in the patient, Nurse Cherry,” she remarked sourly.

“I have a right to feel rather interested.” Nurse Cherry smiled as she cut bread. “The doctor gives me the credit for his being alive.”

“Ah! But the doctor thinks the world of you.”

Nurse Cherry was not conceited, but she was human enough to know that she had made a conquest of the big Welshman.

The green glow of jealousy in Nurse Silver’s eyes made her reply guardedly.

“Dr. Jones is decent to every one.”

But she was of too friendly and impulsive a nature to keep her secret bottled up. She reminded herself that they were two women sharing an ordeal and she tried to establish some link of friendship.

“I feel you despise me,” she said. “You think me lacking in self-control. And you can’t forget that cylinder. But really, I’ve gone through such an awful strain. For four nights, I never took off my clothes.”

“Why didn’t you have a second nurse?”

“There was the expense. The Professor gives his whole life to enrich the nation and he’s poor. Then, later, I felt I must do everything for him myself. I didn’t want you, only Dr. Jones said I was heading for a break-down.”

She looked at her left hand, seeing there the shadowy outline of a wedding-ring.

“Don’t think me sloppy, but I must tell some one. The Professor and I are going to get married.”

“If he lives.”

“But he’s turned the corner now.”

“Don’t count your chickens.”

Nurse Cherry felt a stab of fear.

“Are you hiding something from me? Is he— worse?”

“No. He’s the same. I was thinking that Dr. Jones might interfere. You’ve led him on, haven’t you? I’ve seen you smile at him. It’s light women like you that make the trouble in the world.”

Nurse Cherry was staggered by the injustice of the attack. But as she looked at the elder woman’s working face, she saw that she was consumed by jealousy. One life lay in the shadow, the other in the sun. The contrast was too sharp.

“We won’t quarrel to-night,” she said gently. “We’re going through rather a bad time together and we have only each other to depend on. I’m just clinging to you. If anything were to happen to you, like Mrs. Iles, I should jump out of my skin with fright.”

Nurse Silver was silent for a minute.

"I never thought of that," she said presently. "Only us two. And all these empty rooms, above and below. What's that?"

From the hall came the sound of muffled knocking. Nurse Cherry sprang to her feet.

"Someone at the front door."

Nurse Silver's fingers closed round her arm like iron loops.

"Sit down! It's him!"

THE two women stared at each other as the knocking continued. It was loud and insistent. To Nurse Cherry's ears, it carried a message of urgency.

"I'm going down," she said. "It may be Dr. Jones."

"How could you tell?"

"By his voice."

"You fool! Any one would imitate his accent."

Nurse Cheery saw the beads break out round Nurse Silver's mouth. Her fear had the effect of steadying her own Serves.

"I'm going down to find out who it is," she said. "It may be important news about the murder."

Nurse Silver dragged her away from the door.

"What did I say? You are the danger. You've forgotten already.

"Forgotten— what?"

"Didn't Iles tell you to open to no one? No one?"

Nurse Cherry hung her head. She sat down, in shamed silence.

The knocking ceased. Presently, they heard it again, at the back door.

Nurse Silver wiped her face.

"He means to get in." She laid her hand on Nurse Cherry's arm. "You're not even trembling. Are you never afraid?"

"Only of ghosts."

In spite of her brave front, Nurse Cherry was inwardly quaking at her own desperate resolution. Nurse Silver had justly accused her of endangering the household. Therefore, it was her plain duty to make once more the round of the house, either to see what she had forgotten, or to lay the doubt.

"I'm going upstairs," she said. "I want to look out."

"Unbar a window?" Nurse Silver's agitation rose in a gale. "You shall not! It's murdering folly! Think! That last nurse was found, dead, inside her bedroom!"

"All right, I won't!"

"You'd best be careful. You've been trying to spare me, but, perhaps, I've been trying to spare you. I'll only say this. There is something strange happening in this house!"

Nurse Cherry felt a chill at her heart. Only, since she was a nurse, she knew that it was really the pit of her stomach. Something was wrong? If, through her wretched memory, she again were the culprit, she must expiate her crime by shielding the others at any risk to herself.

She had to force herself to mount the stairs. Her candle, flickering in the draught, peopled the walls with distorted shapes. When she reached the top landing, without stopping to think, she walked resolutely into the laboratory and the adjoining room.

Both were securely barred and empty. Gaining courage, she entered the attic. Under its window was a precipitous slope of roof, without gutter or water-pipe to give finger-hold. Knowing that it would be impossible for any one to gain an entry, she opened the shutter and unfastened the window.

The cold air on her face refreshed her and restored her to calm. She realised that she had been suffering, to a certain extent, from claustrophobia.

The rain had ceased and a wind arisen. She could see a young, harried moon flying through the clouds. The dark humps of the bills were visible against the darkness, but nothing more.

She remained at the window for some time, thinking of Glendower. It was a solace to remember the happiness which awaited her once this night of terror was over.

Presently, the urge to see him grew too strong to be resisted. Nurse Silver's words had made her uneasy on his behalf. Even though she offended the laws of professional etiquette, she determined to see for herself that all was well.

Leaving the window open so that some air might percolate into the house, she slipped stealthily downstairs. She stopped on the second floor to visit her own room and that of Nurse Silver. All was quiet and secure. In her own quarters Mrs. Iles still snored in the sleep of the unjust.

There were two doors to the patient's room. The one led to the nurses' room, where Nurse Silver was still at her meal. The other led to the landing.

Directly Nurse Cherry entered she knew that her fear had been the premonition of love. Something was seriously amiss. Glendower's head tossed uneasily on the pillow. His face was deeply flushed. When she called him by name he stared at her, his luminous, grey eyes were ablaze.

He did not recognise her, for, instead of "Stella," he called her "Nurse."

"Nurse, Nurse." He mumbled something that sounded like "Man," and then slipped back in her arms, unconscious.

Nurse Silver entered the room at her cry. As she felt his pulse she spoke with dry significance.

"We could do with oxygen now!"

Nurse Cherry could only look at her with piteous eyes. "Shall I telephone for Dr. Jones?" she asked humbly.

"Yes."

It seemed like the continuation of an evil dream when she could get no answer to her ring. Again and again she tried desperately to galvanize the dead instrument.

Presently, Nurse Silver appeared on the landing.

"Is the doctor coming?"

"I— I can't get any answer." Nurse Cherry forced back her tears, "Oh, whatever can be wrong?"

"Probably a wet creeper twisted round the wire. But it doesn't matter now. The patient's sleeping."

Nurse Cherry's face registered no comfort. As though the shocks of the last few minutes had set in motion the arrested machinery of her brain, she remembered, suddenly, what she had forgotten.

The larder window.

She recollected now what had happened. When she entered the larder on her round of locking up, a mouse had run over her feet. She ran to fetch the cat, which chased it into a hole in the kitchen. In the excitement of the incident, she had forgotten to return, to close the window.

Her heart leapt violently as the realization that, all these hours, the house had been open to any marauder. Even while she and Nurse Silver had listened, shivering, to the knocking at the door, she had already betrayed the fortress.

"What's the matter?" asked Nurse Silver.

"Nothing. Nothing."

She dared not tell the older woman. Even now it was not too late to remedy her omission.

In her haste, she no longer feared the descent into the basement. She could hardly get down the stairs with sufficient speed.

As she entered the larder the wire-covered window flapped in the breeze. She secured it, and was just entering the kitchen when her eye fell on a dark patch in the passage.

It was the footprint of a man.

Nurse Cherry remembered that Iles had been in the act of getting fresh coal into the cellar when he had been called away to make his journey. He had not time to clean up, and the floor was still sooty with rain-Soaked dust.

As she raised her candle the footprint gleamed faintly. Stooping hastily, she touched it.

It was still damp.

AT first she stood as if petrified, staring at it stupidly. Then, as she realized that, in front of her, lay a freshly-made imprint, her nerve snapped completely. With a scream she dropped her candle and tore up the stairs, calling on Nurse Silver.

She was answered by a strange voice. It was thick, heavy, indistinct. A voice she had never heard before.

Knowing not what awaited her on the other side of the door, yet driven on by the courage of ultimate fear, she rushed into, the nurses' sitting room.

No one was there save Nurse Silver. She sagged back in her chair, her eyes half-closed, her mouth open.

From her lips issued a second uncouth cry.

Nurse Cherry put her arm round her. "What is it? Try to tell me."

It was plain that Nurse Silver was trying to warn her of some peril. She pointed to her glass and fought for articulation.

"Drugs! Listen! When you lock out, you lock in!"

Even as she spoke her eyes turned up horribly, exposing the balls in a blind white stare.

Almost mad with terror, Nurse Cherry tried to revive her. Mysteriously, through some unknown agency, what she had so dreaded had come to pass.

She was alone.

And somewhere— within the walls of the house— lurked a being— cruel and cunning— who, one after another, had removed each obstacle between himself and his objective.

He had marked down his victim. Herself.

In that moment she went clean over the edge of fear. She felt that it was not herself— Stella Cherry— but a stranger in the blue print uniform of a hospital nurse, who calmly speculated oh her course of action.

It was impossible to lock herself in the patient's room, for the key was stiff from disuse. And she had not the strength to move furniture which was sufficiently heavy to barricade the door.

The idea of flight was immediately dismissed. In order to get help she would have to run miles. She could not leave Glendower and two helpless women at the mercy of the baffled maniac.

There was nothing to be done. Her place was by Glendower. She sat down by his bed and took his hand in hers.

The time seemed endless. Her watch seemed sometimes to leap whole hours and then to crawl, she waited— listening to the myriad sounds in a house at nightfall. There were faint rustlings, the cracking of woodwork, the scamper of mice.

And a hundred times, some one seemed to steal up the stairs and linger just outside her door.

It was nearly 3 o'clock when suddenly a gong began to beat inside her temples. In the adjoining room was the unmistakable tramp of a man's footsteps.

It was not imagination on her part. They circled the room and then advanced toward the connecting door.

She saw the handle begin to turn slowly.

In one bound, she reached the door and rushed on to the landing and up the stairs. For a second, she paused before her own room. But its windows were barred and the door had no key. She could not be done to death there, in the dark.

As she paused, she heard the footsteps on the stairs. They advanced slowly, driving her on before them. Demented with terror, she fled up to the top story, instinctively seeking the open window.

She could go no higher. At the attic door she waited.

Something black appeared on the staircase wall. It was the shadow of her pursuer— a grotesque and distorted herald of crime.

Nurse Cherry gripped the balustrade to keep herself from falling. Everything was growing dark. She knew that she was on the point of fainting, when she was revived by sheer astonishment and joy.

Above the balustrade appeared the head of Nurse Silver.

Nurse Cherry called out to her in warning.

"Come quickly! There's a man in the house!"

She saw Nurse Silver start and fling back her head as if in alarm.

Then occurred the culminating horror of a night of dread.

A mouse ran across the passage.

Raising her heavy shoe, Nurse Silver stamped upon it, grinding her heel upon the tiny creature's head.

In that moment, Nurse Cherry knew the truth.

Nurse Silver was a man.

HER brain raced with lightning velocity. It was like a searchlight, piercing the shadows and making the mystery clear.

She knew that the real Nurse Silver had been murdered by Sylvester Leek; on her way to the case. It was her strangled body which had just been found in the quarry. And the murderer had taken her place. The police description was that of a slightly built youth, with refined features. It would be easy for him to assume the disguise of a woman. He had the necessary medical knowledge to pose as nurse. Moreover, as he had the night-shift, no one in the household had come into close contact with him, save the patient.

But the patient had guessed the truth.

To silence his tongue, the killer had drugged him, even as he had disposed of the obstructing presence of Mrs. Iles. It was he, too, who had emptied the oxygen cylinder, to get Iles out of the way.

Yet, although he had been alone with his prey for hours, he had held his hand.

Nurse Cherry, with her new mental lucidity, knew the reason. There is a fable that the serpent slavers its victim, before swallowing it. In like manner, the maniac— before her final destruction— had wished to coat her with the foul saliva of fear.

All the evening he had been trying to terrorise her— plucking at each jangled nerve up to the climax of his feigned unconsciousness.

Yet, she knew that he, in turn, was fearful lest he should be frustrated in the commission of his crime. Since his victim's body, had been discovered in the quarry, the establishment of her identity would mark his hiding place. While Nurse Cherry was at the attic window, he had cut the telephone wire and donned his own shoes for purposes of flight.

SHE remembered his emotion during the knocking at the door. It was probable that it was Dr. Jones who stood without, come to assure himself that she was not alarmed. Had it been the police, they would have effected an entry. The incident proved that nothing had been discovered, and it was useless to count on outside help.

She had to face it— alone.

In the dim light from the young moon, she saw the murderer enter the attic. The grotesque travesty of his nursing disguise added to the terror of the moment.

His eyes were fixed on the open window. It was plain that he was pretending to connect it with the supposed intruder. She, in her turn, had unconsciously deceived him. He probably knew nothing of the revealing footprint he had left in the basement passage.

"Shut the window, you damned fool!" he shouted.

As he leant over the low ledge to reach the swinging casement window, Nurse Cherry rushed at him in the instinctive madness of self-defence— thrusting him forward, over the sill.

She had one glimpse of dark, distorted features blotting out the moon and of arms sawing the air, like a starfish, in a desperate attempt to balance.

The next moment, nothing was there.

She sank to the ground, covering her ears with her hands to deaden the sound of the sickening slide over the tiled roof.

It was a long time before she was able to creep down to her patient's room. Directly she entered, its peace healed her like balm. Glendower slept quietly— a half-smile playing round his lips, as though he dreamt of her.

Thankfully, she went from room to room, unbarring each window and unlocking each door— letting in the dawn.

__________________

5: White Cap

Akron Beacon Journal 31 Jan 1942

Almost certainly a reprint from a much earlier English magazine, probably Pearsons, but I can't confirm this. When the US came into WW2 at the end of 1941, US  magazines were quick to print stories from allied countries..

WHEN TESS LEIGH washed her hair, one June evening, she involved the issue of life or death… On the surface it seemed merely a matter of a trivial change of habit. Instead of going bare-headed to work, she had to wear a cap.

The reason was that her thick wavy hair became unruly if she exposed it to the open air too soon after a shampoo.

The turban was made from a white Angora scarf and was ornamented with a lucky brooch of green-and-white enamel in the shape of a sprig of white heather. Inside the band was stitched a laundry-tape marked with her name in red thread.

It was a glorious morning when— disdaining the trams— she set out to walk to the Peninsular Dye-Stuffs Corporation, where she was employed as a stenographer. The industrial town was built upon rolling moorland whose natural beauty had been destroyed; but the Council had acquired a range of hills— the Steepes— as its lungs and playground. About 1,000 feet in height, they were dominated by the mountain-peak— the Spike— which rose another 3,000 feet into the air.

Tess walked with the rapid ease of youth, swinging the suitcase which held her holiday-kit. From time to time she looked up at the Spike— sharply outlined against a cloudless blue sky. It helped her forget the smoking chimneys of the factories and also to calm her spirit— for all was not well either with her work or her love.

She had only herself to blame for her heart-trouble. No one at the Peninsular could understand why she had been taken in by the cheap glamour of Clement Dodd. She was attractive, athletic and possessed of a sweet yet strong character. Fearlessly outspoken, she had deep sympathy with the underdog and always rushed in to champion any victim of injustice.

As she approached the majestic pillared entrance to the factory, she felt a reluctance to enter which was becoming a familiar sensation.

She knew that she was not the only employee to feel that suddenly sinking heart and lagging foot, in spite of the fact that old John Aspinall— who founded the Peninsular Works— had striven to make it a model factory. He had arranged for the health, comfort and recreation of his workers. There were extensive grounds, a swimming pool, an excellent canteen and various athletic clubs.

These good things remained after his death when his son— Young John— went to the USA to study American methods, leaving his brother to direct the corporation. Brother Eustace was a lazy inefficient man who was content to sink to the status of a puppet government after Miss Ratcliffe had bought a controlling interest in the Peninsular.

She was a wealthy, keen-witted woman with a lust for power. Soured by lack of social sovereignty through her failure to marry a titled husband, she strove to become a Power in commerce. Part of her policy was to use the brains and experience of the men employed by the Peninsular. While she was professing interest in them, her keen brain was mincing up their suggestions and theories until they emerged as facts— for which she took all the credit.

Unfortunately the process was accompanied by corresponding human wastage, when gradually the atmosphere became poisoned because employees feared for their jobs. Most of the small-fry were too insignificant to be vulnerable, but Tess stood out from the bulk of the stenographer-staff, because of an unlucky incident.

The Peninsular ran a rifle club in connection with the municipal shooting-range. One day, Miss Ratcliffe visited them and gave what practically amounted to a demonstration in marksmanship. Tess, who was also expert, welcomed her only as a worthy opponent and challenged her to a match which she won by a narrow margin.

'Bad show,' commented her friends. 'After this, she will have her knife in you.'

In addition to anxiety for her job, Tess was beginning to fear that Miss Ratcliffe was developing her specialized interest in Clement Dodd. As chief accountant of the Finance Department, he frequently visited her office although he denied any personal element to Tess.

Tess's frown deepened as she passed through the gates and entered the grounds— gay with lilac and laburnum. Although it was the half-holiday, the model factory repelled her like a prison. As she gazed wistfully up at the soaring Spike, she suddenly saw a bird circling over its rocky summit.

'Don,' she called to a tall stooping man with grey hair and a classical profile, 'Don, do you see what I see?'

He shaded his eyes with a shaking white hand.

'It must be an unusually large bird to be visible at this distance,' he remarked. 'Can it be an eagle?'

'Of course it's an eagle,' cried Tess exultantly. 'Oh, isn't he a real king of birds? So free and splendid. I've a passion for eagles. The sight of one in captivity makes me see red.'

The old man did not respond to her interest for he was gazing eagerly at an impressive black saloon-car which had just driven up to the main entrance. As a majestic blonde ascended the steps, he glanced at the clock tower.

'Miss Ratcliffe sets us an example in punctuality,' he remarked. 'In confidence, I have an appointment with her. My poor wife has resented the overtime I have given to the corporation. The fact is I was staying late to work out a system of reorganisation for several of the departments, to submit to Miss Ratcliffe… Now I believe I am going to reap my reward. My letter states that the subject of the interview is "important clerical changes".'

As she looked at his flushed triumphant face, Tess had a sudden pang of misgiving. Originally a schoolmaster, Don was a man of superior education. For the sake of a delicate wife and daughter, he had commercialised his scientific knowledge in the Peninsular Laboratory. He was intensely proud of his intellectual family and his cultured surroundings, where every book and picture was the result of selective taste.

'Don't count on it,' she warned him. 'Everyone knows that Ratcliffe is a rat.'

A short girl with a dark fringe and an important air looked at her sharply as she hurried past. She had chosen an unfortunate moment for her remark, since the energetic damsel was Miss Ratcliffe's secretary. Donovan, too, was visibly distressed by her imprudence.

But Tess smiled at him and entered the great hall to clock in.

A young man came forward to meet Tess as though he had been watching for her arrival. Ted Lockwood made no secret of his feeling for her. It was one of Nature's mysteries why she had rejected him for Clement, since he was so suited to be her opposite number. She had a mechanical mind so could appreciate the fact that he was a clever engineer. Like her, he was a fine athlete while he seasoned his sound qualities with a sense of humour.

'Will madame lunch with me?'

'Sorry, Ted,' replied Tess. 'I'm eating with Clem. Have you seen him around?'

'In the sick-bay. He's got a hangover and Matron's fussing over him. If a woman wants to be maternal, it beats me why she doesn't marry and set up her own outfit.'

'Meaning me?' asked Tess with customary bluntness.

'Yes, Tess.' Lockwood's face was grim with resolution. 'Why won't you face the facts? The most successful marriages are founded on mutual interest— and you and I have the same tastes. How will you make out with an artistic bloke like Dodd?'

'Oh, not again, Ted,' pleaded Tess wearily.

She had no further chance to brood for she always worked at high pressure. As the subject of the dictation was technical matter which exacted her entire attention, she welcomed a break, in order to freshen herself with a wash. The men's and women's cloakrooms were built off a central domed hall with a white marble drinking-fountain, which was a popular meeting place.

When she entered it, a group of employees were talking in excited undertones as they gathered around Clement Dodd. He was a tall slim-waisted youth who would have made a pretty girl, but for thin mobile lips. He spoke with a stressed Oxford accent while his manner to women of all ages was that of a courtier.

'Heard the latest casualty?' he asked Tess. 'Poor old Don's got the K.O.'

As Tess stared at him in dismay, he lit a cigarette.

'Afraid he asked for it,' he said casually. 'Too big for his boots. That line does not appeal to our lady-boss.'

'It's a real tragedy,' exclaimed a woman who dyed her grey hairs. 'He was nearly due to retire. Now he'll lose his pension. What will become of him?'

'Hush,' whispered a typist. 'He's coming in.'

His head held high, the old scientist approached the group. He cleared his throat before he made an announcement after the fashion of a Headmaster addressing his school.

'I have just resigned my position. I have never been happy in a non-scholastic atmosphere. Now I shall hope to resume my academic career. I wish to take this opportunity to thank you for your loyal support and cooperation.'

Although his lips quivered. he managed to make a grand exit.

As she watched him, Tess grew suddenly hot and giddy.

'It's cruel— hateful— abominable—' she stormed. 'That horrible woman has thrown him out just to save his pension.'

'Cool off, you young volcano.'

Tess felt herself pushed down on a chair. Although she recognised Lockwood's voice, she barely saw him through a shifting mist. She gulped down the glass of water which he drew for her and then gave him a grateful grin.

'O.K.?' he asked. 'What was the matter? You went first red and then white.'

'Temper,' she replied frankly. 'Only it's a bit more than that. Just before I left Canada, I was in an air crash. Since then, if I get too steamed up, I have a blackout. The doctor told me I'd grow out of it very soon, but he warned me not to get excited.'

'What's it like?'

'Foul— and frightening. Everything turns black and I drop into a sort of sleep. The doctor explained that sleep was my salvation, but it scares me because when I wake up, I can remember nothing. I go right out.'

The rest of the morning dragged itself out. Worried about Don, she forgot to concentrate on her work with the result that she had the greatest difficulty in reading back her outlines. As she was typing her notes, she noticed that Miss James— Ratcliffe's secretary— had entered the room and was whispering to the supervisor.

Although she vaguely expected it, her heart knocked at the summons.

'Miss Leigh. Please report at once to Miss Ratcliffe.' …

Seated at her desk, Miss Ratcliffe looked a model of impersonal Administration— correct to form and polished in every detail. Her dark suit was perfectly built and her silver-blonde wave faultless.

'Miss Leigh?' Her voice was languid. 'Ah yes. I am sorry that your services will not be required after today. You will receive a week's wages in lieu of notice. This is no reflection on your work— but we have to reduce the staff.'

'But Miss Ratcliffe,' gasped Tess, 'there must be some mistake. My speeds are the highest in the office and—'

'This is not a personal matter.'

'But it is personal.' With characteristic courage, Tess dared to interrupt the tyrant. 'If it were not, I should be expected to work out my notice. I have a right to know the reason.'

'The reason is this,' she said. 'You have been disloyal.'

With a guilty recollection of unguarded remarks, Tess could not deny the charge. Instead she sank her pride to make an appeal.

'I don't want to inflict a sob-story on you, but I really need this work. I came over here from Canada when my parents died and I have no friends in England. Jobs are so scarce at present. Will you give me a second chance? I promise you I'll do better in future.'

Miss Ratcliffe looked at her with cold impersonal eyes as she touched her bell.

'My decision is final,' she said.

As Miss James bustled into the office and opened the door pointedly, Tess had a sudden vision of the eagle beating his great wings over the mountain top. The memory flooded over her, filling her with a wave of power.

She realized that she too was free and able to meet Ratcliffe on equal ground.

'You are a cruel, petty woman,' she said. 'The most junior typist has more right in the Peninsular than you have. You've bought your power— not earned it. And instead of using it, you abuse it. When worthwhile people are dying every day, it is a crime for you to be alive.'

She was conscious of passers-by in the corridor who paused to look into the office before Miss James pushed her outside and shut the door.

On her way to the cashier's office, she met Don in the corridor— stooping like a defeated man.

'The Gestapo's got me too, Don. I'm sacked.'

'I'm deeply grieved,' he told her. 'But your conscience is clear, while I have something to regret … When I first had news of my— my resignation, I was so stunned that— in trying to save myself— I threw someone to the lions. That hurts most.' He added regretfully with a lapse of his grand manner, 'Besides, it did me no good.'

As the admission sank in, fitting the circumstances of her own dismissal, Tess felt that she had been struck by the hand of a friend.

'You,' she muttered as she turned away.

The second shock made her feel numbed to reality. After she was paid off, she went to the cloakroom and mechanically changed into white slacks and a rose-red pullover. Her hair was beginning to get bushy, as she drew her white cap over it, in an instinctive desire to look her best when she met Clement.

She waited for Clement for a long time in the canteen, but he did not appear. Presently she accepted the disappointment with dreary fatalism. Too overwrought to eat, she went out of the Peninsular grounds. All she wanted was to escape to the Steepes and climb the rough ascent to the Spike— to stand on the mountain-top and meet the healing friction of the wind.

Owing to its precipitous quarried sides, the Steepes were accessible from the town by a small funicular which carried patrons up the face of the cliff. The girl at the turnstile who collected the tickets was a local character. Abnormally sharp, although she looked a child, her mop of red hair had gained her the obvious title of 'Ginger'.

'Does it bring you luck?' she asked as her quick eyes noticed the white heather brooch on Tess's cap.

'You may have the lot at bargain-price,' Tess told her bitterly.

On the summit of the Steepes stretched a wide level expanse of threadbare turf where a cafeteria as well as chairs and tables were provided for the community. The bulk of the holiday-makers used to congregate there, eating, drinking, reading and playing games; but it was deserted that afternoon owing to a circus performance in the town.

Tess struck off along a narrow path which wound, like a pale green ribbon, amid clumps of whinberry and stems of uncurled bracken. Farther off, on the left, the ground sloped down to the Rifle-Range.

She threw herself down on the heather. She wanted the consolation of contact with primeval things. With a springy cushion of twigs supporting her head, she gazed up into the clear blue sky, when she noticed the flicker of wings.

Again the eagle was circling around the summit of the Spike, reminding her of her impulse to climb to the mountain-top. It was a long rough walk, for the steep track zigzagged continually across natural obstacles of bog and rock. Even the optimistic guide-book stated that two-and-one-half hours were required for the ascent.

Swinging to her feet, she had a clear view of the path leading to the Rifle-Range. Two figures— pressed closely together— stood upon the slope. Even at that distance, it was impossible to mistake the sunlit shimmer of the woman's silvery-blonde hair or the slack grace of her companion.

As she watched them, Dodd threw his arm around Miss Ratcliffe and bent his head, as though seeking her lips … At the sight, the blood rushed to Tess's head. Again she felt the blast of furnace heat while a wheel seemed to spin remorselessly inside her brain.

Recognizing the terrifying symptoms which heralded a temporary extinction, she fought with all her strength to resist them, but while she was struggling, a rush of darkness swept over her like a black rocket. As she fell— face downward— on the heather in her last moment of consciousness, she noticed the watch on her outstretched wrist.

It was 3 o'clock.

It was 4 o'clock. Tess stared at her watch with frightened eyes. Only an instant before it was 3 o'clock. A whole hour had been rubbed out of her life …

She pressed her fingers to her eyes as the memory of Clem's treachery overwhelmed her. The knowledge made her feel not only miserable, but cheap and ashamed, so that her dominant instinct was to hide. Soon the holiday-makers would be spreading fanwise over the lower slopes of the Steepes.

Shrinking from the ordeal of meeting someone from the Peninsular Factory, she rose stiffly and looked around for her cap. To her annoyance, she could not see it and, after pulling apart the nearest clumps of heather, she had to give up the search. Stampeded by the sound of distant voices, she ran over the rough until she reached a slippery bank of turf which dropped sheer to a narrow ledge above a worked-out quarry.

A perilous climb along the rocky rim brought her to a shallow depression in the hillside which offered her sanctuary. When she leaned back in the hollow, she seemed perched upon a lip of some bottomless abyss. For a long time she lay there— watching the pageant of clouds which rolled past like a stormy sea.

When she forced herself to look at her watch, she grimaced.

'Gosh, it's late. Well— I've got to face people again.'

In spite of this resolution, she made a circle to avoid passing the crowd around the cafeteria. She could not understand the force of the instinct which warned her to remain hidden.

As she clicked through the 'OUT' turnstile, she noticed that Ginger was staring at her. The scrutiny alarmed her vaguely for it revived her dormant dread of her lost hour.

'Where did I go?' she questioned. 'What have I done? Do I show the marks of it in my face? Why does that girl stare at me? Oh, dear heart, I wish Ted was with me.'

Now that her infatuation for Clement had been shrivelled by the knowledge of his treachery, her heart turned instinctively towards Lockwood. On the homeward journey, while she sat upon the hard wooden seats of the tram and watched long lines of mean houses slide past, the lines of Kipling's poem swam into her mind.

'The Thousandth Man will stand by your side

To the gallows-foot— and after!'

She lodged in a comfortable house which belonged to a florist. It welcomed her like a haven, that evening. The flowers had never looked so beautiful in the sunset glow when she walked through the garden. The shabby dark green sitting room was cool and a meal was spread on the table, so that she had only to make her tea from the electric-kettle.

She was feeling refreshed and stimulated when her landlady entered the room to remove her tray.

'What news?' she clicked. 'Is it really true she's been murdered?'

'Who?' asked Tess, with a pang of foreboding.

'Your Miss Ratcliffe, of course. It's all over the town that she's been shot dead.'

As Tess stared blindly at her landlady, the scrape of the gate made the woman glance through the window.

'It's Mr Lockwood,' the announced. 'I'll go let him in.'

'I knew he'd come. I knew he'd come,' Tess told herself.

As he entered, she turned away and stood with clenched fists and locked jaws, fighting for self-control. She heard his step beside her but he did not speak until they were alone.

'Tess… Darling.'

The new tenderness of his tone broke down her defences. Clinging to him, she pressed her face against his shoulder.

'We mustn't waste time,' he said. 'A copper will soon be here to question you. First of all, remember I'm with you, whatever you've done … Did you kill her?'

Her face grew suddenly white as she repeated his question with stiff lips.

'Did I kill her? I don't know… Tell me, has my cap been found?'

'Why?'

'Because it's gone. I had a blackout. I can't remember anything… But my cap might tell me where I went.'

Lockwood's face grew grim as he heard her incoherent story.

'I know you are innocent,' he told her. 'But this is not exactly a water-tight yarn. Keep off it as much as you can. Don't lie, but let the police fish for themselves.'

'But why are they coming to me?'

In her turn, Tess listened to his account of the tragedy. A member of the Rifle-Club had found Ratcliffe's body lying in the rough beyond the targets, about 4.30. She had been shot through the heart at close range. The doctor estimated the time of death as between 3 and 4— but probably about 3.30. As Tess's rifle was found lying near, the police had made inquiries about her at the Peninsular Works, when they had learned about her dismissal and her subsequent threats.

He had just finished his story when the garden gate scraped again.

'It's the detective-bloke,' Lockwood warned Tess. 'Don't forget I'm standing by.'

Inspector Pont reminded Tess of an uncle who grew prize dahlias. He was big and dark, with sleepy brown eyes which revealed nothing of his mental process.

Tess met him with the desperate courage of one mounting the scaffold.

'I am Tess Leigh. I am prepared to sign a statement.'

'Not so fast,' said the inspector. 'You'll be warned when I'm ready for that. I want to know if you remember making any of these remarks about the deceased?'

As Tess read the typewritten paper he handed her, her face flamed.

'Only one person could have told you these things,' she said. 'That's Clement Dodd… Yes, I did say them. All of them— and more. They are true. She was a cowardly tyrant for she hit people who could not hit back. Cruelty or injustice always make me see red.'

'The turnstile girl at the Steepes has told me you were up there from between 2 and 6,' Pont said. 'What were you doing during that time?'

'Walking,' replied Tess.

'Where?'

'I don't know… It's no good asking me. I've been in an air crash which has affected my memory. I was terribly upset… But I walked.'

'Did you lose your cap during your walk? The turnstile girl tells me you were wearing one when you clicked-in, but that you were bareheaded when you returned.'

'That's right. But I don't know where I lost it. I tell you— I don't know.'

'I'd like a description of it.'

After the inspector had entered the particulars in his notebook he turned towards the door. Lockwood noticed the glint in his eyes when he spoke to Tess.

'That cap's got to be found. I'll have bills out tomorrow. Meantime, a notice goes up on the Station-board. I don't expect any results tonight, but hold yourself ready to come and identify it.'

Directly the door closed, Lockwood held Tess tightly in his arms.

'I'm standing by you,' he said. 'We'll wait together.'

She was not comforted because she knew that he too was feeling the same strain of suspense. She felt his start when the telephone bell began to ring in the hall.

'I'll take it,' he said quickly.

When he returned, his smile was unnaturally broad.

'We're going for a joy-ride,' he told her. 'My bus is parked outside.'

The journey to the Police Station had a nightmare quality. The lines of smoke-grimed houses seemed to flash by so that Tess— who was dreading the end of the ride— caught her lip when the car stopped under the blue lamp. Still in an evil dream, she stumbled into a tiled hall, when an open door gave her a clear view into a room.

Standing under the glare of an unshaded electric bulb, Clement Dodd was smoking a cigarette. He appeared entirely at his ease until he saw Tess. His face grew red and he turned his back to avoid meeting her eyes.

'This way,' said a constable.

Supported by the pressure of Lockwood's arm, Tess followed the man into another office where Inspector Pont was seated before a table littered with official papers.

'Yours?' he asked, holding out a white Angora cap for her inspection. She glanced mechanically at her name printed inside the band and nodded assent, before she realised that he was smiling at her.

'My congratulations,' he said. 'This cap was brought in by two hikers— strangers to the district— who chanced to see the notice on the board. They say they picked it up among the rocks on the top of the Spike, soon after 4 this afternoon. As the official time for the ascent is two-and-one-half hours and the deceased was alive at 3, according to medical evidence, it stands to reason that you could not have committed the murder and afterwards climbed the mountain, all within an hour.'

As she listened, Tess's head reeled, for she realized that the story was full of holes. Before she could protest, Lockwood grabbed her arm.

'Miss Leigh's our champion athlete,' he told the Inspector. 'Thanks very much. I'll run her home now.'

'I may ring you later,' remarked the Inspector. 'I am going to chat with another party. If you're interested, you could take your time going out.'

Tess understood the reason for his wink when they reached the hall, for after the detective entered the room where Clement Dodd was waiting, he left the door slightly ajar.

'There's just one point I want cleared up, Dodd,' he said in a loud, cheerful voice. 'It's common knowledge that two articles were found on the scene of the crime. One— a rifle— has been identified as the property of a stenographer— Tess Leigh. The other article has still to be identified.'

'But her name's inside the band.' Clement spoke quickly and confidently. 'Besides, everyone knows her white-heather brooch.'

'I was referring to a pencil stamped with "PENINSULAR",' remarked the Inspector. 'The cap you describe was picked up at the top of the Spike at 4 o'clock this afternoon.'

'That's a damned lie. I saw it—'

'You saw it?' prompted the Inspector as Dodd broke off abruptly. 'Go on. Now that Miss Leigh has a perfect alibi, I must go further into your own movements.'

He shut the door and Lockwood dragged Tess outside to the car.

As they reached the front door of Tess's lodging, they heard the telephone bell ringing in the hall, when, once again, he rushed to receive the call.

When he rang off, his face was beaming.

'Dodd's confessed to the crime,' he said. 'The Inspector said he was in such a state of nerves after he made that slip that he cracked directly they got to work on him. It appears that old Donovan— when he was ratting for Ratcliffe— found out that Dodd had been embezzling money from the accounts. He told Ratcliffe and she taxed Dodd.

'As usual, she pretended that she alone had been so clever as to discover the fraud, so he reasoned that if he bumped her off, no one would know. I am assuming old Don blew the gaff from something he said to me. Dodd admitted that he got Ratcliffe to come with him to the Range, to talk it over, so it was a cold-blooded crime.'

As she listened. Tess felt almost light-headed with relief.

'Oh, it's wonderful to know I never killed her. And I'm glad Don didn't give me away. It was Clem he "threw to the lions" … I was feeling that I could trust no one. And then— you walked with me to the gallows-foot. And after—'

Lockwood began to laugh as he interrupted her.

'I've some good news for you. It didn't matter before. Nothing mattered then but you… But Eustace has asked Daddy to carry on until young John returns from America. Looks as if the good times are coming back to the Peninsular… But what's the girl frowning about now?'

'My cap,' replied Tess. 'If it had been found near the body, I should be convinced that I had killed her. I should have confessed to it— and Clem would not have been brought into it. I should have cleared him… But how did that cap get on the top of the Spike? I passed out between 3 and 4. Besides, no one on earth could have made the climb in that time.'

'No one on earth,' said Lockwood. 'But what about someone in the air! There's a simple and natural explanation. My hunch is that Dodd saw you asleep after he shot Ratcliffe— in that white rig you'd be conspicuous on the heather— so he stole your cap and placed it beside the rifle, to frame you. That's why he crashed so badly. Nothing rattles a liar so much as to be disbelieved when he is telling the truth— and he knew it was inside the range. There was no wind, but probably it stirred a bit in the breeze.

'Enter Mr Eagle. He sees something white and fleecy moving on the heather. He swoops down on it, soars up again, realises he's been fooled and drops it again in disgust… By the luck of the air currents, it fell on the top of the mountain instead of the lower slopes. You owe your perfect alibi to your friend— the eagle.'

_________________

6: Falling Downstairs

Pearson’s Magazine July 1934

Table Talk (Melbourne) 13 Dec 1934

MISS WING had a dread of altitude. She used to dream that she was falling downstairs— not ordinary stairs, but an endless flight of narrow steps, leading down, down— to unseen depths. When she stood at the top of this ghastly drop, her head began to swim, and her heart to leap.

Then— she fell.

There was one awful moment of suffocation as she spun over and over in space; but, even as she fought for breath she always woke up, safe and sound in bed.

This nightmare plagued her, whenever she was worried or run down, so of late it had become such a faithful nocturnal feature that she almost dreaded going to sleep.

It was, therefore, with a disproportionate throb of terror that she stood inside London's newest Tube station, and looked downwards at the long flight of the escalator.

Immediately, she felt the unpleasant prelude to vertigo— shaking knees and a faint singing in her ears. Not knowing what to do, she walked away, staring desperately at the paper she clutched.

It was essential that she reached the address typed upon that slip without any loss of time. At least, it seemed of deadly importance to her.

She had been so unusually insistent at the West End Employment Bureau that morning that the secretary had told her of the post, to get rid of her.

"Take the Tube. Mrs Malvoisin will not interview applicants after twelve, and you've cut it very fine," she said, speaking as though it were Miss Wing's fault that she was late.

Miss Wing had rushed and taken her ticket, only to stampede before the unforeseen peril of the escalator.

Her eyes filled with tears, for she had eaten no breakfast. She had no money to pay for a taxi. The fact was, she had been out of work for so long that she could not budget for rent after the end of week. She did not know what to do; but she did what other people sometimes did.

Feeling suddenly desperate, she turned and charged the escalator. To her joy and surprise, it. was now filled with other passengers, who blocked her view of the long drop. Squeezed behind the screen of a blessed portly lady, she sailed lightly down to the train.

Not long afterwards she stood in the vestibule of a luxury hotel, and stated her business to a reception clerk.

"What name?" he asked.

"Miss Wing."

It was second nature to think of herself as "Miss Wing," because she was used only to the official title. No one had called her by her Christian title for about fifty years. That is to say, when one is young one year seems as long as. ten; and it was five years since the last of her friends and relatives had faded out.

All the same, she missed her Christian name. On the rare occasions now when she dreamed of romance, she told herself that it would begin when a man wanted to know that name.

As she waited in the splendor of the lounge, she began to realise the forlorn nature of her quest. Mrs Malvoisin was an American lady of old family and immense wealth, and would naturally insist on the highest qualifications and credentials.

She told herself that she had not even a chance of success, when she was conducted to a magnificent suite and into the presence of Mrs Malvoisin, who was a stately dame with a faultless silver water-wave.

"It is after twelve," she said. "But I always allow three minutes' grace to everyone. Not a second longer."

Miss Wing's heart sank still lower at this unpromising beginning. But, as the interview progressed, she gradually began to grasp the fact that all this overpowering pomp and circumstance was in her favor.

Mrs Malvoisin was sufficiently a personage to dispense with precedent. She applied only the personality test to the applicants for the post of companion to her only daughter on their European tour.

In her eyes, Miss Wing was a most suitable candidate. Although young, she somehow did not suggest youth. It was difficult to credit her with affairs of her own. She knew, too, the importance of showing a good front at all costs. Her grey suit was fashionably tight on her thin figure; she also wore high heels and used a discreet lipstick.

Miss Wing soon grasped the essential facts. The daughter— who, unlike Miss Wing, was called exclusively by her Christian name— was engaged to an entirely desirable and wealthy youth in New York. A beautiful and attractive girl, however, is bound to attract masculine society— which was, indeed, essential to her pleasure— so Baba was always accompanied by some young man.

This escort was an asset, since he was as much protection as an irksome detective, but his presence made some kind of chaperonage a necessity.

"You understand, Miss Wing," explained Mrs Malvoisin. "Although the risk of kidnapping is comparatively slight over here, it is safer for her to go about with some young man of our personal acquaintance. Baba is not likely to lose her head or her heart. But we cannot run risks. You must never leave her. If you neglect your duty even once, I must tell you plainly that your services will be no longer required."

"I will never leave her," promised Miss Wing fervently. She added: "But won't she hate having me always with her?"

"You must use tact. Besides, Baba has always been used to good companionship. It is very hard to be a rich girl, Miss Wing."

It does credit to Miss Wing's imagination that, even in her special circumstances, she was able to agree, without a touch of irony.

She left the hotel, engaged to enjoy a luxurious Continental holiday at a very high salary. All she had to do in return was to be a limpet and stick to Baba, without suspicion of unpleasant suction.

"There must be a string to it, she thought, as she walked exultantly back to her room. "I expect the girl will be a cat."

In her experience of nouveaux riches, she had learned to connect wealth with insults. But Baba was the most charming rich girl she had ever met— beautiful, accomplished, and gay. Since she had been brought up with more pomp than a princess, it was impossible for her to view life from quite the same angle as an ordinary citizen; but she was actually elevated by her wealth above petty standards.

In her turn, she found Miss Wing her nicest companion. She was tireless, sensible, and discreet. Very soon she was accepted as part of the heiress's background.

For all that, she was a clog on complete freedom, and Baba took a sporting view of the position. If she could get rid of Miss Wing by fair means, it was up to her to profit by the opportunity.

Miss Wing soon found out that Baba was trying to discover her weak spot; and she knew that, if it were tapped, she would exploit that special inhibition whenever she wanted a brief flutter of liberty.

She tested Miss Wing in a variety of ways. They went to swimming pools, where— however chilly the water— Miss Wing swam with Baba, stroke for stroke. They patronised the dansants, but the most fascinating partner could not tempt Miss Wing to dance. They took strenuous excursions, where they stumbled through the dark, stony, underground passages of ruined chateaux and abbeys. Miss Wing often got headaches, and she cracked the heels of one shoe; but she always emerged into daylight outwardly fresh as paint.

IN spite of these hectic interludes, she enjoyed every minute of her wonderful holiday.

Every day, too, she saw increasing possibilities in her job. She noticed that, when Baba spoke of the future, she included her as a permanent member of the household. "I must show you this or that when we're back in New York," was a frequent remark.

Miss Wing's imagination widened the loophole, until she grew to hope that the job might prove her old-age pension. She might stay on, after Baba's marriage, to help oil the wheels of staff management. Baba, too, might be starting a nursery.

But when they motored through glamorous valleys, dim and green as faded tapestry, winding down long hairpin bends to the river of long grass which rippled through the narrow gorge, and up again to the opposite crest— always crowned with a chateau— she dreamed of other things. Under the influence of the mediaeval landscape, she thought of that fabulous lover who— with his magic formula— would rend the shrivelled sheath of "Miss Wing," and draw out from it a girl with a name of her very own.

At such times she was unconscious of Baba and her young man. Although he was charged nearly as frequently as the water of the average swimming bath, he always seemed the same youth to her— tall, athletic, with thick, wavy hair and a jutting chin. He wore long, baggy plus fours, breathed physical energy, and answered to some short name, such as "Jim" or "Bill."

These escorts often resented Miss Wing, although the first sign of discourtesy was severely crushed by Baba. The last escort of all seemed to feel the cramping element most keenly. He had more definite personality than the others— less chin and more brow— and his name was "Meredith."

As a matter of fact, he was a romantic, and the scenery was calling him to use it as atmosphere in an episode which should make a perfect memory. Although he was not in love with Baba, he wanted to be, since her beauty and engagement ring invested her with the glamor of a lost cause.

One day he tackled Miss Wing on the subject.

"Do you never fade out, Miss Wing?"

"Never." Her reply was prompt. "I'm paid to protect Baba."

"Why has she got to be protected?"

"Because she's young and beautiful— and rich."

With slight amusement, he glanced down at the fly-weight, Miss Wing.

"And who protects you?" he asked.

"I don't need protection. I'm just a— a sort of a limpet. And I mean to stick."

"Until we find a way to shake you off."

At the hint of a threat Miss Wing looked anxious.

"You needn't mind me," she assured him. "You can say anything you like, just as if I wasn't there. I don't listen."

"Why not? Haven't you ears?"

As he spoke he noticed that her hair was tucked in curls, behind ears which were small and attractive. Although his approval was not lost upon Miss Wing, she continued to protest.

"Of course, I have the usual features. But I want you to understand this. I'm just official. I don't register."

IN spite of Meredith's determination to dislodge her, Miss Wing felt happy and secure. The fact that there were no more attempts to probe her weak spot was evidence that Baba had grown discouraged. It was, therefore, with the fatal confidence which heralds a fall, that she got out of the car, one darkish autumn afternoon, and stood on the cobbled pavement of a small, ancient town. All around the square loomed antique buildings, like derelict vessels in a dead port, while mist arose from the river which flowed turgidly through the valley.

"What do we do here?" asked Baba, who was thorough in her travels.

"There's only one thing to do in this live burg," replied Meredith, who had been there before. "We climb up to the citadel."

Miss Wing looked up at the dim stone battlements, just visible at the top of a bosky precipice, and reflected that they were faced with a stiff uphill walk. It was rather a shock, therefore, after Meredith had escorted them through a door, and paid a small entrance fee, to see, rising up before her, two unusually long flights of steps.

They were so steep that, when they reached the top, the party sat down on a stone bench to recover their wind. Already they had risen far above the houses, whose roofs were smudged with beaten-down smoke rising from the chimneys. Looking down, they had a view of the river and the steamers churning the yellowish water.

"Is it a stiff pull up to the top?" asked Baba, who did not like walking.

"No," replied Meredith. "It's steps all the way up."

"That's better. How many?"

"Over four hundred. I counted them once, but I forget the exact number."

Miss Wing's heart dropped a beat. Four hundred steps. She imagined a staircase, composed of fifty steps, and she put eight of these staircases on end. The result was a veritable nightmare vision.

To her joy, Baba shrugged and lit a cigarette.

"If this town wants me to take their citadel they must install a lift," she declared. "I'm parking here."

"But you must do it," protested Meredith. "When you get back home and tell people you've been here, the first thing they'll ask is: Did you go up to the citadel?'"

"Don't care if they do."

"Yes, you will. You hate to be beaten.... Anyway, I'm going."

Springing up, he swung along a plank bridge, fringed with mountain ash, and disappeared.

It was quiet after he had gone. Miss Wing realised the fatal blank, and was about to propose a descent to the town for tea, when Baba jumped up from the bench.

"That boy's right," she said. "I hate to be beaten. We'll catch him up."

Miss "Wing did not betray her discomfiture; her face was set like a stone, but she felt as shrinking within as a bit of ice on a fishmonger's slab in midsummer. She obediently followed Baba around the corner, where another long flight of steps was built into the precipice.

Looking up, she saw other staircases rising, one above the other, in a giddy perspective. They were broken up into flights, but Miss Wing thought of the inevitable descent, when she would be forced to look down at the town, so far below. Instantly her head began to spin at the threat of altitude.

If she were suddenly overpowered by vertigo and fell, at the best she might sprain her ankle. It was about equal to a broken neck, for, if she were incapacitated, she would be of no more use to Mrs Malvoisin.

Miss Wing had no illusions about her employer. She had not proved her value yet, and was still on trial with the august lady.

Miss Wing remembered those last ghastly days of unemployment and resolved to hang on to her luck, at whatever risk. The pity of it was that when she crashed— as she knew she would— and was met at the Door by St. Peter, he would ask her a question

"What name?"

And she would have to answer, "Miss Wing".

The fear of losing her job was greater even than her dread of the steps. Even while she was conscious of every foot she rose took her up further from the ground, she led the way, climbing grimly, with the tireless precision of a machine.

Her mechanical movements were noticed, with ironical amusement, by Meredith, who was resting about half way up.

"I knew you wouldn't bilk," he called out to Baba. "Sit down and admire the view. Now, isn't that worth a little effort?"

His enthusiasm was somewhat forced for visibility was poor, and part of the town was wiped out by mist. Miss WW stared down on to a confused huddle of buildings— ominously dwarfed-and a coil of the river, spanned with miniature bridges. It was rather like looking at a picture through a reducing-glass, and she moistened her lips nervously.

Baba was swift to sense her discomfort.

"Tired, Miss Wing?" she asked. "Would you rather rest here while we go on?"

The honey-sweet voice put Miss Wing on her guard. If once Baba suspected her obsession, this would be merely the beginning of a series of dizzy adventures which would lead inevitably to the sack!

"No, thanks," she replied. "I don't feel my legs a bit."

"Of course not." Meredith spoke quickly. "She never does. Miss Wing feels nothing. And she doesn't see and doesn't hear."

Miss Wing could not know that his bitterness was inspired by annoyance at any frustration of Nature. She thought it arose from his personal dislike of the chaperon. Biting her lip, she turned her back on her companions and watched the procession of tourists down the steps.

It was evident that she was alone in her obsession, for the citadel had been stormed by a number of visitors. She noticed, too, something else which gave her a flutter of hope.

"Everyone seems to be going down," she said. "No one's coming up. I wonder if we are too late to get in."

Meredith ruthlessly slew her excuse.

"Then we'd better push off again," he said. "Follow me, my children."

They followed him. Up... up. Higher and higher, with the town dropping lower at every step. Even to sound hearts and lungs it was a gruelling ascent to make against time, and, before very long, they were forced to rest again on a stone slab.

"Good drop," remarked Meredith approvingly, looking over the side. We can't be far from the top.

Clinging to her seat Miss Wing saw that a sinister change had indeed taken place in the view. The bridges now appeared as black filaments, spanning stream. Steamers had shrunk to water beetles, while the buildings had dwindled to misted suggestions of mushrooms.

Unluckily, Baba put her vague fear into words. "Are we as high as the Roman Catholic Cathedral in London?" she asked.

"Higher than that," replied Meredith. "We're about on a level with the top of the Empire Building.

His statistics were of no value, he had forgotten the height of either building. But he knew that Baba wanted to be thrilled, so he obliged.

Had he known the effect of his careless words upon the other girl he would chivalrously have kicked himself all the way down those impressive stairs.

They had made Miss Wing realise the exact position, as she remembered photographs of the Empire building.

"When you're at the top you can feel it sway, can't you?" she asked in a small, controlled voice.

"Of course," replied Meredith. "It wouldn't be safe if it didn't give. "

In that case, Miss Wing, too, was secure, for she felt herself suddenly rock, as though in the throes of violent  disintegration

Meredith glanced at his wrist watch, and then urged them on again.

"There's rather a dizzy bit ahead of us," he warned them.  "Watch your step."

THEY came to it at the top of the next staircase,  when they had climbed clear of the bushes and small trees which clung to the bluff,  and reached the sheer rock.

Just above them rose the high wall of the fort, and, clinging to it on  one side, was built  the last flight of steps.

It swung directly over a gulf of vacancy high above the town, the trees, the Cathedral. An iron hand-rail was the only protection from the drop down into the abyss. Miss Wing felt exactly as though she were in her special nightmare. Every fibre seemed to weaken, every muscle relax. Her legs doubled under her weight, like wax tapers. She was conscious of a horrible sensation at the base of her spine, as though a steel finger were prodding an exposed nerve,

For one ghastly moment she felt as though she must faint.... Then she realised that Baba had pushed past her and was mounting the steps, forcing a thrill the while, with shrill cries of excitement.

"Meredith, look down. There's the top the cathedral. Oh, what a way below! Meredith, I'm going to drop my handkerchief. Oo! Look at it, miles below. It looks like a bit of confetti. Oh! I can't see it now." .

Baba. Her job. With a stupendous effort Miss Wing forced herself to go on. She found that she could just manage to pull herself upward, step by step, if she looked up into the woolly sky, and never relaxed for a second her grip of the rail.

Suddenly she thought she heard footsteps coming toward her, and she wondered vaguely what would happen if someone came down just as she was fling up. They would meet— and neither could give way. They would be stranded in mid-air, between the earth and the sky.

A; ghastly thought, which made her look down from the clouds. She saw no one  on the steps, but below her was a terrible chasm of misted air, pricked by twin spires.

It was the top of the cathedral, far below her. At the sight, her stomach seemed to turn over. Everything began to spin round. The sky was growing black.

She shut her eyes desperately and clung to the rail. As her strength returned she continued to pull herself up, automatically, like the reflex movements of a dead snake, until her foot reached the level.

Looking up, she saw before her, an ancient door in the  wall, and a dangling below which was painted "SONNEZ".

The others had just entered, so the official was prompt to answer her ring. Directly she had passed through the ponderous portals, into the courtyard, she experienced a blessed sense of safety.

Massive stone buildings ringed her, enclosing a quadrangle of vivid green grass, where the flowers of summer lingered in autumnal decay. On one side  was a hind of makeshift refreshment room, filled with chattering children in charge of two nuns and an elderly priest.

Baba, as usual, insisted on a tour of the museum and the fort, so Miss Wing accompanied her like a faithful shadow.

Presently they returned to the quadrangle, where the priest was photographing  his flock. Baba and Meredith few sat down at a small table, to drink beer, while Miss Wing carried her black coffee a discreet distance away.

She stared listlessly across at the shrivelled red rambler roses on the opposite wall. The afternoon was grey and cheerless, as though the very air were draped in cobwebs. Her heart heavy with foreboding, when the priest finished photographing the children, and plumped himself down on the same bench as herself.

Presently Miss Wing felt compelled to speak, indirectly, of her fear.

"Isn't it dangerous to bring children up here?" she asked.

"Why?" The priest was surprised. "It is not a mountain climb. There is no danger in walking upstairs."

"But that last bit," Miss Wing shuddered in retrospect. "The side is quite open, and you look down on such an awful drop."

"There is a rail to hold on by. Naturally, we caution the little ones and help those who are smallest. We take reasonable care, and we know the Saints will protect them."

Miss Wing— who was a Protestant— felt a surge of envy for a religion which could ensure invisible protection. Looking into the priest's kindly face, she spoke impulsively.

"Do you believe in miracles?"

"Certainly," he replied. "They are happening every minute. Of course, they are not spectacular supernatural events, but everyday trifles which are projected divinely, to meet a special crisis."

"Ah! Then a miracle could happen, to save me?"

"If you have faith." The priest looked intently at her pale face, and added: "Surely miracles have happened to you before? Think, Madame!"

Suddenly Miss Wing's face lit up. She remembered her job, which she had always placed in the class of supernatural luck. But now, she realised that the actual miracle was a trifle of everyday occurrence, when an opportune straggle of passengers had lined up before her on the escalator.

It was not so haphazard as it appeared. It was a slack time, and the station was rarely crowded. Had it remained deserted for only a brief period longer, Mrs Malvoisin's precious three minutes of grace would have run out, and she would have refused to grant an interview.

Meredith, who chanced to be glancing in Miss Wing's direction, surprised the glow which transfigured her face. His pulse suddenly quickened in response. It called to some vital need within himself, reached some hidden sanctuary, which Baba, for all her beauty and charm, had never penetrated.

For a moment the machine had actually turned into a girl. An attractive girl, charged with the vitality of youth and health, and also refined by spirit. But, even as he watched her, the flame was blown out.

Miss Wing had just remembered the ordeal in front of her. Again, she asked herself however she was going to get down that first awful flight. It was true that she had once seen a stout lady descend the steps of a pier backwards; but, were she to follow her example, she would betray her vulnerable spot to Baba.

And she knew that, while Baba would be sweet and sympathetic, her perfect companion would' drop in her esteem. It would be impossible for her to understand a weakness which she would connect with cowardice. If she wanted to keep her job, she must never expose the fatal heel of Achilles.

Conscious of the priest's sympathetic gaze, she tried to explain her discomfort.

"The air is not very bracing up here," she said.

"But you are only on a level with most of the countryside," he reminded her. "It is the town which is buried in a pit."

Miss Wing, who had foolishly imagined herself perched on the top of a tower, laughed faintly.

"Silly of me. Then I suppose there are other ways of reaching the citadel?"

"There is a winding road at the back, used by the waggons which bring up the army stores," he told her.

For a mad second she again glimpsed release. She could return to the town by that road. Only— it meant leaving Baba, who certainly would not wish to accompany her. And if she deserted her charge, it meant the sack.

She clung passionately to her job. It was her salvation. It had driven away the spectres of the past, given her a grip on the present, inspired her with hope for the future.

Conscious that Baba was catching her eye, she crossed over to her table.

"Nearly time to go," said the girl. "So stop flirting with your priest."

"He was only telling me that there is a road at the back for army lorries," explained Miss Wing gravely.

To her surprise, Baba's eyes began to sparkle.

"I'll sell you an idea," she cried. "It's dull to come back the same way. We'll ride down in a lorry."

"I don't buy," declared Meredith. "For you'll want to drive. Hairpin bends on a greasy road. Not on my life."

"Then Miss Wing and I will go without you."

AS the young couple began to bicker, Miss Wing— discreet even before the threat of Eternity— slipped back to her bench.

Her heart was bursting with a newborn hope. A miracle might happen, to save her. Her future hung on Baba's whim, and also on the outcome of that clash of wills. She cared nothing for motoring perils, and could take her chance of any as lightly as a dirt-track racing ace.

"I must have faith," she thought.

Closing her eyes, she shut out the grim old walls and the shrivelled screen of crimson roses. Dimly conscious of the shrill voices of children and the soft cooing of doves, she concentrated.

"I will believe. It will happen. I have faith."

She lost all sense of time. Presently she became aware that the priest was wishing her good-bye. She sat up with a start, and noticed that it was perceptibly darker.

"I was thinking of miracles," she said. "Mercy, what a fog!"

"That, alas! is no miracle, but a misfortune," laughed the priest. "We get them constantly in autumn. When the wind is in a certain quarter it blows the smoke from the chemical factory right into the damp air."

"Then we ought to be getting down," said Miss Wing, turning towards the small table.

To her dismay it was empty.

"My friends," she cried. "Have you seen them?"

"A pretty young lady in green and a young man?" he asked. "Yes, they have already left."

The priest nodded towards the ancient door in the wall, and added: "The young lady beckoned to you. I thought you saw her."

"How long ago?"

Miss Wing could understand French; but he answered her in a language which she could not translate.

He shrugged and turned away.

Miss Wing's heart seemed to stop beating. How long? The answer was a shrug. Half a minute— five— or even longer? She knew that her fate hung on the difference.

It would never occur to Baba to wait for her below. In spite of her charm, she was a spoiled young autocrat. All her life she had been waited on and accompanied everywhere. Others waited for her, but she did not wait for them.

Besides, there was no reason for her to wait, in view of the fact that Miss Wing knew their rendezvous.

While it appeared simple, Miss Wing remembered that Mrs Malvoisin had arranged to meet the party at the prearranged hotel on their way to another town. When Baba came with her escort and minus the companion Miss Wing's job would be gone.

In a panic, she rushed outside and stood looking down on to a thick bank of baffling mist. Straining her eyes, she could see no looming shadows. The fog had swallowed up Baba completely.

Immediately her brain began to boil with horrible possibilities. She remembered that Meredith—unlike the other escorts— was not a friend of the family, but a hotel acquaintance, introduced by a  mutual friend. In spite of his engaging personality— in fact, probably because of it — he might be a fortune  hunter.

Or— he might even be one of a kidnapping gang, who had made the fog his opportunity.

At the thought, Miss Wing lost her last shred of self-control. She did not know where she was, or what she did, although she tried to run. Yet she not seem to advance as the fog swirled around her in a dun blanket— muffling her, binding her, confusing her senses.

Only one thing was clear m
she arrived at the hotel without Baba, or whether Baba arrived, unharmed, without her, she had lost her job.

So great was her mental agony she appeared actually afflicted with symptoms of physical distress. She was sick and giddy; her heart was leaping madly, while iron bands clamped her temples.

Her job was gone. She had no money to face the future, for her first salary  had been spent in buying clothes necessary for her position. And the fog was everywhere—all around her, below her, inside her.

Her job was gone. As she paused for breath, suddenly she heard Baba laugh a few yards below her. Instantly her fear of unemployment was swept away, and she became aware that she was standing at the top of a flight stairs, walled with vacancy, lead down to unseen depths.

Her knees began to shake violently, as all the familiar sensations of vertigo rushed at her in a mass attack. Then, to her horror, like a liner looming up, through a fog, appeared the magnified figure of a gigantic black-clad female, who was pulling herself upwards by the

They met, and neither would give in a short but desperate encounter, Miss Wing clung, like a limpet to the slippery bar of iron, but the woman's superior weight won the day. Forcing the girl aside, she rolled on, like a relentless machine, still holding on

Pushed out into the middle of the stairway, Miss Wing felt her heel give way under her. She stumbled, balanced, clutched the empty air, and fell.

She fell....

It was like her nightmare a ghastly moment of breathless agony. She knew  that the cathedral spires, the trees, the houses, must all be rushing up to her. Then she felt herself caught in a pair of tweed arms and heard Meredith laugh.

"Good tackle" he said.

Unable to believe in her safety,  she clung to his neck. ,

"Did I fall far?"she panted.

"Not far to fall," was the reply. "We're nearly at the bottom.".

Miss Wing could hardly believe her ears, although she vaguely remembered her brain-storm and how, while it lasted, it blotted out everything else.

"Did I— I must have come down very quickly," she said.

"Like an avalanche," declared Baba. "No wonder you slipped on those slimy steps."

"No wonder," echoed Meredith. "Look at her broken heel. She threw that in just to make it more difficult. What a mountaineer you'd make."

Suddenly Miss Wing began to laugh, while she thrilled with triumphant life. The Priest had said that the fog was no miracle. Yet in spite of her mental turmoil, she knew she could never have made that perilous descent if the empty gulfs of space around her had not been mercifully veiled.

Meredith watched her transformed face with a thrill which welcomed romance. And since he naturally wanted to know the name of a girl who had awakened his pulse, he spoke on impulse.

"Next time you feel like falling, let me know, and I'll be waiting around,  Miss— What's your Christian name?"

Miss Wing told him... Exit Miss Wing

_________________

7: Green Ginger

The Grand Magazine June 1927

Australian Women's Weekly 5 May 1934

JOYCE'S coloring was charming— her line was perfect. She was so exclusive— the last word in simplicity and chic. She came to Lewis Pomeroy when he was in his bath, for Joyce was a jumper-suit.

Lewis Pomeroy was a designer in the dress establishment of a certain Major Lucas, who called himself "Mary." He was a thin-faced, eager young man, who beamed at the world through horn-rimmed glasses with something of the enthusiasm of a stray pup which has, at long last, found a home.

He had only learned to sketch after the war, when other doors had been closed, owing to ill-health. After months of privation, his modest salary seemed a fortune. To add further zest to life, he was in love with "Mary's" head mannequin, Bonnie Doon.

Ambition to marry Bonnie made Pomeroy keen as mustard on his work. He had already attracted fresh custom to "Mary," and, on the strength of "Joyce," he meant to apply for an increase in salary.

The first model from his sketch had already been finished in elephant's breath and ashes of roses, while a letter— hand-written— had been sent to an important client, inviting her to a private view.

On the morning of the inspection, Pomeroy walked along the High Street, thinking only of "Joyce." The sun was shining and the streets looked clean and picturesque in the mellow light.

It was an historic borough, crusted with tradition, and it had slept for centuries by the side of its green, sluggish river. Recently, however, it had given signs of awaking to civic ambition. There was talk of municipal swimming baths and a free library. For the past two years it had pos-sessed a picture palace, although this was due to the enterprise of a non-local syndicate and was already showing signs of sleepy sickness.

Among the citizens who planned to put their town on the map were Major Lucas— whose other name was "Mary"— and Morgan Bros., the drapers.

A great trade rivalry existed between the two. "Mary" was high-class and charged exorbitant prices. It also prided itself on the exclusive possession of a staff of four mannequins and an artist. While it pretended to ignore the existence of Morgan Bros., it could not blind itself to the fact that a good stream of money flowed into the till of its plebeian rival.

Morgan Bros. was a big, ill-built shop, without pretension to style. It did a roaring trade in cheap readymades, but it could not attract the cream of the population.

Lately new blood had come into the business in the person of a nephew, young Charles Morgan, fresh from the "Bon Marche," Paris. He was goodlooking, and smart, in a hard and glossy fashion, and had at once proved himself a live wire.

His first action had been to scrap all the pallid dummies in the shop window and then to install a flock of gorgeous waxen beauties, who eclipsed even the charms of "Mary's" mannequins.

Pomeroy, therefore, was a little apprehensive of the future. Recently Charles Morgan had paid marked at-tentions to Bonnie Doon, which she had accepted with her habitual dreamy complacency.

Smiling at the thought of "Joyce," Pomeroy paused to bestow his usual glance of veiled contempt at the window of Morgan Bros. In spite of the gulf between them the rivals watched each other like panthers on the pounce.

As he gazed, the smile left Pomeroy's lips.

Before him was "Joyce."

Rather it was a line of "Joyce's" in crudest shades of grey and pink. A large placard proclaimed: "Snappy Suits for Misses, 39s. 11½d."

At first Pomeroy was unable to believe the evidence of his eyes. Yet. in spite of her degradation, the model was his "Joyce." He recognised his own distinctive touches, which are the hall-mark of creative art, and which had raised her above the level of or-dinary jumper suits.

HE walked on mechanically, reeling like a man in a bad dream. The theft admitted but one explanation— treachery. As he grew calmer, he tried to trace it to its source.

Only three persons had seen the model "Joyce," and these were the Major, Miss Beaver, the head dress-maker, who had copied the sketch, and Bonnie Doon, who had served as her dummy.

The Major was, of course, out of the question, and so was Miss Beaver, who had grown grey in the employ of the Major's mother, Madame Char-lotte. Reluctantly, Pomeroy began to think of Bonnie Doon.

She was a mystery to everyone, for it was impossible to tell whether she veiled a shrewd brain under a manner of rustic simplicity, or if she was, in reality, as green as grass.

Her short life had been passed on a farm, buried deep in the country. But in spite of this she knew how to enter and win first prize in a West Country beauty competition.

Armed with the newspaper reproduction of her photograph as her testimonial, she took the cheap half-day fare to the county town.

Arrived, she displayed remarkable flair; unattracted by the large plateglass windows of Morgan Bros., she presented herself at the unpretentious establishment of "Mary."

She was interviewed by the Major, who saw at a glance that there was no question as to her beauty. She was a real blonde with honey-yellow hair, deep sea-blue eyes and a complexion of roses and snow.

The Major was not only susceptible to a pretty face, but alive to its or-namental value in his business. Otherwise, he would have turned down Bonnie at once.

He liked his girls to be of good address and what he termed "quick in the uptake." But Bonnie was slow in answering his questions and her speech revealed the limited vocabu-lary of one who had passed her life among silent rustics.

Against his own judgment, the Major decided to try her out in the sales department of his elegant shop.

So Bonnie went into ribbons. Within a week she was reported to be careless and simple to the verge of simplicity. She lived in a dream. When ordered to take a message to the Major's office she was found wander-ing in the basement.

"She's a hopeless hayseed," declared the scornful cashier. "She doesn't know the difference between a florin and half a crown."

"Hum!" reflected the Major. "Pay her sixpence short on her wages and see!"

The experiment was tried. Within five seconds of opening her pay en-velope. Bonnie was back at the cashier's desk.

"Please you've given me a florin instead of half a crown." She added politely, "by mistake, of course!"

The Major stepped forward.

"So you do know the difference when it happens to be your own money and not the firm's," he said dryly.

Bonnie began to cry. She declared that she was not accustomed to money, since her mother and elder sisters always presided over their stall at the market.

"And indeed. Mr. 'Mary,' " she cried, "I always looked after the firm! Directly I saw the horrid things were so much alike I always wrote down whatever was given me as a florin. So you see, if the customer didn't notice, the firm got sixpence. Indeed, indeed, I wouldn't be dishonest for the world!"

The cashier hid her smile with a manicured hand.

"Now I consider it, Major," she said, "the mistake was always in favor of 'Mary.' But it's not pleasant for me to have complaints from the public, especially now she's proved that she really knows the difference."

"But that's different," declared Bonnie earnestly. "If you had to provide yourself with clean lodgings, nourishing food and decent clothes on that"— she held up her pay envelope— you'd know if you were a farthing short right through the paper."

"Aren't you paid enough?" asked the Major uneasily.

"You're never paid enough if you want to get on," said Bonnie. "And I want to get on. It was the dream of my life to come to a select, high-class, aristocratic establishment like 'Mary.' It's not like trade. It's more like a society bazaar. And now I must go in the ribbons at Morgan Bros!"

The Major noticed that she took for granted her engagement by Morgan Bros. And he knew that she was right.

It galled, him to think of his beautiful Miss Doon being unrooted from his beautiful shop and transplanted to a bargain-basement concern like Morgan Bros.

"You spoke just now of 'nourishing food,' Miss Doon," he said reflectively. "Need it be so very nourishing? If you were a shade thinner, I might consider you as a mannequin."

"They say I have a perfect figure," said Bonnie simply.

"That is my point. A mannequin must not possess such an indiscretion. She must be line. All line. She has to display extreme modes.... Well?"

"I'll give up pudding," Bonnie promised passionately. "And, of course, I'll get the same wages as the mannequins, for my Union would never let me go for less."

It was the first time the Major had been threatened with bogy.

"You belong to a Union?" he asked.

"Not yet," Bonnie assured him. "It's not necessary when you're dealing with a gentleman."

So Bonnie Doon became a mannequin and history was repeated. In this capacity she was again a failure. She was slow in obeying the summons when the head saleswoman whistled down the tube to the mannequins' resting room, and she was unskilful in wriggling into skin-tight gowns.

Worse than this, although she was prettier than the other mannequins, she did not display her models to advantage. She was utterly lacking in clothes sense. For a person must be keen on what he sells— be it gin or giraffes— otherwise he will never persuade anyone to take home a giraffe, with a reduction for two.

Once again the Major had to face Bonnie's expulsion. By this time, he— like his artist— had fallen under the spell of Bonnie's sweetness and unfailing good temper. He was of the type which does not exact brains with beauty.

So he resolved to make Bonnie head mannequin, with charge of the model gowns and authority over the other mannequins. Her honesty and loyalty to the firm would stand him in good stead. She would see that no one wasted the gas and also be on view, on special occasions, when a new creation wanted the advertisement of her beauty.

AS he walked onward to his dreaded interview with his employer, Pomeroy reviewed Bonnie's history. When he thought of her blue eyes he was positive that she was innocent of intrigue. She was a darling, but green— green as the grass.

Yet he could not blind himself to the fact that Bonnie, although a new-comer, was drawing a higher salary than that paid to any other girl by "Mary."

"Mary's" looked more like a private house than a shop. It had a win-dow, but it displayed nothing but some scant orchid drapery. The door was rather similar to a sheet of expensive stationery— grey, with a small silver "Mary" enscrolled in one corner.

Pomeroy slithered over the Persian rugs and polished parquet of the salon until he reached the Major's office.

The Major was lean and grey; he was dressed in grey, also, finished with white spats, four violets and a monocle.

He greeted Pomeroy with a hungry smile.

"Well, Pomeroy?" His voice was thin and toneless. "Another inspiration? A little sister for 'Joyce'?"

Pomeroy felt his throat go dry. Hitherto he had not tasted the bitter fruits of failure.

"I— I've got bad news, sir," he stam-mered. "They're showing 'Joyce' at Morgan Brothers!"

The Major listened to his story in stony silence.

"You've sold us a pup this time, Pomeroy," he said. "I must cancel the appointment with her ladyship, since we can no longer show 'Joyce' as a feature. You represented her as your original design, whereas she's simply a rehash of something you've seen— and forgotten— in a fashion journal. Unless," he added sharply, "you've shown your rough sketch to some outsider?"

"Is that likely, sir?" Pomeroy's thin cheeks showed his working muscles. "I swear she is original, and some-one's pinched her. But I'm entirely unable to explain it. No one saw the sketch except the dressmaker and— Except the dressmaker."

"And Miss Doon." The Major, who hunted, did not shirk the fence. "Well, we can wash out the dressmaker.

She's the soul of loyalty. As for Miss Doon, I'll tell you an incident which illustrates her keen notion of honesty."

"I don't need assurance, sir."

"Neither do I. As you know, she has made good in her new post. Yet not long ago she wanted to give notice, because she could not condone the dishonesty of the other mannequins. There were tears in her eyes— tears, Pomeroy— when she told me that they were in the habit of wearing the silk stockings, which we supply, to parties. I had trouble in assuring her that so long as they did not exceed the number of pairs allowed by the firm, we had to look down our noses at that sort of practice."

"Fine!" said Pomeroy earnestly. "Miss Doon is the last person to suspect. She's the soul of simplicity."

The Major took up a book of fashions.

"Sorry, Pomeroy, but I can spare you no more time. I hope there will be no repetition of this incident. I can only pay a salary for original
work."

Pomeroy's knees were rather shaky as he walked to the door. The Major's words suggested the lean days of un-employment.

He turned again at his employer's voice.

"I agree with you, Pomeroy. Miss Doon is the soul of simplicity. But— have you ever considered her name? 'Doon' is common and 'Bonnie' rather uncommon. But the juxtaposition does not strike me as altogether disingenuous."

Pomeroy's smile was twisted as he walked downstairs to the mannequins' room. Of course, everyone had a perfect trust in Bonnie.

Of course.

THE mannequins' room was in the basement. It was a real den, dingy, warm from a flaring gas-fire, and artificially lit. The girls were in their orchid wrappers, waiting for the sound of the whistle. They each wore flesh-hued satin slips and silk stockings and shoes to match— all the property of "Mary."

Pomeroy entered to a chorus of laughter, for the girls were at leisure. The brunette smoked a cigarette, while the brown-haired beauty worked at a cross-word puzzle. A little girl with a pert bob and an orchid frock made cocoa for her superiors.

The blonde, who was busy with her make-up, stopped in her occupation of spiking her eyelashes with some unguent which she applied with a match.

"Don't make me laugh!" she pleaded. "If any of this stuff gets in my eye it hurts like hell."

"No swearing, please!" It was Bon-nie's voice, muffled by a hanging cluster of swathed frocks. "Lowers the tone of 'Mary', girls."

When she emerged from her shelter, Pomeroy saw that her calm was ruffled.

"Just listen to those girls laughing!" she said. "They've just asked me some-thing silly about sticking a stamp on a letter or myself. But I'm not such a fool as I look, Have you seen this?"

She pointed to a paragraph in a fashion journal.

"I've just been reading about those mirrors they use in Rue de la Paix which make customers look slim. I think Mr. 'Mary' should know about them."

"He does," said Pomeroy. "And you ought to know enough of the Major to realise that he is above such dishonesty."

"Yes," mused Bonnie. "But think of the awful prices he charges for things which cost nearly nothing. But it's quite fair when it is business."

Looking at her soft apple-bloom cheeks. Pomeroy wondered whether the guileless Bonnie was not fooling them all.

He resolved to be on guard.

"Miss Doon," he asked, "will you be surprised to hear that 'Joyce' will not be shown to-day?"

She did not blink an eyelash. "Whoever's 'Joyce'?"

"Apparently you do not remember the model."

If Pomeroy hated himself for the use of the word "apparently," it made no impression on Bonnie. During his recital of the tragedy she preserved her poker-face of innocence.

"I'm so sorry," she murmured sweetly. What was more, she looked sorry. "But jumper suits are exactly alike, you know."

Pomeroy swallowed the heresy.

"Exactly. By the way, can you draw?"

Bonnie's blush of shame was genuine.

"No. I was always so busy on the farm I hadn't time to learn too much. But— but I won a beauty prize."

"Not hard work for you," said Pom-eroy gallantly.

"Well, it was rather, filling in all those coupons, voting for myself!"

Again Pomeroy fell under the spell of her crystal-clear eyes.

"Miss Doon," he said impetuously, "why do you go about with that outsider, Morgan?"

"Nephew? Oh, I like him. Such a gentleman. Always pays everywhere and doesn't take advantage. And we are taught in the country not to ex-pect something for nothing."

"But— but you'd never let him kiss you?" gasped Pomeroy.

"We are taught in the country exactly where to draw the line." was the calm response.

THE following week was a succession of dreary days for Pomeroy, as he vainly tried to recover his lost prestige by another inspiration for "Mary". He went for long walks, but the blue dusk flowing through the crooked streets of the town, so that it looked like a page torn from some old wives' tale, only filled him with the unrest of spring.

For his worry over the future was sharpened by the change in Bonnie. He knew that love renders some people silent and that Bonnie had seemed to return his own affection.

But it was patent that her former feeling for him was blotted out by a more powerful emotion. In his company she seemed to be in a dream, although he noted jealously that when he met her with the Morgan nephew she was chattering like a brooklet.

One evening, when a heavy cold made his brain too woolly for work, he asked Bonnie to accompany him to the pictures. Later, as they ate hot cheese cakes at the pastrycook's, he broke off in the middle of a sentence.

"You're not listening. Whom are you thinking of?"

"Dear Harold Lloyd."

As Pomeroy vainly tried to think of a citizen of that name, she enlightened him.

"I saw him in a lovely picture last week. It's the dream of my life to be a film actress. But I have blue eyes. It's awful to have blue eyes. They photograph white. "Mary Pickford has hazel eyes. Oh, dear!"

Pomeroy went home in the depths of depression and ordered boiled onions for supper. And then, when his eyes ran and his head ached, he was visited by a dream of inspired beauty.

Curling out of the smoke of his broth, he saw "Viola."

"VIOLA" was a rest gown— a filmy creation in faintest mushroom and glacier-green. She suggested twilight memory and lost love, which held a delicate hint of subtle intrigue.

Pomeroy worked half the night, and presented the Major with his finished wash-drawing in the morning.

"Excellent, Pomeroy," said his employer. "Your masterpiece. It has come at an opportune moment."

The faint red streak in his grey face showed that the Major was stirred with his first real civic growing pains. He glimpsed the possibilities of a word un-known in the vocabulary of the old town— that grey limpet clinging to its past.

Expansion.

In spite of the paradox of the empty gap in front, "Mary" carried all his goods in his shop window. Only the part of the premises which were public— the shop, salon and the Major's office— were decorated in the general scheme of grey panelling, dull-silver beading and orchid pile carpets.

The rest of the large rambling house was shabby and mouse-nibbled. The Major was now visited by a dream of converting two large first-floor rooms, at present used for stock, into an ele-gant lounge and high-class cafe, where the cream of the county could meet to listen to wireless music and watch the parade of the mannequins.

The chief difficulty was capital. He still had an overdraft at the bank in connection with his first venture. It was true that he had received an offer from a firm of local solicitors to sell his sole bit of property— a small fish shop, which lay between the large blocks of Morgan Bros. and the picture palace.

Although the premises were too small to be of value to Morgan Bros., the Major had inquired the name of the probable purchaser, for he had no in-tention of serving his rival. He was informed that the cinema company had made the offer in view of future structural alterations.

The sum offered was fair, but too low to be of much service for the Major's new needs. Moreover, the sale involved a sentimental surrender, for the fish shop had belonged to the Major's mother— Madame Charlotte— and like everyone in the town he was loyal to the past.

Unaware that he was following in the best speculative traditions, the Major resolved not to close with the offer for the present, but to lie low for a time.

HE came out of his dream as Pomeroy walked to the door— a new confidence in his look and bearing.

"If you are wise, Pomeroy, you will let no one see that sketch except the dressmaker. No one."

Pomeroy nodded. When he was back in his studio— its dirty distempered walls decorated with railway posters and Rackham reproductions— he felt a pang of real uneasiness.

Now that "Viola" stood for his second chance he remembered that he was still at a loss to trace the treachery which had stolen "Joyce."

Each of the principals, excluding Bonnie, was outside suspicion. It was absurd to credit a raw country girl with trained artistic talent which would have gained her a good salaried position. And he could not understand how she could have obtained posses-sion of his original sketch, which was guarded by the dressmaker by day and locked away in his desk every night.

The whole affair was a mystery which left him with the uneasy feeling that the dingy walls of his office screened prying eyes.

He turned his sketch face downwards as Bonnie entered.

"Miss Beaver wants you to see those patterns of lacquer-red georgette. She won't come in as she's in a hurry."

Feeling ashamed of his suspicions, Pomeroy went into the corridor and made a lightning choice. He told him-self the while that "Viola" was safe. She was too intricate a model for any-one to memorise in a couple of minutes.

Yet it gave him a shock when he returned, to find Bonnie looking at the sketch with vivid interest.

"Isn't it wonderful?" she cried. "I think it would look wonderful in a film. Don't you think it would photo-graph wonderfully?"

"Thanks!" was Pomeroy's sole comment as he held out his hand for the sketch.

He guarded "Viola" as closely as an official of the C.I.D. while she was copied by the dressmaker. The work was carried through at record speed as she was destined to be the special feature of "Mary's" spring display at the Bear Hotel, with a cup of tea thrown in.

Once again Pomeroy walked with the spring of hope, which was only dimmed as he watched the progress of "Joyce."

She had sold like hot cakes. Already she had passed from Grey Pink into Champagne Emerald, and was now being stocked in Navy White. Nearly every flapper in the town wore one of Morgan Bros.' Snappy Suits for Misses at 39/11½.'

On the tenth day after "Viola" had been finished. Pomeroy asked Bonnie to come for a walk. It was not a suc-cess, for although she was kind, her thoughts were plainly elsewhere.

"Boring you again?" he asked.

"Oh, no. But— you will talk of the shop. And I hate shops."

"Then why did you leave the farm?"

"I hate farms, too."

"What don't you hate, then?"

"The pictures." Her blue eyes sparkled. "If you'll keep a secret, I'll tell you something. I'm going in for this!"

She showed him a newspaper clipping which told of a film magnate's efforts to find fresh talent for the screen.

"You send in your photo," explained Bonnie. "Then you have a film test. Then they give you a contract."

"Sounds simple. But I wouldn't build on it!"

"There you go!" Bonnie showed her first sign of temper. "I'm boring you now. That's why I like talking to Morgan Nephew. We're both interested in photography, so we can talk together of the pictures."

"Got a camera?" asked Pomeroy.

"How funny your voice sounds!" remarked Bonnie. "Just like the Major's! He always talks as if his teeth had slipped and trodden his tongue flat."

"Good description. Got a camera?"

"Only a pocket one."

Pomeroy's heart began to hammer violently. A photograph would account for the fidelity with which all his touches had been copied. With a sinking at his heart he realised that Bonnie had been alone in his studio long enough to take a snapshot of "Viola."

In vain he told himself that he was the victim of nerves. Bonnie was inno-cent as daisies and dewdrops.

But he could not sleep that night. As he tossed in the fever of unrest every door seemed to shut. He was heavy-eyed next morning and leaden-soled, as he walked to his work.

When he reached Morgan Bros., it required an effort to raise his eyes.

And there—to justify his presenti-ment—in the middle of the window, was "Viola."

SHE was marked at three-and-a-half guineas, and in spite of himself, Pomeroy had to admit that she was a bargain at the price. He stared at her, held by the allure of her glacier-green fragility, until his eyes grew blurred. Even more than his interview with the Major he dreaded meeting Bonnie.

The Major regarded his polished nails while Pomeroy blurted out his tale.

"Striking coincidence," he drawled. "May I inquire what Morgan Brothers paid you for your duplicate sketch?"

At the words Pomeroy's self-control broke.

"Go to blazes!" he snapped.

In the pause that followed he seemed to hear his salary drop to the ground with the rustling of notes like withered autumn leaves.

As he blindly stumbled towards the door he turned at the sound of the Major's smooth voice.

"One minute, Pomeroy!"

"Why?" He turned. "I know I'm sacked. But no man shall say I doublecrossed him, and get away with it."

"Good! Two minutes, Pomeroy! I want to know if you suspect anyone of double play?"

Pomeroy's compressed lips gave him away.

"No, sir."

"Like that? Three minutes. Pomeroy! You have done good work for us and I can make allowance for the artistic temperament. Better take the day off and see if you can clear up the mystery."

Pomeroy felt vaguely that the Major was treating him decently, but he was too stunned for thanks. He knew that he could not trust himself to meet Bonnie. As he stepped into the sun-splashed street he felt that he had passed for the last time through the elegant portals of "Mary."

HE returned from his tramp in the country just before closing time, when the lamp-lighter was going his rounds.

The first person he met was Bonnie. As he approached, she paused before the window of Morgan Brothers and then audaciously pointed to the central model.

"Looks a bit like 'Viola,' " she said sweetly.

"I trace a resemblance," observed Pomeroy acidly. "In view of it, it may not surprise you to hear that I am leaving 'Mary'."

"Going-away?"

Bonnie looked blank, and the corners of her mouth began to droop.

"Going away," repeated Pomeroy. "Its been an education to meet you, but now it's Good-bye."

THE evening breeze, however— a nasty bit of work from the east— decreed otherwise. It whisked a corner of Bonnie's coat, revealing a glimpse of gleaming sequins.

"My hat!" murmured Pomeroy, as he recognised "Mary's" new Paris model. "What are you doing in that?"

Bonnie's eyes grew rather wide.

"Indeed, it's all right," she assured him. "I've only borrowed it for half an hour, to be photographed in. I'll take the greatest care of it. Why, do you know that the Major actually lets the mannequins wear their stockings to dances and make holes in them? He told me himself that I must learn to look down my nose at it."

"By why are you being photographed in it?" persisted Pomeroy.

Bonnie looked nervously up and down the street.

"Don't tell anyone! It's the competition. You have to pass a film test, so I'm having mine done by a photo-grapher who's a friend of Mr. Morgan's. And I simply must wear something special, for no promoter will look at you if you don't seem to have a wardrobe."

Pomeroy whistled as he suddenly saw daylight.

"And did you wear 'Joyce' and 'Viola' for these tests?" he inquired.

"Yes. But both were failures, so I have to be done again."

"I see. So Morgan's helping you. Kind man. But have you forgotten that 'Joyce' and 'Viola' were to be kept secret until they had been displayed by 'Mary'?"

Bonnie's eyes began to fill.

"But no one has seen them. Not even Mr. Morgan. Just the photographer, and he doesn't count. And the film test wouldn't be sent to the competition until after they'd both been sold again and again. Stop frightening me. I tell you it's all right!"

Pomeroy patted her arm gently.

"Bonnie, you little mug! Don't you realise that a film company would make its own test? You've been used by Morgan in a dirty deal. His hired photographer might have turned a handle, but I'll eat my hat if there was an inch of film inside his machine. All he did was to take a photograph of your frock, for Morgan Brothers to copy."

"No! It can't be true! No one could be so wicked— so mean!"

Although the High Street of a small town is not an ideal place for tears, Pomeroy rejoiced as he realised that Bonnie's amazing greenness came from the best source of all, a perfect trust in human nature, based on her own standard of honesty.

She raised her tear-drowned eyes.

"I've lost you your job!" she cried. "All through my vanity!"

"Poor little thing!" said Pomeroy. "Now I'll have to leave you for a few minutes. I want to have a little chat with Nephew."

His eyes gleamed as he spoke. Although he was uncertain of the outcome of their meeting, he had been considered a useful boxer when he was training for the Army.

"I want to see you presently, Bonnie," he said. "Where will you be?"

"M-M-Mary's."

"Poor little thing!"

WHEN Bonnie entered, the Major was sitting at his desk, reading a letter from a solicitor. Although the original offer for his fishshop had been raised, it was not suf-ficient to finance a new venture. His hope of expansion seemed frost-bitten, and he felt, consequently, depressed and out of temper.

Bonnie poured out her confession, and sat in resigned submission for his inevitable lecture.

Presently, it began to dawn on her that the Major was not such a kind gentleman as usual. He never patted her arm. or said "Poor little thing!"

She blinked her lashes dry.

"Well, anyway," she said briskly, "I've learned something by being friends with Mr. Morgan. I know that the Picture Palace here belongs to Morgan Bros., because they got all the shares when the company was rocky, and they're going to build a new cinema near the station. But they don't want anyone to know! Isn't that funny?"

The Major's cold eye bolted behind his monocle, as he realised the value of Bonnie's news. The theft of his models had been a bit of trickery which could only have a limited life. It was possibly the outcome of the nephew's rivalry with Pomeroy.

What was of real importance was the knowledge that, while he dreamed of expansion, the same idea had visited his business rivals. They meant to extend their premises from their pre-sent block to the Picture Palace at the corner.

Their sole obstacle was the wretched fish shop which lay between.

The Major thought rapidly. It was useless to try to stop a big firm from reaching out, especially as there should be room in the town for two different classes of business.

For "Mary" would become so specialised and exclusive as to fear no rival— when he had carried out the extensions which Morgan Bros. would enable him to make.

He decided that they should buy the fish shop-at his own price.

"Hum!" he said. "That is quite interesting. Only, I am wondering why they took you into their confidence."

"Mr. Morgan didn't," said Bonnie. "But one evening when we were in the cake shop, that foxy-faced lawyer of his came in and talked to him in shocking bad French. Mr. Morgan learned his trade in Paris, so he understood all right. And, of course, they couldn't tell I knew French, because I always made Morgan Nephew translate the menu when we had supper to-gether."

"You— speak— French, Miss Doon?" gasped the Major.

"Better than I can speak English." said Bonnie. "You see, Papa is English and Mama is from Jersey. She's French. Papa never talks at all, and Mama talks all the day, so my English isn't too good. That's why all the girls here think me so stupid. They talk of the 'office' when they mean 'bureau,' and when they do say 'bureau' they mean a chest. And when I was told to go to the 'office,' of course, I went to the pantry. It's all so confusing."

"But," the Major's eyes glittered hungrily, "why didn't you tell me you spoke French? It would have been useful."

"That's what Mama said," replied Bonnie simply. "She said, 'Don't let them know you understand a word.' She said they'd stick up a sign 'Ici on parle Francais,' and I'd be called here, there, and everywhere, and not get paid a penny more. And I'd never get the chance to learn elegant English if I had to speak French. Oh, Mama knew!"

Suddenly the Major's eyes twinkled. Morgan and Co. had found Bonnie so very easy to dupe.

And yet, the Major had a vision of her sitting in the pastrycook's, with the mahogany counters and bottleglass windows, a lovely lady nibbling jam puffs— her blue eyes dreamy as though her thoughts were far away, while no word of the low gabble of French escaped her shell-like ears.

The Major began to laugh. Bonnie was green— green as grass. But she had plenty of ginger.

She was Green Ginger.

BONNIE started up at the distant sound of a telephone bell.

"It's in the Salon. May I go? I think it's someone for me."

A minute later she was listening to Pomeroy's voice, which was jubilant but unfamiliar.

"What's the matter with my voice? Oh, just a thick lip, or something. What? You've told the Major? Excellent! Now I can touch him for a rise, as I want to get married. And— listen, Bonnie!— I've got a corking inspiration for a wedding-dress. Her name is 'Gloria,' and she suggests purity, peace, and perfect love. She came to me just as I gave Morgan his second black eye!"

________________

8: The Holiday

Britannia and Eve, Feb 1938

NEARLY everyone in the small block of old-fashioned mansion-flats seemed to be going on holiday, with the exception of Charles Bevan.

Checked in his ambition to become one of Trenchard's young men, for the past eight months he had been lying in a back ground-floor flat, which looked out into the well of the courtyard. He disliked reading, so had nothing to do but listen to the rush of bath-water down the pipes from six o'clock in the morning, and to watch the lights appear in the opposite building until the final eclipse.

The walls were thick, so that he could not hear the voices or footsteps of the other tenants. He had but few visitors, and depended mainly on the society of the porter— Tory— and his wife, who looked after him. That was his life.

In the circumstances, it was hardly surprising that his energy had corroded to mental irritation, his ambition had turned to poison, and all hope had soured and died. On this particular hot August morning he had sunk to a stage when he doubted not only the doctor's assurance of his ultimate recovery— but his own power to endure....

At the top of the building, Janet Lewis— the girl in a fifth-floor flat— was going on a holiday. She did not want to go, but as there was a lull in her typing-commissions it seemed prudent to take advantage of the chance, for reasons of health.

Her suit-case was packed and lay on the floor; inside the tradesman's lift was placed a note to Mrs. Tory, who shopped for her, asking her to send up no more provisions until further notice. Before she left, she was finishing an article intended for a woman's journal, which contained hints on holiday preparations.

As she typed it, she checked its points for her own benefit.

"Turn off gas, water, and electricity at the mains." She would do this just before she left.

"Make provision for pets." She had none, for lack of room.

"Dispose of all perishable food." While she thought of it, she would crumble up the remains of the loaf for the birds.

Plate in hand, she unlocked her front door and ran up the last flight of stairs to the roof. It was hot weather, and as she gazed down at the forest of chimneys pricking through the smoky haze, she suddenly realised that she was stale and overworked.

In spite of her youth, she had known the horrors of poverty, as a result of which she had begun a twenty years' plan. This involved continuous work to secure an annuity at the age of forty, when she would live in a cottage in the country and grow her own spinach.

Although she was sacrificing everything to her purpose— leisure, exercise and amusement—she remained surprisingly healthy and attractive, with fresh colouring which accompanied the dash of red in her brown hair. She was too busy to worry or question, while her flat which consisted of two rooms— a living-room and kitchen, with a hall which held the usual offices—seemed a luxury apartment to her.

But as she looked down at the city, for the first time, she welcomed the prospect of a holiday, when she would be free to wander, according to her whim and without a single plan.

Next door to the mansion-flats, the cashier of a small branch-bank was thinking also of his holiday. He had booked rooms at Eastbourne, and was due to meet his wife and young family at Victoria Station, in half an hour. Anticipating his emancipation, he was wearing grey flannel bags, and he sported in his buttonhole an orange carnation, from his garden.

There only remained two minutes to closing time, so he looked up with a slight frown, at the entrance of a latecomer.

The man walked to the counter, but instead of a cheque, he presented a revolver at him.

Even as he realised that he was being held-up, the cashier rushed at the bandit. The next second, he lay, crumpled upon the floor, with a bullet in his brain— while his wife was watching the clock at Victoria Station and his children sucked toffee-apples.

The bandit worked swiftly, but even as he packed his bag, the alarm was raised. He reached the door just in time to see his partner scorch away in the car, either to save his own skin or to draw the pursuit. Panic-stricken, he darted into the entrance hall of the flats and tore up flight after flight of stairs until he reached the haven of an open door.

A minute later, Janet ran down from the roof and entered her flat. The first thing she saw was a leather bag on the floor of the hall. She was wondering where it came from, when someone behind her sprang on her and gripped her throat.

"One squeal and you're dead," he whispered. "I've just killed a man."

TOO stunned with shock to feel fear, she realised the strength of his position. He could shoot her and be invulnerable to reprisal, since the law could not hang him twice.

In any case, she could not have cried for help, because of the pressure on her wind pipe. She was beginning to choke, when she heard the sound of heavy footsteps ringing out on the stone stairs.

They stopped on the fifth-floor landing and then someone hammered on her door. With a throb of deep gratitude, she realised that the hunt had picked up the man's trail and was hot on the scent.

She was waiting for the end of a brief yet concentrated thrill when the man pushed her forward.

"Open the door," he whispered fiercely.

As he spoke, she felt a ring of metal against her back. Flinching from the contact, she drew back the catch of the lock with trembling fingers.

The porter and a policeman stood outside; both were out of breath and appeared hot. She looked at Tory with beseeching eyes as he mopped his face. Although she could touch him, she was divided from him by a gulf she could not bridge.

"Did you hear anyone pass this way?" asked the policeman.

Her unwelcome guest stood behind her where he was screened from view; but she felt the increased pressure of the metallic ring. It was a hint whose nature she could neither mistake nor ignore.

"No," she replied quickly.

"Has your door been open?"

"No."

As she spoke, a hope flared up that they would insist on searching her flat; but Tory crushed it immediately by a suggestion.

"We'd better try the roof, to satisfy you."

Once again Janet was left alone with the man. He took no notice of her, but looked around him with intent eyes which missed no detail.

"Yours?" he asked, kicking her suitcase aside. "Are you going away?"

"Yes," she replied.

"How long?"

"A fortnight."

"Do your friends know?"

"Yes."

She answered mechanically, for she was listening for the sound of footsteps coming down from the roof. It was a cheering reflection that the man was only waiting for the chance of a safe getaway She was wondering how long he would linger in the building, and whether he would force her to act as his scout, when he snatched her note to Mrs. Tory, off the lift.

She swallowed her indignation as he tore it open and read it.

"Does this woman send up all your food?" he asked.

"Yes," she replied. "Don't you ever go out?"

"Yes, sometimes, when—"

"Shut up."

The threat of his revolver made her realise that Tory and the policeman were returning from the roof. They tramped across her landing, passed her door, and went down the stairs.

When they reached the hall, Tory had the satisfaction of reminding the policeman that he was right.

"I told you he couldn't be here. All the flats are kept locked and there's nowhere he could hide."

He was still very pleased with himself when he entered the ground-floor back flat, to give his gentleman a second-hand thrill. His idea was to cheer up the invalid, so he was taken aback by the glum misery of Bevan's face, as he interrupted the tale.

"He came in all right. I heard him on the stairs, but I didn't give it a thought. Even if I had. Amusing, isn't it? On the spot and able to do nothing, while some decent chap is sent west, and his murderer gets away with it. I'm a valuable member of society."

"Now, sir," protested Tory, "you'll soon be all right again. The doctor says—"

"Don't quote that comedian. It's his daily joke. Of course, it's obvious what happened. The man went up to the roof and came down by the fire escape to the back entrance, while you were on the tiles. He's well away by now. Will you tell Mrs. Tory not to trouble to send me in lunch. Thank her very much."

When Tory repeated the message to his wife, her jolly face grew grave.

"I don't like it," she objected. "He's too polite. If only he'd buck up and swear. I'm getting afraid of going in to his room, for fear of smelling gas."

IN contradiction of Bevan's statement, the bandit was in a state of nervous tension when he experienced the aggressive terror of a cornered rat. Since he had been followed to the flat, he felt sure that the building would be kept under observation, and he dared not leave, for fear of walking out into an ambush.

But Fate had provided him with a solution of his problem. He reasoned that the police would count on his being starved into submission, in the event of his having found some hiding place on the premises. Therefore, if he remained in this girl's room for a definite period, their suspicions would be destroyed and they would call off any guard.

Whistling under his breath, he considered the possibilities of his scheme. The girl would not be missed at her place of business for the duration of her holiday, while supplies of food would arrive daily. The fact that she did not go out would not be noticed unless a deliberate watch was set on her movements. In this case, there would be nothing to attract attention, since apparently she would be carrying on her usual routine.

The flaw seemed to lie in her holiday arrangements. He knew it was useless to question her about these, since she would lie, but he counted on the fact that anyone who was puzzled at her non-arrival, would ring up the flat—when he could compel her to reassure them.

Fortunately for his conspiracy, the telephone, speaking-tube and tradesman's lift were all in the kitchen, where he could control them. Success depended on whether he had the nerve to lie low and sit tight. Spinning a coin for luck, he tore up Janet's note to Mrs. Tory, countermanding supplies.

"Listen, you," he said. "You're not going away. I'm staying here— and you've got to stay too. You've only one chance. Keep quiet!"

Too terrified to protest, Janet stared at him with dull wonder that he should look so average and normal. He did not resemble the gangsters of the screen, neither did he use their slang. Hard-eyed and tight-lipped, with smooth hair, there was nothing to distinguish him from any keen young business-man, who determines to rise.

Yet, in spite of her fear, she found it impossible to believe in such an amazing situation.

"It can't last," she told herself. "Someone is bound to come to the flat—Tory, or the postman. I must make them suspect something is wrong."

Her hope rising at a sudden inspiration, she ventured to speak to the bandit.

"I think I had better send a message for extra supplies. I don't eat much and you won't like my food. I don't have meat."

His sneer at her flimsy ruse shrivelled any expectation of success. He did not even trouble to reply, but asked a sudden question.

"Has the porter a master-key of the flats?"

"Yes, in case of fire," she told him.

"Well, if he uses it, for any reason, he's a dead man. That goes for anyone who tries to come in. And the next bullet will be yours."

He went to the door, locked it, and put the key in his pocket, thus formally making her his prisoner.

She was too stunned to protest. His last speech had reminded her of the hideous truth that he had just killed a harmless citizen in cold blood, and that any unsuspecting person who entered her flat would meet with the same fate.

It would be an invitation to be murdered, if she incited Tory to come to her rescue, unless she could smuggle through a note to him, telling him the facts. If he communicated with the police, she knew that they would devise a means to draw the man's fire and take him by surprise.

But, pending such information, she must do her utmost to keep the porter— or anyone else— away.

"Directly I've a chance, I'll write to Tory," she decided. "I don't suppose he'll let me get near the lift— but I can throw it out of my window."

As though he were playing into her hands, the man went into the living-room and wheeled out the divan, which served as her bed, by night, and a couch, by day.

"I'm sleeping in the kitchen," he told her. "There'll be no monkey business with the lift. You stay in the other room."

Even as her heart lightened at the prospect of privacy, he went into the living-room and jerked the pictures from the walls. Wrenching out the long nails, he drove them through the frame of the window, so that it was impossible to open it. Then he came close to her and stared into her eyes.

"It's a noisy business to try and break glass," he said. "I don't advise you to try. I shall hear you. And now listen I don't like you. I don't want you here. Keep out of my sight. Don't speak to me. If you call out, or try to attract attention, I'll shoot you like a rabbit. And this is to show you I mean it."

His fist shot out and she fell down limply to the floor.

Her holiday had begun,

WHEN the man had gone back to the kitchen, Janet sat in the living-room and tried to think. Although she felt mentally bruised, and her cheek was beginning to swell, in one way, she was vaguely relieved by the man's attack. It expunged the human element from the situation, and made him seem almost disembodied, like a destructive force of indiscriminate and universal hatred.

As she lit a cigarette to soothe her nerves, he reappeared at the door.

"So you smoke?" he muttered. "Fags, too."

He snatched up the packet of cigarettes as he nodded at the typewriter.

"Carry on as usual with that," he then commanded.

The incident made her realise the cunning of his imagination, which foresaw every possible pitfall. In his determination to avoid any discrepancy, he had refrained from smoking, until he had learned her own habits. He meant to shield himself with her identity. It was fortunate for her sanity that she was allowed occupation. In accordance with her principle of never refusing work, she had accepted some heavy monotonous matter, which was poorly paid, but which she was privileged to deliver them in instalments.

She now set herself the task of clearing it off in bulk. As she tapped away, her thoughts circled around her imprisonment. She could see no shred of hope anywhere. The other tenants of the fifth floor were away on holiday, and no one could possibly miss her, or know of her predicament.

When she set out to compass her twenty years' plan, she had isolated herself rather too well. All wires were cut, while signals were worse than useless.

"I could keep flashing the light, when it is dark," she told herself. "But whoever noticed it would only tell Tory and send him up. Sherlock Holmes is the only person who could help me now."

Presently, when Tory whistled up the tube— as a preliminary to winding up the lift with her supplies— the bandit ordered her into the kitchen.

"Thank you, Tory," she said faintly.

"Have you got a cold, miss?" he called up. "Your voice sounds rather queer."

As the bandit flourished his revolver, she forced herself to speak brightly.

"No, thanks, Tory. I feel splendid."

Then the lift was wound down, empty, and her brief interlude of intercourse with the world was ended.

"Is this all?" snarled the man, as he looked at the small supply of wholemeal bread, butter, an egg, and salad.

"I warned you," she told him.

"Then take this."

As he handed her the lettuce and fruit as her portion, she managed to pluck up her spirit.

"I'd better smash the window and let you shoot me," she told him. "It's quicker than starvation."

She could not know that the man's calculations were seriously upset by the food shortage. While her own rations were sparrow's food to him, and he did not scruple about reducing her to a state of semi-starvation, he did not want to lose his official voice, whose function was to quell any outside suspicion. Therefore he was relieved by her suggestion to order a tin of biscuits.

"I always have one in stock," she told him. "The last one is practically finished."

When he had tested the truth of her words by finding the empty container in the cupboard, he allowed her to whistle down the tube to Tory, who was not too pleased with the request.

"Won't to-morrow do, miss?" he asked.

"No, to-day, please," she told him. "I'm terribly hungry."

"Very good, miss."

As he expected, his wife was annoyed at the prospect of having to go out again, when she had finished her day's shopping.

"Give me a man to do for every time," she declared. "If she can't remember, she shouldn't order in penny numbers. She can wait till to-morrow."

Tory, as usual, saved the situation with a suggestion.

"There's Mr. Bevan's new tin, not opened. He never eats now with his tea. You can get in another tin for him by the time he asks for them again. If he ever does."

In spite of the calendar, that day was the longest in the year for Janet, but at last, it came to an end. As she dozed—fully dressed—in an armchair, she kept reminding herself of her identity, and also that there was a time-limit to her ordeal.

"I'm Janet Lewis," she told herself. "Something has happened to me—but it will pass. In three weeks' time, he will be gone and I shall be here. I'll still be Janet Lewis."

DURING the hideous days that followed, the fifth-floor flat was not a dwelling, but a temporary shelter where two alien personalities shared an intolerable situation. Except for unavoidable contacts, they kept apart. Sometimes the man gave her an order in a penetrating whisper, but otherwise they remained silent.

Janet grew pale and thin from semi-starvation, but she suffered most from the enclosed atmosphere. In spite of the relief of an almost continuous wind which whistled down her chimney, the air grew daily thicker and fouler, so that she had to deny herself the consolation of smoking. She made cups of tea over the gas-ring in her room, when she forced herself to nibble biscuits, but all appetite for food had deserted her.

As she tapped away at her machine, she lost all sense of place and felt suspended in a curious dimension outside space, even while she was enclosed within the walls of her flat. She could hear people pass by her door and see them cross the courtyard, yet she was cut off from all intercourse with humanity.

Sometimes she wondered whether Tory would remark her closed window, but he never appeared to look up. In any case, it was almost screened from observation by the high coping of the small balcony in front.

Besides—she did not want him to notice any unusual feature—lest it should prove his death-warrant.

Although she welcomed the end of every day, as one stage nearer release, the nights were even worse, when she sat, in her clothes and dozed, starting awake at every creak of the divan in the kitchen. The man, too, scarcely slept, for he was strung up to a state of nervous expectancy which exceeded her own, and which kept him continually on guard.

Through the day, he lay on the divan, smoking and counting his piles of new notes; but while he was obsessed by his fortune, his main object was to get away in safety. He always turned on the wireless to get the news, in case of a police SOS; and he strained his ears for the movements of the porter and other tenants, in order to get a clue to their time table.

Although he ate Janet's daily rations, after his first outburst, he seemed indifferent to food. At night, he removed only his boots and slept with one eye open— his revolver beside him— ready for instant flight.

As he grew daily more red-eyed and unkempt, Janet shrank from him. She guessed that he was maddened to a pitch when, at her first false move, he might shoot her from panic. Being shut up with him was about as safe as sharing a confined space with an infernal machine, but she endured because of her confidence of the end.

One hot muggy night, however, when she was panting for fresh air, this certainty of release was replaced by a new and ghastly dread. Suddenly she remembered a picture she had seen at a cinema, when a gangster shot the doctor and nurse who had rendered him a service, in order to secure their silence.

For the first time, she asked herself the question— "What will my own fate be?"

Meanwhile the occupants of the fifth-floor flat were not the only sufferers. Bevan, too, was feeling the heat acutely and was more than usually depressed. In his morbid condition, he seemed to assume responsibility for the fact that the criminal who had shot the bank cashier, was still at liberty. He feverishly searched numerous newspapers for news of his capture, and practically ceased to eat.

One afternoon, however, he staggered Tory by a request for biscuits with his tea.

"I'm afraid you've finished your tin," he said. "The missus will slip out and get you some in two minutes."

"It doesn't matter, thanks." Bevan's voice was listless. "It's very quiet," he added. "I suppose everyone this side of the building is away?"

"All but the young lady up there."

Glad to change the subject, Tory pointed to a window set high in the side of the wall.

"She sits typing all day," he told Bevan. "She's so set in her ways, you could put a clock by her, for all she's young and pretty. My missus shops for her too, as she doesn't get out much."

"Sounds unhealthy," yawned Bevan, who had lost all interest in young and pretty girls.

"But she looks blooming," Tory told him. "She eats well, too. I'll confess now we let her have your tin of biscuits because she told me she was extra hungry."

"Oh, confound the blasted biscuits," said Bevan with unfamiliar vigour.

WHILE the two men chatted, life went on somehow in the fifth-floor flat. Every morning, Janet told herself, "This can't last another day," but the hours crawled on until she was faced with the torment of another night, with its question of haunting suspense.

"What will my fate be?" A week passed, every day of which left its mark upon her. She lost all personal pride and stopped looking in the mirror. Because of her shrinking dread of passing through the kitchen, in order to reach the hall, she did the minimum of washing—although she powdered her face with some vague notion of covering up deficiencies.

Nothing seemed to matter in this nightmare, except the fact that the end must come. Whenever she typed, her thoughts winged on strange journeys. Gradually she became a kind of split personality, when she carried on conversations with herself. Semi-delirious from strain and hunger, she listened to a girl of twenty—her own age—who reproached a woman of forty.

"You're a selfish introvert. You've never considered me. I've never been to dances. I've had no time to make friends. I've had to slave for you.... Why couldn't you wait till you were fifty-five to get your cottage in the country?"

The voice droned on in unison with an imprisoned fly which buzzed maddeningly over the window-pane. But in the lucid interlude which followed, Janet admitted the truth of her ravings. She had wasted her youth and was losing the present for the future.

In this connection, she remembered with a pang, that Tory had told her of a bedridden young man on the ground floor, to whom she could have lent books, in token of sympathy. Now, as though in punishment, it was her turn to feel completely cut off from the world.

ON the eighth morning, the bandit returned from the hall, completely altered in appearance. He was cleanly shaved, his hair shone, and his coat was well brushed. He looked like any smart young business man, except for the revolver with which he drove her into the kitchen.

"Whistle down to the porter," he commanded. "Tell him to stop sending up food, as you are going away on your holiday."

Too excited to think clearly, Janet rushed to the tube and delivered the message to Tory.

"Will you want a taxi?" he called up.

"No, thank you," she replied, obedient to the shake of the bandit's head.

"Then, a pleasant time, miss," said Tory. "If you should want me for anything, I'll be over in the back block, after eleven, as I'm showing some people a flat."

Janet noticed the sudden glint of the bandit's eye, and realised that, unconsciously, Tory had revealed the exact time when the entrance hall would be unwatched.

The next half-hour was an agony of suspense, when hope struggled with fear of her fate. Suddenly the man glanced at his watch, and, laying his revolver on the table, came towards her.

"If this was a picture, I should seize it and hold him up," she thought wildly.

Even while she was trying to nerve herself for the attempt, the man threw a double of laundry cord around her and the back of the chair on which she was sitting, pinioning her to her seat. Too terrified to cry out, she struggled silently and vainly, while he bound her wrists together and fastened her legs to the rungs.

"What will happen to me?" she whispered.

"Shut up," he growled. "You'll be all right."

These words were all she had to guide her to make a terrible choice, as the man took a kitchen cloth from the table drawer. She told herself that if he meant to leave her gagged and bound in a locked flat, her end would be so terrible that she had better scream, and so ensure the swift mercy of a bullet. But, on the other hand, there was a glimmer of hope that he might send information to the porter, which would lead to her release, once he was safely away.

It was taking a desperate chance, for she had noticed no scruple or sign of ordinary humanity in the bandit; yet the passion for life was so overpowering, that she resolved to remain silent.

As the man folded a strip of linen into a pad, there was an unexpected interruption. A loud scrape and rattle against the outside wall of the building was followed by the appearance of the top of a ladder against the kitchen window.

"The cleaner," gasped Janet.

With an oath, the man pushed her chair towards the window.

"Tell him to go away," he ordered.

His back was turned to the door, so that he was unable to gauge the significance of that psychological moment of distraction. But even as Janet remembered that the window cleaner was not yet due, she realised that the noise of the ladder had covered the silent entrance of Tory with two policemen.

With the fury of a tidal-bore, they rushed at the bandit. Unarmed and taken completely by surprise, he fought like a maniac; but after a period of noise and confusion, he was overcome and handcuffed.

After the police had tramped away in triumph with their prisoner, Tory stayed behind to release Janet. Now that her ordeal was ended, she had become hysterical, and she overwhelmed him with blessings and thanks.

"How did you know about me?" she asked, when she had grown calmer.

"I didn't," he told her. "It was Mr. Bevan, the gentleman in the ground-floor flat. He fixed everything up. If you are ail right now, I must go down and tell him everything went off according to plan."

"I'm coming, too," said Janet. "I must thank him."

She drew out her pocket mirror and then gave a scream.

"Is that me?" she gasped. "You'd better go down without me. I won't be long."

WHEN Tory opened the door of the ground-floor flat to her, ten minutes later, it was evident that Bevan also had prepared for a reception. He looked as gorgeous as a Sultan in a new dark purple dressing-gown, while his thin face wore an unaccustomed grin.

"Don't tell me who you are," he called out, before Janet could speak. "You're the six o'clock bath. I've known you for eight months. You're punctual to the dot. And you're cold."

"How could you tell that?" gasped Janet.

"Because no steam ever issued from the overflow. I knew the exact point in this antiquated plumbing where to expect to see you. And since a cold morning bath is a Spartan habit which, once acquired, is not lightly or wantonly abandoned, I noticed the fact when you stopped running down the pipe." "I had to give it up," explained Janet. "You see, the bath is in—"

"In the kitchen," finished Bevan. "I knew that, from the arrangement of my own flat. At first, of course, I paid no attention to your lapse, as it was obvious that you were either ill, or away. But when Tory told me that you were still in residence, and eating rather above form, I grew reflective."

Suddenly Janet began to feel hungry.

"He ate all my food," she said piteously.

"That's why you are going to have lunch with me at once. Mrs. Tory has kindly promised to arrange it."

Tory caught his wink and beamed at the new development. While he hurried away to tell his wife. Bevan went on with his explanation.

"As, providentially, I had nothing to do but lie still and puzzle it out, I came to the conclusion that you might be entertaining an uninvited visitor of a certain type, in your kitchen. I remembered the scare over the bank bandit, and as he was still at large, I thought I might connect the two. After that, the significant feature of your continued silence pointed to the threat of a bullet."

Janet forgot to shudder as she gazed at Bevan with shining eyes.

"I can never thank you," she told him. "It was marvellous of you."

"Oh, that part of it was elementary," he told her lightly. "The difficult bits were, first, to prevent the gallant Tory from using his master-key on his lonesome, and then to sell the idea of a surprise visit to the police. By the way, you appear to have the remains of an old-fashioned black eye."

"Yes. He knocked me down."

"Good luck for you. He might have been amorous. When I'm up again— and that will be very soon— we must go to the pictures together and see a gangster film, to criticise its technique."

"No," shuddered Janet. "It will bring it all back."

"Now, don't be sorry for yourself. I know it's Satan rebuking sin, but we're both alive— and that should be enough for us. You've been jolted out of your rut, and I—"

He lowered his voice as he added, "You'll never know what this has meant to me. I had lost my faith. Everything seemed a futile mess and waste. But now I know why I had to lie like a log for eight months, and listen to water rushing down the pipes. It was because I had to miss the six o'clock bath. You."

________________

9: The Sham Shop

The Grand Magazine, Aug 1921

Chronicle (Adelaide) 10 Sep 1921

WHEN the miracle happened to Day Henson her surprise petrified her to dumbness. She knew that miracles happened in the Bible; she believed that they were supposed to happen at Lourdes; but she was sceptical that the whole course of Nature could be reversed in London in the beginning of the 20th century.

Yet—

Wilfred Gibson had offered her a seat in his car. Gibson was an unassuming-looking individual, who faded away when you caught him in a strong light. Had you met him in the street you would have bracketed him in the same group as the lamp-post and the pillar-box; whereas Day was young and possessed of beauty, which gained her the instant admiration of men and the dark suspicion of women. Moreover, the rain was falling so heavily that the spatter rebounded foot-high from the pavement. As final touching details, Day had thin-soled shoes and no umbrella. Yet the offer of a ride, which on the surface would seem merely a decent, charitable action, was an actual miracle to the girl by reason of this fact:—

Wilfred Gibson was one of the great ones of the earth. He controlled destinies. Like the centurion, he said, 'Do this,' and a horde of men endeavored to do it. He said, 'Go,' and a horde of women went— or, at least, started in the requisite direction. Day lived under the shadow of his uplifted thumb, owing him the debt of her existence, for she had been born about 20 years ago, and naturally had forgotten the original source.

To sum up, Gibson was the head of the great firm of Gibson & Co., wherein Day worked as a zealous and aspiring unit.

Gibson repeated his offer in his quiet, almost deprecating voice. 'Will you let me give you a lift?'

Day found her wits just before she recovered her tongue. She was a wholesome young person, but she had been reared on the moral lessons of novels and films. Gibson's behaviour represented but one aspect-covertures.

But the' sight of the gorged buses reeling past decided her. 'Oh, thank you!' She hopped into the car, trying to tread as lightly as a fairy so as to leave no damp smudge on the carpet— an ambitious essay for five feet eight. ''Where?' asked Gibson, as he followed her.

'Pimlico.' Day blushed for the whole of Pimlico. 'I'm afraid it must be dreadfully out of your way. Though, of course, it is quite near Buckingham Palace,' she added confusedly.

'I don't live there,' retorted Gibson.

The car purred onwards like a well-fed tiger. Day lay back in luxurious ease and watched the lights flash by, distorted by the steaming windows. It was like a dream, but she dreaded the shock of the awakening. So she tried to adjust the situation.

'This is exceedingly good of you. But I shouldn't have taken advantage of your— your kindness, if I hadn't forgotten my umbrella.'

'You don't forget habitually?' he asked sharply. 'If so, you ought to take a course of memory training.'

That touched Day in her sensitive spot— her business pride. 'I never forget in hours. And I don't know how to thank you—'

'It's nothing.' He cut her short. 'You should try to cultivate a sense of proportion. I would not let a dog run home in this weather. Although I plead guilty to placing dogs above most human beings.'

By that speech Gibson gained a loyal adherent and friend. For Day not only loved animals, but was able to settle down to enjoyment now that the compromising element was removed from the situation. In blissful content she waited until the Chief should again condescend to address her.

'What's your name?' he asked presently.

'Henson.'

'Never, been christened?'

'Oh! My Christian name is Ada.'

'Don't like it.'

'I'm so sorry. But I'm always called Day.'

'Ah! That's better. Makes one think of sun and glory and consummated promise. The dawn holds possibilities, but the day is achievement.'

Day's pretty mouth was wide open. She had hitherto regarded her name as conveniently short for marking on underclothes. The Chief continued his examination.

'Which department?'

'Toilet. I'm doing face treatment.'

'Aren't you very late?'

'A bit. But my head, Miss Ripon, is always much later.'

'Hm! Capable girl, very. You keep her before you.'

'Oh, thank you!' Day's face showed as though she had received a personal tribute.

'You like your work?' he asked.

'I love it. It's rather wonderful to me— a bit like a fairy-tale. A woman comes in, all yellow and lined and ragged. And you steam and massage and astringe, and she goes out all pink and plumped out. Pity it-does not last.'

'Mighty, good job it doesn't!' Gibson's voice was nearly sharp.

'Oh; dividends would drop and you would be out of a job. I like a kind heart, but it should always be yoked with common sense. And this is where I drop you.'

Day felt that he. had already dropped her a million miles from the heights. But there was a wondrous glow at her heart as she knocked at the blistered front door. For upon parting the Chief had warmly shaken her damp-gloved hand. Just like a human being.

Punctuality was the rock on which the Gibson mansion in Park-Iane was. built. Therefore, Gibson explained to his sister the alteration in his routine which had made dinner seven minutes late. 'I went round by Pimlico to take one of the girls home.'

Miss Gibson elevated spectral eyebrows.

'An employe?'

'Yes. Day Henson. Under twenty five, I should say, About five feet eight. Technically flawless complexion. Fair hair— it's better left side than right. Grey eyes with brown flecks in the iris, giving the impression of being dark. Rather fluid brain, but seems keen on her work. Which is everything.'

'When did you find out Jill this?' gasped his sister.

'Within the first minute.' He preened himself.  'Part of my System. I intend to individualise and to know every unit I employ as a separate entity. I may control an important business .which has to run like faultless machinery,; but I am not actually a lever— neither is Day Henson a cog. I've decided definitely never to overlook the human standpoint.'

'That's very nice of you, Wilfred,' faltered Miss Gibson, who was a pure-minded woman, and consequently feared the worst.

Day had wonderful dreams that night. Her supper had consisted of a Welsh rarebit washed down by many cups of tea. Her imagination did the rest. All night long she was haunted by the face of the new Chief. Dark, rather moody, with a sensitive mouth. To Day's romantic fancy it was the presentment of a poet who has seen visions and. dreamed dreams. That night, as usual he dreamed solely of business. After her early swim in the baths Day was inclined to regard her overnight adventure as some delirium. Yet when she arrived at the great shop and was donning her snowy overall, in preparation for the daily grind, she could not resist the temptation to preen her feathers.

'Did you get wet going home last night?' she enquired of her chief friend— Cherry Pine— a tart-tongued, sloe-eyed damsel.

'There was just a spot, I believe. Did I get wet? I mopped up the whole storm, like blotting-paper.'

'Poor you! I was rather in luck,' Day regarded the great bowls of bronze and purple tulips with a bored eye. 'The Chief took me home in his car.'

'Low company you keep. NW, the Prince of Wales wheeled me home in a wheelbarrow.'

'But honestly, Cherry! I'm not rotting.'

Cherry looked at her keenly. 'He took you home! What for?'

'Just kindness.' Day grew rather hot.

'And I'll tell you something else, which you'll find out, all of you,' for the group had been swelled by two more white-robed forms— 'the new Chief's not like old Porpoise Gibson. He is a gentleman. And a lamb!'

'Stop talking, girls! Get ready for your appointments!' Miss June Ripon swept down them like an avenging goddess. She was a mature girl, with a beautiful figure, permanently-waved ashy-blonde hair, and a complexion which was a dazzling advertisement for the salon. She spoke in a deep voice, rather like that of a man or a formidable old woman.

'We are ready,' rose the aggrieved chorus.

'Then keep on getting ready! It's one maxim of business never to appear idle.' She turned to Day.

'A word with you, Henson, or rather— several. I overheard your remark about the Chief. Doubtless he would appreciate your loyalty. Let it stop there!'

'But—' Day's face was on fire. 'I—'

'You— you. Quite as. Remember that the toilet salon is but one department of the house of which the Chief is head. Remember your figure on the salary list— thirty-five shillings, and if you were worth more you'd get it.'

The recording angel passed the stupendous lie as sheer formula. 'Remember, also, that if you are pretty you could not walk up Regent-street without meeting half a dozen women prettier than yourself. That's all.'

She sailed away in response to a call from one of the telephone operators.

'Old Rip's got a special down on you,' said Cherry. 'Rotten your living in the same house!'

'We've separate rooms and she's decenter outside. Besides, she knows the business from A to Z, and can give me tips. I mean to be a hundred per cent, efficiency!'

A FEW days later the entire staff was emulating Day's standard, for the new Chief had instituted the order of the direct personal interest, and the girls' had all been granted a bonus on their appointments and sales. In spite of the stigma of her thirty-five shilling Day bad always been clever and keen. But she worked now with added concentration, for she worked especially for Gibson.

Disregarding Miss Ripon's hint, she wove her secret dreams around him. She was young, lonely and enthusiastic, and was bound to find raw material for her adoration. By reason of his exalted position Gibson appeared to her as a being both splendid and remote, who played an imaginary King Cophetua to her Beggar Maid.

She had always liked the vanity salon, and the rich luxury of deep lounges and soft carpets; lit with the subdued pinky glow of mulberry shaded lights; she revelled in the undercurrent of activity all around this lounge, where the public awaited its appointments; the constant traffic between the frosted-glass cubicles where the rites were conducted— the descent of mannequins, for finishing touches, like a flock of birds of paradise— the sales of the toilet requisites reposing under the glass-topped tables. Above all, she watched for the infrequent passage of Gibson.

The first time he had passed through the salon Day had glanced at him shyly, not expecting recognition. She had no knowledge of the System, and, consequently, could not credit her eyes when he smiled.

'Good morning, Miss Henson.' His beam was self-congratulatory, because he had memorised her. Yet it remained on his lips, fort the memory of a face radiant with youth and happiness, which imparted a vague sense of pleasure, just as he had suddenly smelt lilac; or the firm had delivered a fat dividend.

Wilfred Gibson loved two things— Socialism and his shop But I am afraid that he loved his shop the more. His monastic appearance and gentle voice masked a keen business personality. It was not long before Day sounded the side of him which was as hard as nails.

Her friend— Cherry Pine— had received dismissal. It had been a shock, as she was an artist in the permanent wave and believed herself an indispensable. She appealed loudly and tearfully for mercy, but found only justice in the guise of Miss Ripon and the manager.

Day had given profuse sympathy, which had stung Cherry to unaccustomed poesy.

'Pity without relief

Is mustard without beef.'

Day's eyes flashed. She was rather like Gibson, inasmuch as she yearned to create a new scheme of things entire.

'You're right, Cherry. And I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll appeal personally for you to the Chief. He naturally would know nothing about the dismissal of an employe. And he's really awfully decent. One wet evening he actually took me home in his car—?'

'Still riding?' groaned the ungrateful Cherry, For Day had told and re-told the story until it had passed into a legend which, nobody believed.

'Say, that car must be getting tired. Time you got out and walked a bit.'

Day's heart was doing strange things in syncopated time as she knocked at the door of the Chief's sanctum. Yet his smile was so charming as he invited her to sit down— another small-scale miracle— that she believed her cause to be already won.

'I'm come to ask you if you would be so— so frightfully kind as to cancel the dismissal of one of the assistants in the toilet salon— Cherry Pine. She—'

'What is she dismissed for?'

'For pilfering a few—'

'For stealing. Exactly. How much did she take?'

'Only five shillings' worth of stock at cost price, which she has refunded.'

'Thank you for telling me. That is quite out of order, she had ceased to be a member of the staff when she made the payment, therefore she should have paid retail price. However, as she appears to be your friend I will not take advantage of your communication. Well?'

'She is so hoping— once you know— you might give her another chance. She is very sorry and she has a mother—'

'So have I. Is it unusual? Haven't you one?' He was surprised at the sudden red which flooded her face.

'N-no.'

Gibson looked sadly at the vase of tea roses on his desk.

'The dismissal stands. I never give a second chance.'

Day got up to go, but at the door she turned impulsively.

'I would like to say— for all of us— how much we appreciate your generosity over the bonus. If it is anything at all to you, you can always count on my personal loyalty.'

Gibson's smile was radiant.

'It is everything to me to feel I have gained the goodwill of those who work for me. Good afternoon, Miss Henson. I hope you are still living up to your beautiful name? Day— isn't it? he glanced at the clock. 'And as you have, on your own initiative, taken up ten minutes of the firm's time on private business, I am afraid— in justice to the others— you must report the matter to Miss Ripon.'

Day returned on air. He had remembered her name. And he had smiled at her like an archangel.

'Oh, Cherry,' she said dreamily, 'he is just wonderful. He asked me to take a chair, and he treated me as if I was Royalty come to give a wedding order. Fancy! He remembers my name.

'Oh, yes, darling, you're dismissed. And I'm to be docked of ten minutes' pay. Oh— he really is a lamb!'

But, after all, the dismissal of Cherry made history in the House of Gibson. For the Chief, passing through to his shrine, overheard the angry scorn with which she wiped the dust of the vanity, salon from her feet.

'I'm glad to be leaving this old place, an my mother will be glad, too. Everyone knows it has a bad name!'

The remark pierced Gibson through a chink in his armor. His predecessor— Neil Gibson— had been a florid, overfed person, with red spouting lips and a hectic reputation. If he ever chanced to notice an employee she inevitably left his service— usually because she failed to see eye to eye with him. Had all the stories about him been true, he would have paid the rents of an entire Garden City. But, apart from exaggeration, he was not a pleasant character.

In addition to this stigma, Gibson had been stung by a remark made by an envious trade rival, in respect to Gibson's toilet salon, which was the most reputable of its kind.

'How's your Sham Shop, Gibson?' He had explained his playful gibe. 'If you put over genuine goods why do all your girls go about painted and powdered like little ladies from a travelling revue?'

Gibson had cogitated over the reflection. The girls in his vanity salon were all carefully selected. They were young and beautiful, expert in their work and perfectly respectable— but did not look it. Therefore, on the following Friday, when each girl received her pay-envelope, it was accompanied by the following typewritten slip:

'Henceforward, no employee in the toilet salon is to use rouge, powder, or any cosmetic whatsoever, under penalty of a week's notice.'

The ultimatum had something of the effect of a shell burst. The girls hung around in groups and alternatively raged and lamented.

'I'll lave to be introduced to my own face,' moaned a manicurist, Sybil White, who was delicately tinted as any Pierrette. 'But what are you pulling that long face for, Henson? This doesn't touch you'.

Day had grown quite white and was staring in front of her with eyes of positive anguish.

'Doesn't it touch me?' she said bitterly. 'Rather more than any of you can imagined. What does anyone know of the other? Of her real life, I mean?'

The curious eyes restored her self-possession.

'Of course, I'm talking through my hat. I'm— upset. But this—' she waved the shop— 'this is a shameful abuse of power. What are you others going to do about it?'

'What choice have we? Just wash our faces and be simple and natural, like you.'

'You won't be like me. For I am going to put on as much paint and powder so my face will carry without cracking. And you are all going to do the same!'

'And get the bird,' grumbled Sybil White. 'A nice sensible time to choose, with all this unemployment.'

'All us?' Day grew eloquent. 'They simply could not replace all of us at a moment's notice, except with makeshifts. Aren't we all experts? Can't I make a face like cheese-cloth look sweet and twenty? Can't you— White— make a charwoman's paw look like the lily hand of a film heroine? Can't you— Millie— grow four hairs from two? Gibson's has the name. But remember! It takes years to build up a reputation and about a week to destroy it!'

She saw that they wavered and she clinched their indecision with a promise. 'I give you my word of honor that you shall not suffer. As leader, I take full responsibility. If anyone of us is sacked, it will be myself.'

'And you think yourself safe?' asked Sybil White. 'Isn't it about time for another ride?'

Day's smile betrayed her confidence.

'Just waiting for a rainy night, dear.'

'It's a rainy day that's all you'll get, I'm thinking.'

ON the following Monday morning, when Gibson was shining like the sun in his sanctuary, one of Me satellites, a Mr. Morgan, a distinguished individual,— who looked exactly as the great Gibson should have looked— and didn't— broke the news of the mutiny.

'I give you my word; they're all of them pink and white in layers, like cocoanut candy.'

Gibson elevated his brows.

'Sack the lot!'

He listened, however, when Mr. Morgan recapitulated most of Day's own arguments, together with a few which she had not thought of.

'Then send me the ring-leader!'

He received a nasty shock— the severity of which startled him— when the door was opened and Day confronted him, her eyes tragic above her painted cheeks.

'You!'

Had he said no more Day would have instantly capitulated. Her heart nearly cracked at the surprise, reproach and disappointment in his voice. Unfortunately, however the human nature which Gibson had extolled began to operate with a violence which defied the regulation of any machinery. He felt furious anger at her perfidy.

'Ringleader?' he snapped. Day inclined her head proudly but sadly, feeling like Browning's Patriot.

'Then take this away.' He handed her a copy of the ultimatum. 'Read it again. And let it sink in!'

This was the wrong cue, for Day had prepared a long speech which embodies every possible point of discussion.'

'We wish to protest against the infringement of our personal liberty and to ask you—'

That slip says everything I have to say on the matter. You can go!'

'Do you mean— go altogether?'

'Good lord, no.' It slipped out involuntarily. 'Go back to your work.'

'Yes, I can afford to lose no time.'  Day was swift to seize her chance.  'I've never been so busy, although this is our busy season. All my old clients ask for me. They simply won't be put off. It takes years to really understand a complexion. And I've worked up my sales of late. I've introduced fresh custom to the firm.'

Gibson knew that, in reality, she was a rude little girl saying— 'Wouldn't you like to dismiss me? Yah!' He immediately became a rude little boy. 'This is all to the good of your bonus. I hope you are buying War Savings Certificates as provision for your old age. You cannot count upon marriage with this shortage of men.'

Day opened the door crisply. Like every pretty girl, she was confident that marriage must be her destiny.

'Oh, men!' she slid pleasantly and vaguely. 'I don't call all those things by that name.'

And she shut the door more crisply. The vanity salon was but a few bricks in the house of Gibson, and Day merely a unit on the pay-sheet. Yet Gibson thought of her during the day about one tenth as often as she thought of him— which was all her time. The brief and undignified skirmish had established an odd intimacy as though they had known each other in nursery days, when he had kicked her shins while she had scratched his face. He simply could not understand her rebellion.

He was astonished to find how many pictures of her had been registered by his sub-conscious mind— all snapshots of a flushed and eager face which smiled welcome at his approach. Moreover, her conduct was inexplicable, since she had nothing to fear, or lose, from the embargo on powder.

'I'd have staked a thousand pounds on that girl's loyalty,' he thought bitterly.

Each succeeding day Mr. Morgan reported the spread of the mutiny to an indifferent Chief.

'Even the 'runners' have powdered their noses. Whole salon's out in red-and-white, like bunting. They look a set of brazen hussies. It's Bolshevism!'

The girls were certainly animated by the spirit of anarchy and thoroughly enjoyed the drama of the crisis. Gibson made no further sign,  and they were confident that they held all the winning cards. Each day fresh roses bloomed and snows were eternal on cheek and brow. Yet they, too, were puzzled at the discrepancy between Day's impassioned leadership and her poorly-concealed depression at its success. She still flamed to defence of the chief end made his interests her dominant ambition.

The fateful Friday arrived. Pay envelopes were opened, and there arose the loud wail of the duped. Every member of the toilet staff had been given  notice.

Day was at first too stunned to realise the storm of denunciation which was breaking against her like a torrent over a rock.

Presently she raised her hand for silence.

'It's all a hideous mistake, girls. It shall be put right, I am going to the Chief!'

Gibson's car was awaiting him, and he was on the point of departure when Day burst into his room. He stood, patient and immaculate— his white spats and tiny orange rosebud, his tribute to the season.

'Ah, please listen!' Day threw out her hands in appeal. 'Dismiss me if you like! I— alone— am to blame.'

'Are you dictating to Gibson's?' he asked pleasantly. 'If it makes you any easier, you are dismissed. With the rest.'

'But— I pledged my word to the others that no one should suffer!'

'Then you pledged something you could not back. Your word!  Had you referred you tools to me, I could have told them of an employee who— unasked— assured me of her complete loyalty.

Day covered her face with her hands and began to sob. When she raised it, it rather resembled a futuristic idea of a Japanese sunrise.

But suddenly Gibson seemed to consider it merely pathetic.

'Just tell me why you did it,' he said in his gentlest voice.

'I must. Well, it is something like "If one tree was felled in a forest you would notice it immediately.  But if someone felled all the trees it would be hidden amongst the rest." '

'I take your meaning. You have instigated this wholesale makeup in order to mask the make-up of one person in particular.'

Day began to gulp anew.

'How clever you are! Yes. Among the staff of the toilet salon is a woman who passes for a young spinster, but who is really a middle-aged widow. Her face is sallow and lined, and her hair is grey. She had a little business of her own as a  beauty specialist, but illness and bad luck killed it. When she tried to get work at the only trade she knew she was turned down everywhere because of her faded looks.'

Gibson pricked up his ears.

'So she began to make up. Oh, it was pitiful! If you only knew of the daily drudgery and penance of her toilet— the cruel lacing and the long, long process of enamelling her face. It is beautifully done, but you would spot it in one minute if the rest all washed their faces. She had a splendid post here and was putting by every penny towards her age. She hoped soon to give up. But if she is dismissed now, she might never get another chance.'

'Why didn't you tell me this before?' asked Gibson.

'I dared not risk it, for it was someone else's secret. And you were so hard over Cherry Pine. You said you never gave a second chance.'

'True. You may tell me now in safety. Who is it?'

'Miss June Ripon.'

He whistled in astonishment as he thought of the mature and competent, yet youthful blonde. He remembered now that whenever he had seen her outside the shaded radius of the salon she had been invariably hatted and veiled.

'You took a big risk,' he said.

Day wiped away the last of the roseate hues of early dawn from her face and he saw how white and washed-out it had grown.

'This week has nearly killed me. I hated going against you. But I felt— it was awfully silly and conceited of me— that you somehow would not let me go.'

Dame Nature is no lady, and she has never grasped the gradations of the social scale. Gibson was a solitary Socialist who shrank from the overtures of society maidens. The only other woman he knew at all well, besides Day, was his car.

The Dame gave one mighty push— and there was Day inside the Chief's arms.

'You're right. I could never let you go!'

'But why did you sacrifice yourself for the sake of Miss Ripon?' he asked presently. 'Whenever I passed through the salon she seemed to be especially severe on you.'

'That was just part of our plan to keep our secret,' smiled Day. 'You don't know how soft and comfy and adorable she was— outside. Isn't she my own mother?'

________________

10: The Call of the Tiger

The Strand Magazine, Sep 1907

Digital text produced by Colin Choat and Roy Glashan

BILLIE'S thumbs were turned down. "Kill! Kill it!" she shrieked.

In front was the dilapidated wood-shed, criss-crossed with stacks of sweet-smelling timber. Above was the clear blue stain of a cloudless sky. The sun-baked ground was a scene of the wildest riot and disorder. Sawdust flew into the hot, quivering air as a swarm of rats, a couple of terriers, and two sunburnt men in flannel shirts doubled and cut, turning the yard into an arena of strife.

On the outer fringe of the conflict, poised on a log, were the two spectators of the rat-hunt. They formed a curious contrast. Belinda Salt, commonly known as Billie, the apple of her father's eye, the idol of the station, and the belle of the whole district, was quivering with excitement as she leaned, with her body poised at a dangerous angle, over the yard. An ecstatic puppy was tucked under one arm. Her clear skin was tanned, her eyes were fearless, and her hair a copper glory. The vitality that seethed from every line of her face and every gesture of her lithe form bubbled up constantly from a vast reserve of energy. As her male belongings said proudly, Billie was full of ginger.

Her companion stood gazing apparently at the hunt with listless unconcern. As a matter of fact his eyes were steadily focusing a low line of blue hills in the distance. He was tall and fair, and had regular features. His face and figure bore testimony to race. His manner was stamped with the hall-mark of Eton and Oxford. His clothes, with silent but eloquent voice, rose up and called a good tailor blessed. He smoked a cigarette, apparently unconscious of his companion's clamour.

Billie's eager eyes watched every detail with vivid interest. Her upbringing was responsible for her crude tastes; for the girl's mother, by dying early, had turned her baby over to her men-folk and the universal mother. Between them they had made a good job of the girl's rearing, according to the broad terms of the contract— sun, wind, freedom, and masculine devotion all contributing their share. But while the essentials were sound, the details of necessity were lacking.

Billie jumped up and down, urging on the men with increasing vigour. So engrossed was she in the sport that she never noticed when the frantic pup slipped from her arm and joined the fray. But a piteous howl roused her, and she turned to see a huge grey rat hanging on to the white coat of her pet. With a cry of dismay she cried out to her silent companion.

"Oh! look, look Mr. Tygarth— look! Be quick and get him. Quick!"

Tygarth never moved. Apparently he was absorbed in re-lighting his cigarette. Billie gave him one quick glance, but she did not repeat her appeal. Springing off the log, she dashed into the mêlée, to return a minute later with the puppy. Tygarth turned his head slowly.

"What's happened?" he asked. "I was just trying to get this thing to draw."

"I noticed you were absorbed," answered the girl. "This bad pup got loose, so I had to go to his rescue."

As she spoke she shook her hand impatiently, and Tygarth noticed that a small splash of red had speckled the sawdust.

"Good heavens! You've got a bite," he exclaimed. "Here, let me tie up your hand."

Billie looked him squarely in the eyes.

"No, thank you, Mr. Tygarth," she said, quietly. "I prefer not to trouble you. Forster will do it."

She called out, and immediately the hunt was suspended, both Dyke and Forster crowding round their queen in concern. As they bore her off between them to their universal remedy, the cold-water tap, Forster looked back to shout to Tygarth:—

"You should not have allowed this to happen. You want more eye-wash, young man."

But Tygarth remained motionless, sucking at his cold cigarette, his face absolutely devoid of expression as he watched the shadows drifting over the hills.

Tygarth came of a race of mighty warriors and hunters. From the first Tygarth, surnamed the Tiger, killing had been their occupation and pleasure. They killed men for work, and beasts for play. The Tiger now only survived on the coat of arms, and the savagery of the original strain had been watered down to a streak of the courage that had made the name of Tygarth famous.

The Tygarths had always been attracted by feminine courage, and had chosen wives of similar stern material. But one Lady Tygarth of an earlier day had been cast in a gentler mould, for, before her marriage, she was destined to be a Bride of the Church. Throughout her life she was an earthly angel, and when she died a feather dropped from her wing, and, floating down the ages, lighted on the forehead of the present Dennis Tygarth. From the very purity of its source it was the white feather, and Dennis Tygarth was utterly and hopelessly a coward.

His cowardice was as much a disease as insanity, or a craving for alcohol. It was deep-seated, its roots reaching down to the very rock-bed of Fear. Perhaps the worst feature in the case arose from the fact that not one of the Tygarths had the courage to acknowledge this failing in their heir, and to openly tackle it. They held their heads high, affecting not to notice the record of nursery, school, and college. Finally, they sent him abroad to the Salts' ranch, with the unspoken hope that the wilder life of the Australian bush might foster his stunted manhood.

Sandy-creek was a bad place for cowards. Dennis's nervous shrinkings from animals reached a climax of spasms of terror at the unknown insects and reptiles. But his fear culminated in the knowledge that one day Billie would find him out.

When he first arrived he was not popular. Billie complained that the Englishman's complexion was fairer than her own. Forster and Dyke, who were learning sheep-farming, shied at his silk shirts and fancy ties. Dr. Beaver, who was staying at the homestead whilst he pursued a course of investigations, was the first to diagnose Dennis's disease. And he held his peace.

Presently Billie began to annex the newcomer, and the jealousy of Forster and Dyke grew apace. After a month, however, perplexity began to mingle with her friendship. With hard-set mouth, Dennis waited for the disillusionment of the girl whom he had learned to adore. Bit by bit the truth leaked out. Hints were dropped, and ugly rumours spread about the station. As Dennis's fair skin peeled daily under the rays of the Southern sun, so the outer scales of his armour of self-protection were rubbed away under the test of each fresh incident. With the unlucky episode of the puppy the last shred was stripped away, and the girl saw the pock-marks of the scourge which the youth had tried to conceal.

Tygarth waited by the creek, watching the muddy water eddy by, till the short twilight smudged the sunlit land. When the windows of the dining-room shone like glow-worms he slowly crept back towards the house. He heard shouts of laughter, and the clinking of glass and cutlery, as he stood outside the door. Then, stiffening his lip, he turned the handle and slipped into his place at the supper-table.

No one took the least notice of him but Daddy Salt, who stopped in his task of carving to exclaim at Tygarth's pallid face.

"Bless my soul, the boy looks like a boiled rag," he said.

Billie turned her scornful eyes on Dennis. He noticed that her hand was bandaged.

"No, Daddy, not like a boiled rag," she corrected. "He looks like a striped thing that has run in the wash."

No one could have told from Tygarth's sphinx-like face that he had grasped her meaning, but every pulsation of his heart hammered home the truth. His tiger stripes were not a fast colour.

"Let the boy have his supper now, and don't worry him," interposed the kindly Salt. "By the way, Tygarth," he added, "a letter came for you by the mail to-day."

As Forster passed the envelope down the table he commented on the crest. "Why a tiger?" he queried.

Bitterly conscious of the irony, Tygarth explained clearly and at length. When he paused he looked up, and noticed a grin dodging from face to face before his suspicious eye. Then Billie spoke, innocently.

"It takes a long time for a tiger to become a domesticated cat," she observed. "I suppose now, that as the Tiger, your ancestor, is at one end of the chain and you are at the other, by the process of civilization you must have become— er— humanized. In future I shall no longer call you Tygarth. Instead, from this day forward, I formally christen you— the Tabby."

Dennis tried to smile at the outburst of cheers that followed, knowing well that his new name was the outward sign of his degradation.

After that night an era of persecution began for the Tabby. Dr. Beaver and Daddy Salt, absorbed in their different interests, took no notice, but Billie, Forster, Dyke, and all the hands on the run daily subjected the Tabby to a pitiless course of ragging. Every day they contrived a fresh test for his courage, and every day his quivering nerves gave way before the ordeal and he gave a more thorough exhibition of cowardice. But, as of old, the same curse followed him. No one openly accused him of his fault. Had Billie spurned him with her foot and trampled on him Tygarth would have hailed her overtures with relief. All his life he had longed to speak of his shame, feeling the mere mention would take away some of the sting. But Billie preferred to give him his medicine in the old nursery fashion. A snub was wrapped in a smile, an insult larded over with flattery, while at the bottom of the jam of Billie's sweetest speeches lay the bitter sneer. Treated thus, with outward politeness, Tygarth preserved a stony countenance, which further enraged the Inquisitorial Council of Three.

One afternoon, as Tygarth wandered listlessly on to the veranda, longing for the pitiless Australian blue and gold to change to his native green, and dreaming of trout-streams, a familiar sound floated out through the open French windows. The rattling of china and the buzz of conversation, stabbed with high-pitched feminine notes of exclamation, proclaimed a social function. As he entered the drawing-room he realized that he was assisting at the rites of a formal call.

These were visitors of a different type to the chance pilgrims who dropped in lightly at any hour on the Salt ménage, and who flapped away as suddenly on the casual wing of an angel unawares. The lavish hospitality of which these strangers partook was now pared down to a frigid entertainment which Dennis hailed as English afternoon tea. Billie presided over the teapot with her usual nonchalant air of dignity. But, true to feminine tradition, she had dressed for her own sex in a fashion she had never troubled to display to her male subjects, and as Dennis looked at her lace and flounces he felt himself subjugated anew by her queenly beauty.

A brief introduction enlightened him as to the identity of the visitors. The dry-skinned, wizened man, the large, gorgeous lady, and the two smart maidens stood revealed as Theophilus Berry, the richest squatter in the district, his wife, and his daughters.

With a sigh of relief Tygarth concerned himself with the transit of the tea-cups, feeling he had stepped from the savage region of the Southern Cross to his native sphere of the civilized world.

Billie noticed the change. Tygarth, answering to the call of his early training, was a different being to the cowardly youth who had cringed round the sheep-runs. Even the silk shirt and immaculate parting seemed now to take their right place in the general scheme of fitness, and appeared no longer a mixture, but a blend. For the first time the girl realized that two Tiger attributes— the steady eye and free bearing— had survived the watering-down process and chosen to reappear in this degenerate descendant.

Half cross with herself for her sudden interest, she glanced at her chosen pals, Forster and Dyke. They suffered badly from the contrast; as they squirmed their legs desperately to hide their uncompromising boots they appeared nervous and awkward. In short, for the first time Tygarth shone, solely from the fact that he now possessed what he had hitherto lacked— a fitting background.

The Hon. Theophilus Berry beamed at Tygarth and invited him to ride over soon. Mrs. Berry seconded the invitation, and also beamed— in a manner that was too maternal for Billie's taste, in view of the Berry girls' evident overtures of friendship. It was true that Ruby Berry's face was freckled to the semblance of a bran-mash, but Pearl was passably pretty, and had the further advantage of being fresh from a finishing school in Brussels. So, to her surprise, the despotic Billie found herself joining in the running, once the Berrys had fairly made the pace, and helping to swell Tygarth's little triumph.

But, after his long abstinence, the strong dose of flattery was as dangerous to Dennis as an over-lavish meal to a starving man. In a short time the unaccustomed kindness of Pearl Berry turned his head. Billie had treated him like a cur; now he would have none of her patting, and at the first opportunity he snapped back.

"It's a real treat to meet someone fresh from England," said Ruby Berry.

"It's a still greater treat to me to talk to a lady again," replied Tygarth.

The sudden sparkle in Billie's eyes asked the question framed by Miss Berry's lips.

"But you see Miss Salt daily?"

Tygarth shook his head. "Miss Salt is such an excellent sportsman, and has such wonderful courage and skill, that one overlooks the fact that she belongs to the weaker sex."

The youth uttered the words straight from a heart rankling with many an old wound scored thereon by Billie. He experienced the unholy joy of a small boy who has thrown a snowball at a policeman, all unconscious that a stone was embedded in his soft pellet.

Billie felt that her supreme power, her feminine charm, had been impeached. She glared at Dyke and Forster with burning eyes and read their anger in their crimson faces, while even Dr. Beaver's listless eyelids appeared to be suddenly wired. By mental telegraphy the sentence of lynch-law was passed by common consent, and all settled down to the task of showing up Tygarth.

"Talking of sport," said Forster, breaking the silence, "our friend, Mr. Tygarth, has given us many a surprising— I think I may call them surprising— exhibition of his skill. You know, Mrs. Berry, he is too modest to tell you himself, but he is descended from a particularly bloodthirsty and courageous ancestor. He was called the Tiger. Our friend preserves the traditions."

Pearl's eyes grew wide.

"How splendid!" she said. "We miss that sort of thing in Australia. Then, of course, you came here for sport and excitement."

A suppressed laugh flickered round the room, and Pearl was surprised to see a faint colour rise in Tygarth's nonchalant face.

"No, no; nothing of the sort," he answered, hastily. "I came merely for health."

"I thought you looked a little delicate. But our climate and Miss Salt's care will make a new man of you."

"That would be an impossibility."

Even the Berry family stared at the note of scorn in Billie's voice. Mrs. Berry seized helplessly at the obvious explanation.

"Ah, she means you don't take enough care of yourself. That's like a man, especially an Englishman. You are all for sport. What is it you say? 'Let me go and kill something'!"

The colour ebbed from Tygarth's face as he waited for Billie's comment.

"You have just hit it," she said. "Once the excitement of slaughter is on him he thinks of nothing else. Why, I came home the other day with a bite on my hand as a result of his rat-hunting."

"How reckless of him!"

A shout of bottled-up laughter belled up from Forster's throat. Dyke and Beaver followed suit, while the Berry family stared in amazement. Billie had repaid her score with interest, but the China mask of Tygarth's face could not enlighten her to the fact that, false to the principle of true sport, she was hitting a man who was down.

"Tabby," she said, lightly, "just run to my sitting-room and put your hand inside my work-basket. I have left a box of chocolates there."

"Why do you call him Tabby?" asked Pearl, curiously.

"I will spare his blushes," was the malicious answer. "Wait until he is gone and you shall have the whole story."

Only Beaver caught the look in Tygarth's eyes as he abruptly left the room, but it startled him by its strained intensity.

"She's driving that boy too far," he reflected. "Like all young things, she is ignorant of her strength."

Directly the door closed behind him Billie faced her visitors.

"You ask why I call him 'Tabby'?" she demanded. "Because he deserves no other name. Because he is a disgrace to the race of Englishmen. Because he is a miserable, half-baked coward."

From behind the frail door Tygarth's burning ears heard a confused babel. Billie's words had called forth incredulous dissent on the part of the Berry faction, and vehement support from Dyke and Forster. He waited for Billie's clear voice to resurrect the first discreditable incident. Then he rushed down the passage in the direction of the sitting-room.

When Billie stopped at length in her recital, through sheer lack of breath, she saw she had wasted her eloquence, for the Berry family was apparently unconvinced. The girl appealed anew to her male belongings, but Mr. Berry shook his grizzled head.

"That's the smartest two-year-old I have seen out here for many a cold day," he said, dryly. "And I reckon, p'r'aps, an old man like me can size him up better than you fine bucks. We don't run against each other."

"That's about it, pa," chimed in Mrs. Berry. "These young men are jealous. Such a nice manner he has too. I will never believe him a coward."

"He is," flamed Billie. "I say he is; and I am not a man."

"But you are a girl, my dear, and apparently he has not grasped the fact," was the dry answer.

"He hinted as much," said Pearl, acidly.

Billie grew scarlet under the raillery of the Berry family.

"Very well," she said. "I will prove what I have said. I am not piqued because the Tabby has not noticed me. I would not look at him, for he is a coward. See now. I have sent him to my basket. Crusty, my pet lizard, always goes to sleep there every afternoon. He lives on my roof, and the Tabby has never seen him. Mark my words, he will think him dangerous, and have a fit, for he is the biggest and ugliest specimen you could find. Now listen. You will have to acknowledge me right."

"Suppose he should kill him?" queried Pearl.

A shout of laughter drowned Billie's reply. "Kill him? Not he— he hasn't the pluck! He dare not touch a rat. There, what did I say? Oh, listen, listen!"

She opened the door, and her visitors rose and stood, with strained ears, in a semicircle in the doorway. As they listened, from a little way farther down the passage and muffled by closed doors, came the sound of a cry of fear. Then followed strange confused noises, as if someone were furiously rushing round the room. A piece of furniture, apparently, was thrown over with a loud thud. The sounds died away after that, till the silence was shattered by the crash of broken glass.

An expression of doubt broke over the serenity of Theophilus Berry's hatchet face. He beckoned to the others.

"Get back to the drawing-room," he said. "We'll see this thing out. We'll be in at the death."

They had barely re-seated themselves, when the door at which they were all staring was thrown open, and Tygarth staggered in. The change in the youth was incredible. His face was flushed, and in his blue eyes burned a light of triumph. A bandage was tightly fastened round his wrist and his tie was crooked. He crossed over to Billie, lurching at every step.

"I've killed him," he shouted. "I've killed him."

Billie turned pale. "You have killed him?" she repeated. "Oh, how could you? You low, cowardly brute! You've done it for revenge. You've killed my pet. Oh, I hate you, I hate you!"

Tygarth's jaw fell as he listened to the vehement words. All the joy was whipped cleanly off his face.

"Your pet?" he stammered. "But— it was dangerous."

"Dangerous It would not hurt a mouse."

"But it bit me," Dennis persisted. "Look!"

He pointed to his wrist.

Billie's scornful eyes flickered alertly over the stained bandage.

"Lies won't serve you," she said, instantly. "That's a cut; it is no bite."

A confused expression stole over Tygarth's face, and he rocked slightly.

Theophilus Berry exchanged a glance with Dr. Beaver.

"It's a cut," persisted Billie. "Done with glass, and from a broken bottle. You can't deny it."

"No, no; but—"

Dennis's voice trailed off into a mumble. All his strength seemed concentrated in an effort to keep his heels together; but it was plain by the beaten look on his face that not one of Billie's words missed its billet.

"Don't say another word," she commanded, sharply. "You must get up a little earlier in the morning to get the better of an Australian girl. I have eyes. Now, listen. To sustain your reputation for courage you have killed a perfectly harmless animal, and you couldn't even do that without Dutch courage. You have been drinking. You reek of brandy. You are not fit to be in a lady's presence. Go this instant, you— you— you Tabby!"

Tygarth turned on his heel. "Remember, I did it for you," he said, thickly. Then his head fell, and were it not for Beaver's arm he would have slid to the ground. With a nod to the doctor Berry slipped round to the other side, and, thus supported, Tygarth staggered from the room.

Directly he had gone a storm of voices broke loose. Reckless of her visitors, Billie prolonged the scene by bursting into tears— half in sorrow for her pet and half in anger against the Tabby. The Berry girls looked miserable and uncomfortable, while Dyke and Forster groaned for vengeance at every convulsive wriggle of Billie's shoulders. Mrs. Berry alone displayed a spasm of forbearance.

"My dear," she said to Billie, "you must not judge the poor young man too harshly. I have no doubt that such a state of nerves proceeds from ill-health. It's all diet, my dear. With proper feeding—"

"All the feeding in the world would not put one drop of red blood into his putrid, blue-blooded veins," growled Forster. "He is rotten, through and through."

Billie dried her eyes. "He did it for my sake," she said, faintly. "Did you hear his crowning insult? My darling Crusty!"

She spoke tenderly, yet even the sweetest cadences of a mourner's voice are powerless to quicken the dead or to explain the sudden resurrection that followed. For, at the sound of his name, a huge green lizard suddenly shot, with a ripping noise, up the reed curtain, and hung on to the cornice. With fascinated eyes, everyone watched him.

"Crusty!" screamed Billie. "It is— it is Crusty!"

For a few seconds all stood in a ring, worshipping the motionless reptile. Then Mrs. Berry's placid voice rippled through the ferment of excitement.

"What I want to know," she remarked, "is this: What did that young man really kill?"

Billie sprang to her feet. "Come along, all of you," she cried. "We'll soon find out."

They flocked out into the corridor in a confused heap, Mrs. Berry flapping along in the rear. As they passed one of the bedrooms they heard the sound of footsteps passing up and down. Berry's wizened face appeared through a slit in the door.

"Forster, Dyke, you two— come in here and lend a hand," he shouted.

The women rushed on into the sitting-room. It was in a state of disorder. A couple of chairs were overturned and a cluster of roses lay strewn on the matting. Billie's eyes went instantly to the bowl in which the flowers had stood, and she gave a faint shriek to see that the water was of a deep crimson colour.

But her cry was swallowed up in a yell from Mrs. Berry.

"Look!" she shrieked.

Something black was hanging from the basket. Ruby touched it lightly, and then recoiled in horror as it gradually slid to the ground. It seemed to the terrified women, as inch after inch slowly descended, that there was no end to the hideous spectacle. But at last, with a sudden rush, the whole weight of the creature fell with a soft thud, and they saw on the ground the carcass of a deadly swamp-snake. Its coils still twitched convulsively, but its head was crushed to the semblance of a flat-iron.

With a recollection of Billie's former outburst, Mrs. Berry instinctively produced her handkerchief. But Billie did not cry this time. She only repeated her former remark, "He did it for my sake." Then she added, slowly, "I have taunted him to his death."

"Nonsense, my dear," said Mrs. Berry, cheerfully, although she wiped her eyes, "the young man knew what to do. He took proper precautions, and acted promptly. This explains everything, blood, brandy, and all. They will bring him round all right. It will be a slight attack of blood-poisoning, perhaps, and after that, why, it will only be a question of diet."

But Billie waved aside all comfort. Her strained ears only heard the sound of footsteps in the adjoining room, that passed and repassed with measured tread.

The afternoon wore away. When the evening breeze was springing up the door of the room adjoining the sitting-room was slowly opened, and Theophilus Berry, pale and exhausted, limped out into the corridor. A shaft of red sunlight dazzled his tired eyes, so that he nearly stumbled over a little figure that was kneeling beside the door. Though white and limp, in her battered finery, he recognised his radiant hostess.

She looked up at his grim face, and saw that it was scored with the signs of a conflict waged against the Silent Adversary.

He regarded her sternly.

"You are to blame for this, young woman," he said, gravely.

Billie bowed her head in anguish.

"Don't tell me!" she cried. "Don't tell me Tabby is dead!"

For answer the old man drew out his large half-hunter.

"The Tabby died two and a half hours ago," he said, slowly, "but the tiger in a man dies harder. Tygarth of Tygarth will live."

_______________

11: At Twilight

Pearson’s Magazine, June 1930

Observer (Adelaide) 17 July 1930

THE world seemed to end at Pymans Corners and pile itself up in a green wash of trees. Although it was still afternoon, the autumn mists had veiled the evergreen shrubs in Miss Luck's moist, leaf-strewn garden so that the lawn seemed peopled with crouching forms.

Standing at her parlour window, Miss Luck thought of churchyard lights— the whisper in the lane— the footsteps on the stairs— all the old nursery tales of horror and fear. In appearance, however, she looked more than a match for man or ghost. A tall, massive woman, she were an iron-grey suit cut on masculine lines; her powerful shoulders and muscular back suggested almost ruthless strength. She turned her head and the illusion vanished. Her face was a mere handful of little, indefinite features over which peered timid eyes.

"Fay," she bleated, in a small, weak voice, "I saw a— a tree move in the garden."

The younger Miss Luck, a feather-weight of a girl with a small, pale face and short, dark elf locks, laughed.

"Did it? Now, that's quite interesting. Suppose we have a look at it."

As she rose and put her arm within that of her aunt the enormous lady felt a sudden gust of courage, for this tiny creature was more than her niece and companion. She was her protector. Together they peered into the gloomy garden, nearly submerged in that strange medium— the shade between the lights. And immediately the creeping, misted trees stopped in their advance and stiffened into definite holly or laurel.

"Where's your wonderful tree?" asked Fay.

Miss Luck laughed in her relief. She did not know that she was unable to point it out to her niece because it had crept so much closer to the cottage that it was lurking behind the pillars of the porch.

"Draw the curtains and let's be snug, Felicia," she said.

SHE squared her massive shoulders and flung back her head, every inch a heroine. At this moment she could have faced lions or raging seas. Because— at this moment— the witched garden was shut out by thick wine-red curtains; the comfortable room glowed with light from lamp, and fire; the gilt clock told her that it was only a quarter to 5. And on the rug was a small, dark girl in a leaf-brown jersey and kilt.

Unfortunately, she saw the smile Fay tried to suppress. It made her writhe with secret shame. It was in vain that she reminded herself that she was a lady of considerable wealth and, as such, an object of interest her family. She could always depend upon some niece eager to "keep her company" in her Sussex cottage.

In spite of her armour of frigid dignity, she was the meekest soul at heart. A street urchin could make her quail by a shouted insult. She never rode in an omnibus, because she feared the angry glances of the passengers she crushed.  She allowed tradespeople to overcharge her rather than risk a scene.

As Fay remained silent, Miss Luck tried to force her to an admission.

"Did you hear how that gardener you— I— discharged described me to Elsie?" she asked. "He said I was a fat old coward. Really fantastic!"

"Really insolent," said Fay severely.

"I confess it made me laugh.... Now, Would you call me a coward?"

Fay noticed that the tip of her aunt's nose quivered, as it always did in moments of emotion. In spite of her natural contempt, she suddenly felt very sorry for Miss Luck. Fortunately, she was spared a reply by the ringing of the telephone bell from the hall.

"I'll answer it," she said quickly.

When she returned there was a jaded look on her small, vivid face. "Frightfully sorry, Aunt Winny," she said, "I've got to go out immediately."

Miss Luck's mouth dropped. "Leave me all alone?"

"But, angel, it's still afternoon. It's only for half an hour. And you'll have Elsie."

"No. It's her evening out. Where are you going?"

Fay braced her nerves for another scene. "To the police station," she replied. "They've arrested another man and they want me to identify him."

Miss Luck's face puckered with rage and fear.

"Felicia," she gasped, "I forbid you to go."

"I'm afraid it's nothing to do with you." Fay's tone lacked respect. "And I don't see why you should worry. It's my funeral. Oh, dear, why did I take that , walk?"

Her face grew wistful as she remembered that wild wet day of high wind and flying leaves which had tempted her to a ramble in the beech woods. She had been so filled with the joy of living— so unconscious of the horror in store. And, in the midst of her rapture, she had heard a scream. Breaking through the bushes, she had been in time to see a man rushing away from the prostrate form of a woman.

Although she had missed the actual murder and was thus spared the nauseating details— which her aunt devoured in the morning paper— the shock was severe. She relived that moment, together with her breathless rush to the police station; in many a nightmare.

What had tried her nerves most, however, was her aunt's attitude. She reproached Fay bitterly for giving information of the appearance of the criminal, and thus exposing them to his possible recrimination.  "We're a marked house," she quavered. "You should have kept your own counsel and said nothing at all."

Unfortunately, some of Miss Luck's gloomy prophecy had been fulfilled. The police made an arrest, but Fay failed to identify the man. Although her name was kept out of the papers, she must have been seen as she left the station, for the next day she received an anonymous note.

I seen you. Keep your trap shut or I'll serve you same as I done her.

A Man Of His Word.

Fay crushed the note in her indignation.

"Fancy that railing itself a man. Optimist. I'm jolly glad now I saw the little rat."

But some of the poison which lurks in every anonymous letter got under her skin. She could not rid herself of. the impression that her movements were dogged. Therefore she was careful to avoid lonely localities and not to go out, unaccompanied, after dark.

Today's message from the police station came as a relief. Her description of a gentleman of brunette colouring, smart appearance, and poor physique applied to more than one member of a razor gang in which the police were interested," But, since the problem boiled itself down to a suspect being unable to account for his movements on a certain fatal Wednesday afternoon, she was hopeful that this time she would return to the cottage with the comforting knowledge that the criminal was safely under lock and key.

Her lips were set as she walked into the hall and took down her brown tweed coat from its peg. When she returned to the parlour her aunt looked at her with doglike, appealing eyes. She had many nieces— all attractive and charming— but this independent chit was the one she cared for most, and was, in fact, her principal legatee. She wanted desperately to win back Fay's respect.

Fay's lips did not relax at her unspoken plea.

"I'm going to the kitchen to tell Elsie that she must stay in for another half hour," she said.

As she spoke, she regarded her aunt with eyes that had grown speculative. Apart from her failing, Miss Luck was a good and charitable soul, with excellent qualities. At her death she would be missed more than many an attractive personality.

Suddenly Fay felt that she would he really fond of the old thing if she were not such a desperate coward. With the regrettable urge for reformation which animates most young and ardent natures, she wondered if it would be possible to cure her aunt of cowardice. She would have to endure a sharp lesson, but the result would justify any pain. She must be made afraid of some peril which was nonexistent, and thus receive a demonstration of the futility of fear.

"How?" wondered Fay, her eyes brilliant as diamonds.

But, even as she racked her brains, she remembered the classic horror of the man who frightened his wife with a dead snake, only to attract its living mate. Fay shook her head. Her idea held dangerous possibilities.

As she went into the kitchen, she caught Elsie in the act of applying lipstick before the small mirror. Her pretty face had rather a foxy expression. Although it was not yet 5 o'clock, she wore the Lido blue coat and small felt hat which showed that, temporarily, she was out of service.

"My aunt wants you to stay in until 5.30 this afternoon. Elsie," said Fay.

"Then 'want' must be her master," returned Elsie smartly.

She knew her value as a treasure whose only fault was carelessness, and she had no intention of making herself cheap. By leaving the cottage at 5,  she could obtain her seat at the cinema for the low price of the afternoon session.

"Where's the sense of me staying?" she argued. "She's set in the drawing room and me here, and she won't see me once all the blooming time."

SUDDENLY, Fay saw a chance of the desired lesson for her aunt. There would be no possible risk in leaving her alone at this ridiculously early hour for thirty minutes.

"So long as you can make her think you are here," she said carelessly, "it seems to amount to the same thing."

She brought back the tidings to Miss Luck that Elsie would stay in.

"And they're going to fetch me and bring me back in a car," she added, "so there'll be no risk of meeting the man."

She noticed that Elsie had taken off her coat and hat and was wearing her muslin apron when she announced Sergeant Davis. He was an excellent type of policeman; powerfully built, with a pleasant and intelligent face.

"Sorry to trouble you again," he said, addressing Miss Luck, "but I think we've got our bird this time. We're lucky to have someone like your young lady, who knows her mind right off. Indeed, we're most grateful to both you ladies for your public spirited attitude and your pluck."

"My aunt thought she saw a man lurking 'round," Fay said.

"If he is, we'll soon have him out," remarked the sergeant, darting across the lawn and ducking round every shrub and tree.

"Not a smell of anyone," he said, returning to the porch, "Well, if your niece identifies this man we'll see the end of a nasty set of cowards. He's the brains, and the gang will fall to bits, once he's out of the way, like a slit string of beads."

"Good luck," beamed Miss Luck, waving her hand.

"Back in half an hour," called Fay from the car.

As she looked back she saw the front door close on her aunt. She smiled, feeling confident that her plan must succeed. Inside were warmth, light, and safety. The garden had harboured no reptile. And when Miss Luck knew how she had been tricked she must realise the absurdity of her fears.

For there was nothing to tell Fay that she had just locked up the poor lady in the Company of a live snake.

HAD Sergeant Davis beaten the garden three minutes previously he would have found the snake. It lurked, ceiled up behind the pillars of the porch, a yard away from him, when he rang the bell. When Elsie opened the door to admit him she did not slam it to, but left it slightly ajar. This was the snake's chance. With the flash of the fer-de-lance it darted inside and hid behind the row of coats which hung in the recess under the stairs.

In appearance it was not an imposing snake, but among the most venomous of the species are the small reptiles which crawl in the dust. And it carried its sting— a razor in the breast pocket or its smart, plum-coloured suit.

In its flat, black, oiled head, too, was its plan. Snotty, the brains of the gang, who had croaked the woman in the woods, was now in quod, awaiting identification. The snake had been unable to strike before the advent of the police car. But, upon Fay's return, she would find a perfect gentleman waiting to open the door to her.

With the mentality of his kind he .believed that the removal of the chief witness for the Crown would cause the case against Spotty to collapse.

Happily unconscious of her anonymous visitor, Miss Luck strolled back to her parlour.

As she lowered herself cautiously into a deep-padded chair, Elsie entered, carrying a plate with molds of yellow-white sugar.

"I've brought you the sugar from the candy peel," she said loftily. "I've started to mix the Christmas puddings while I'm waiting for Miss Fay, and then when I come back I'll finish them before I go to bed."

Miss Luck beamed her approval.

"And please, mum," went on Elsie, "can I get you anything now? Because I won't want to answer the bell with my hands all mucky with flour."

"I shall require nothing, Elsie," Miss Luck informed her.

Three minutes later Elsie slipped through the hall, unbolted the front door cautiously, and started off at a good pace down the dim grey road toward the tram terminus.

Presently, Miss Luck finished her sugar and strolled out into the hall for a little exercise. At its far end was the kitchen door. It was outlined with a crack of yellow light, which, together with a smell of nutmeg, told her that Elsie was busy at her puddings.

The knowledge gave her such a sense of security that she determined not to disturb her conscientious maid in order to light the bedrooms. Miss Luck explained her illumination of the house by her wish to avoid a possible personal accident in the dark.

UP the stairs she ambled ponderously.

When she was nearly at the top she slipped and had to hold the balustrade to prevent a fall, as the carpet became suddenly taut beneath her feet. Looking down, she saw that Elsie had failed to put back one of the brass rods after cleaning.

"Elsie, Elsie," she called.

There was no reply, although the girl must have heard her. Miss Luck was on the point of descending the stairs when she remembered the Christmas puddings. Because of them, she resolved to accept the fiction of Elsie's deafness.

The staircase ended in a broad corridor. On one side were Elsie's bedroom, the bathroom, and the spare bedroom. On the other side Miss Luck's huge bedroom opened into Fay's smaller apartment.

As a rule, Miss Luck hated to open her door in the dusk, because it faced the wardrobe mirror, and it gave her a shock to see a dim figure advance to meet her. But this evening she was forcibly struck by her vast, swaying grey shape.

Her face grew wistful as she remembered how Fay had hinted that she, too, could acquire courage if she would realise her reserves. From the bottom of her heart she wished that, by some miracle, her cowardly nature might be changed. She had been told that miracles actually did happen. Her silly muddle of features did not look quite so silly as she uttered lip a voiceless prayer for a miracle to happen to her. A prayer— to be brave.

Feeling quite gay and confident, she strolled over to her toilet table. To her surprise, a cheap blue leather bag lay on her silver tray. She opened it and found, by the evidence of money, key, packet of fags, and sundry cheap aids to beauty, that it belonged to Elsie.

Miss Luck forgot her exaltation in the human, indignation of a mistress. This time the careless baggage should stir her lazy bones and come upstairs, in spite of floury hands.

ON her way to the bell, however, the thought of the Christmas puddings prevailed. Elsie might get mixed in her quantities were she called away. Leaving the bag on her toilet table, Miss Luck descended the staircase, ' treading carefully over the loose carpet on the twelfth step. She was crossing the hall when she glanced at the front door.

It gave her a mild shock of discomfort to discover that the bolt was not drawn. She distinctly remembered doing so herself, when she had seen Fay to the police car. Feeling vaguely disturbed, she burst into the kitchen to catch Elsie unawares. The homely place reassured her with its glowing fire and snowy table laden with suet and dried fruits. The primrose-enamelled walls gleamed and the air was hot and spiced.

But Elsie was not there. Miss Luck's heart began to hammer as she went into larder, scullery, and outhouses, calling the girl by name. When she returned to the kitchen her eye fell upon the empty peg upon which Elsie's coat usually hung. Suddenly she felt blasted by a terrible sense of desolation. Elsie had gone out secretly and left her all alone.

Miss Luck's muddle of features puckered up like a pimpernel on a wet day. To understand her feelings it must be stated that the situation was unique. When she was quite young the doctor had prescribed constant companionship, after a nervous break down. Being a lady of means, Miss Luck had converted a temporary measure into a permanent one.

She felt as helpless as a stranded baby. Fortunately, however, her first flush of indignation left her no room for actual fear. She vowed that Elsie should have her marching orders. When she returned from the pictures Miss Luck would be waiting for her on the mat. Elsie should learn who was her master.

The kitchen clock, too, provided her with a measure of comfort, for its hands stood at 5.15. Already half the time had slipped away and she had survived. Mechanically she scooped up a handful of raisins and put them in her coat pocket. In another quarter of an hour Fay would be back. Meanwhile, she thought, she would feel safer in her own bedroom than on the ground floor.

With the exception of the bathroom and her own bedroom, all the white-enamelled doors had their keys on the outside, in proof that they were never used. As Fay's sanctum communicated with her own by a door without even a flimsy bolt, Miss Luck locked it, and then put the key in her coat pocket. She marched, like a soldier, into her own fortress, where she set about the task of making it impregnable.

It was now more necessary than ever to curb her imagination, for the pictures had made her dread gigantic hands with clawing fingers shooting out from behind curtains and secret panels opening behind her in the hall. She began to give Elsie notice all over again, but this time her phrases were pitched in an ominous minor key.

"Oh, Elsie, how could you betray me?"

"Haven't I always been a kind and generous mistress to you?"

"Perhaps you'll be sorry when you hear I'm—"

Miss Luck checked herself just in time. Under the beds. Behind the window hangings. Inside the wardrobes. The worst she found was a little fluff. Dusting her skirt, she went to the window and looked out.

She was amazed to find that it was still twilight. The laurels and hollies stood out distinctly against a neutral background, and the lamps in the road were not yet lit. Officially, it was afternoon. As she leaned out of the window in the hope of hearing the car her broad back was toward the door. So she did not see the handle turn slowly, as though someone on the other side were trying to enter.

But she looked, around at the sound of footsteps. Or, rather, they sounded like footsteps, creeping along the corridor. She put her hand automatically to her heart and then withdrew it proudly, as she remembered the locked doors. Besides, she knew how much mimicry there was about the noises of an empty house at dusk. That creak, for instance, exactly resembled the opening of Elsie's door.

She looked at her watch and heaved a sigh. It was nearly 5.25. Of course, she could not count upon Fay returning to the dot, but her vigil would soon be over.

She determined not to let her thoughts get out of hand. Little bits of cotton wool in her ears would be helpful.

Suddenly her expression grew intent. In the distance there was a pinging note, like the buzz of an insect. It might be the car returning with Fay. In order to listen better, she removed the plugs of wool from her ears.

Her face paled. Someone was moving inside Fay's room.

This time it was not fancy. There were unmistakable footsteps on the other side of the thin wall. Intelligent footsteps, too, that paused when she moved, in order to mark her down.

In an agony of fear. Miss Luck told herself that it was impossible. She had herself locked Fay's door, and the key was in her pocket. Besides, there were old-fashioned lusters on the mantelpiece which always rattled when anyone walked over a loose board in the middle of the room. As the thought flashed through her mind it came— the thin, icy tinkling of glass.

MISS Luck's terror was too acute to endure. She was timid of most tangible things, but her practical mind rejected sheer impossibilities. She did not believe in ghosts. And no human being could pass through a locked door.

It was Elsie's bag, lying on her table, that suggested the solution. The girl must have discovered her loss directly she reached the tram. What was more natural than for her to return and stealthily creep about the house to find her bag?

Miss Luck knew that she was on the right trail, for Elsie had informed her of her discovery that the bathroom key fitted the lock of Fay's room. She determined to give her deceitful domestic the fright of her life.

"Come out," she called in a loud voice. "I know you are there."

There was silence as the footsteps stopped dead. Miss Luck advanced toward the door of communication.

"Come out and show yourself," she repeated. "I'm waiting for you."

But as she stood, in expectant majesty, her attention was distracted by the hooting of a motor horn outside the gate. She hurried to the window to see a car stationary in the road This time there was no mistake, for Fay's voice floated faintly on the air.

The person in the adjoining room had caught the sound's even sooner than herself. Returning from the window. Miss Luck looked inside to find the bird flown.

She smiled grimly. Elsie could wait her pleasure, with Fay at the gate. Humming tunelessly, she opened her door, only to step back in surprise at the belt of darkness which lay behind the area illuminated by her room.

She nodded sagely. Another of my lady's tricks. This fresh demonstration of guile was typical of Elsie's mentality. Since her mistress could not actually see as she stole upstairs, she would swear by all her gods that all the time she was in the kitchen.

As the electric switches were in the hall, Miss Luck groped her way along the wall until her outstretched hand touched the balustrade. Stepping cautiously into the gulf, she started to descend, peering the while into the well of darkness. Suddenly she stopped and stared more closely, blinking her eyes the while, as though to clear some flaw of vision. Against the dark panel of the front door was a denser shadow, like the blurred shape of a man.

The light from the porch, filtering through the fanlight, fell upon a flat, shiny black head, a peaked, evil face, rotten teeth. A corrupt soul peered out of small, flickering eyes.

As she stood, petrified with shock, her brain worked rapidly. She realised that Elsie had not come back, after all. Below her crouched the actual source of the mysterious happenings—the footsteps, the scratching. Probably, following some. predatory urge, lie had crept about the house under cover of darkness. His cunning would soon detect which key fitted the lock of Fay's door.

HER hands grew sticky and her throat dry as she thought of the boltless door of communication. Only a few frail panels of wood had divided her from him. She remembered the murder in the wood and those newspaper details from which Fay had been spared. Had she confronted the man, she knew that he would have attacked her, like a cornered rat.

Even as she thought of the danger she had just escaped, she heard Fay's voice ring out from the garden path. She was evidently calling to her escort in the car.

"Don't wait. I'm all right. My aunt will he frightfully thrilled at the news. She's been windy about me."

Miss Luck made an important gesture as though to arrest the car. But she heard its exhaust roar as it hummed down the road like an express train.

Cheerily Fay's signal knock sounded on the front door. In imagination Miss Luck could see her standing outside— her cheeks coloured by her ride, her dark elf locks blown, and her eyes shining with excitement. She had a tale to unfold.

Instantly the dark figure crept forward, while the light flashed upon something in his hand. Then Miss Luck understood the ultimate horror. A gentleman with a razor was waiting to open the door for Fay.

That moment was to remain as her bitterest memory. She recognised it as the peak of her life. All its events had led up to this climax, when she would expiate her cowardice in a blaze of heroism. She had prayed for a miracle to happen....

But miracles follow the working of the natural law. Because Miss Luck had violated this law— starving each feeble flicker of courage while she pampered her nerves— the moment of trial brought its logical fulfilment.

No rush of mysterious power flooded her veins. Instead, she stood paralysed, like a rabbit hypnotised by a snake. She tried to move, but her limbs were stiffened, as though her muscles were tied. Her strength oozed away through every pore. Her tongue felt so swollen that it seemed to stopper her throat.

"Fay! Don't open the door!"

Her lips framed the words, but the only sound that issued from them was a tiny gasp.

With the sensitised ears of his species, the snake heard. He darted forward, the razor flashing in his hand. As he sprang, terror snapped the spell which bound Miss Luck. All thought of Fay was swept away by sheer, blind panic. She turned to run. As she did so, the loose stair carpet slid under her foot, and the tense moment of climax shirred down into anti-climax.

Miss Luck fell down the stairs.

She dropped, like a stone, with twice the force of her stupendous weight, hitting the snake just over his heart so that he collapsed, like a crumpled paper bag. Winded and prostrate, Miss Luck awaited her end.... Then, as nothing happened, she opened her eyes. Underneath her lay something which felt boneless as pulp. Peering down, she saw a narrow-chested, putty-faced creature— an adder crushed flat by an elephant's foot. His sting was drawn, for his razor gleamed two yards away.

Miss Luck stared in astonishment at her handiwork.

"I— did— that!" she gasped.

It was in this moment that the miracle actually happened. As she gaped at the puny form, now beginning to twitch feebly under her weight, she suddenly realised her own strength.

A wondrous sense of release swept over her. She felt mighty and dominant, as though she were sitting on top of the world.

Outside the door Fay hunted for her key. She had just remembered that Elsie was out, so could not answer her knock.

As she entered the hall she was startled by the unfamiliar darkness. But her alarm was lost in surprise when she heard Miss Luck's feeble bleat magnified to a trumpet blast of triumph and scorn.

"Fay, bring the laundry cords, quick! I've squashed something here!"

_______________

12: The Uninvited Guest

The Novel Magazine June 1928

Observer (Adelaide) 11 Aug 1928

"LOOK! She's burning the table cloth!"

The country girl cried out in horror as the ultra-smart, Eton-cropped young woman at the next table pressed her cigarette-end against the snowy damask.

The town youth— who was the country girl's cavalier— wrinkled his nose in disgust.

"Rotten bad form Gives her away. I'll bet anything she's a crasher."

"Crasher?"  Echoed the country girl, whose name was Teddy. "Whatever is that?"

They were in the supper room of an expensive mansion, which was the scene of one of the biggest balls of the season. Delphiniums and madonna lilies were banked up almost to the deep blue Italian ceiling , and, through the great crystal doors, Teddy could see the red lacquer and gilt of the famous Chinese salon.

"Marvellous!" she whispered.

Outwardly she resembled any London debutante She was both slim and shingled, and dressed in a petal-frock of orchid mauve. Her liquid powder and lipstick were of the right shades, in these days of sales catalogues, any country girl who knows her job, need not look classified.

But, inwardly, Teddy was about as sophisticated as a child at its first pantomime. It thrilled her, just to remember the last night she had stood at the garden gate at home, staring at the dark, quiet fields, scented with new mown hay.  Within 24 hours the express had rattled her up to London. She had barely been enfolded within the powdery hug of her old schoolmate, Rosamond when Rosamond's special cavalier had called at the tiny basement flat, to carry them off to the ball.

Piccadilly was jammed with traffic and glittered with the lights of congested vehicles. To Teddy it was a dark lane, stuck with fireflies, as, steeped in enchantment, she lay back while the others cursed each traffic block.

Her happiness suffered its first check when Rosamond's cavalier informed her of the existence of the crasher.

She looked at him in real dismay.

He was a typical town youth, charming and correct; but he had an uneasy feeling that he would rather be dancing with Rosamond.

"Crasher'," she repeated. "Is it really true, Mr. Parnell, that people in London come to balls without invitations."

"Crowds," Parnell assured her. "Easiest thing in the world. Your hostess doesn't one-half of her guests. You see, she broadcasts for dancing, men. Take me. I was told to bring a friend— but I brought you."

"Sweet of you," said Teddy, gratefully, "But it makes me feel quite guilty to think I don't know my hostess."

As she spoke she looked up and met the full gaze of a man who, in spite of the throng, had arrested her attention and held it, by his air of high adventure.

Young Parnell smiled.

"I'm vouching for you. But, seriously, this crasher business is overdone. I was at a dance last week where there was a famine, half-time. In common decency the crasher should bar the buffet. Hulloa, Rosamond!"

His face grew wistful, as Rosamond, beautiful in a sheath of crushed golden tissue, appeared— partnerless.

Teddy was growing awkward, for Parnell was Rosamond's property, when the situation was suddenly saved. The fascinating stranger had whispered in. Parnell's ear, and he had mumbled an introduction.

Next minute they were wandering together towards the ballroom, and the adventure was spiced with the personal element.

Teddy looked up into her partner's blue-black eyes— chill as Arctic seas, they held the glint of high adventure.

"You're a friend of Mr. Parnell's, I suppose," she said. "Have you known him long?"

"Long enough to know him." He looked at her and added abruptly:— "Are you from the country?"

Teddy made a grimace. She hoped that her dress looked like the French model from which it had been copied.

"Now, I wonder how you knew that," she said forlornly.

"I didn't. I ask all my partners that. In hopes. Once I fell in love with a country girl. Adorable creature. Freckled like a cowslip. She need to water the milk for market. I helped her do it. I staved on in the country until my cash gave out. I was bitten by bulls, but I stuck it— for her. Since then I've been searching for another country girl.

"Why?"

"To fall in love again."

"But you must know crowds of London girls, if you want to fall in love," said Teddy. "I expect you know lots of people here."

He threw her what Teddy would describe as "an old-fashioned look.

"Not so many. Do you?"

"Of course not. I'm a stranger. But, according to Mr. Parnell, there are a lot of other strangers here. Uninvited guests, I mean.... Look! There's one.'

They had halted by the carved mantelpiece, which was one of the marvels of the mansion. A sleek-haired woman, with geranium-red lips, repeated the gesture of the girl at the supper table. She put down her cigarette and left it smouldering on the mantelpieces

Teddy sprang forward and picked it up.

"That's the second time I've seen that happen tonight. Appalling. Take it from me," she added with proud sophistication, "that woman's a crasher."

Her partner began to laugh.

"No, you're mistaken. That lady's well known in society. Chucking about her cigarette stubs is only one of her playful little tricks."

"Well! I call it an abuse of hospitality," said Teddy.

"Quite. But that sort of graceful gesture is hot characteristic of the crasher. He's generally an acquisition— a good dancer and well behaved. finally, he's a bit of a buccaneer and does it for the sport. I rather admire him, myself.'

"You can't!" said Teddy.

"Why not?  It shows a spirit of adventure. Life's so tame. So far the game's dead easy, but you never know when you are going to be shown up. I don't envy the crasher that. Hot. Let's go out!"

They crossed the road and sat under the shade of the plane trees that fringed the park. The foliage glittered like jade in the light of the electric standards. Red buses lurched by in the road. From the house floated the strains of the band. Teddy thought of last night; the empty fields, only the harsh cry of the corncrake and the gurgle of the watercress-choked brook.

Her life had been empty as the night. She met men— in novels and on the screen. As she caught the smile in the blue-black eyes of the stranger, she exulted in a sense of contrast.

"You were introduced to me merely as Teddy," he said. "Another name, by any chance?"

"An awful one. I'm fearfully ashamed of it. Smith."

Her partner looked at her thoughtfully. "That's my idea of rather a useful name," he observed. "Mine is Brown. Spelt with two b's."

"Like the pencil," said Teddy. "B.B. means 'very soft.' I don't think you are that."

"Thanks. I'll return the compliment.'

"Of course." Teddy laughed. "Country girls are up to all the tricks of the trade. Don't forget we always water the milk!"

During the next hour under the plane trees, they made the joint discoveries that Brown's other name was Valentine; that he cherished a secret passion for leeks, but had an aversion for walking over the joints of paving stones.

Further— that Teddy's lucky day was Friday; that she had an ambition to fly, but had only got so far as going down a coalmine.

"Of course," she admitted, "it was down instead of up. But it was a thrill, with real rats. Oh, good gracious! There's Rosamond."

She sprang to her feet as a slim figure in a golden tissue frock, accompanied by a black coat, appeared on the steps of the mansion.

They waved to her frantically. "Going on?" asked Brown.

"Yes. To a Mrs. Eddystone's dance, in Hertford street."

Brown pulled down the corner of his mouth.

"Oh, haven't you been asked?" cried Teddy. "What a pity.''

"I've received no invitation. But— is that that an obstacle?"

As they crossed the road, Teddy put out her hand impulsively. '

"Good-bye. I've enjoyed to-night like anything."

"Aren't you going in to get your cloak?" asked Brown.

"No. We left our things in the car. Oh, I— I must have a last peep! It looks like a scene on the stage."

Teddy looked reluctantly through the great glass doors.

"Going on is a silly idea, just when one is nicely set," she remarked. "And it does seem so rude not to wish your hostess good-night."

"It you want to," said Brown, "there she is."

At his words, Teddy had a sharp pang of I disappointment. Brown had indicated a stout brunette in kingfisher blue.

Yet, earlier in the evening, Parnell had pointed out to Teddy the gracious lady of the mansion— a willowy aristocrat in green and silver— her beautiful hair powdered by time.

Brown had given himself away by his ignorance.

He was a crasher.

As Teddy squashed into the two-seater, she observed that Piccadilly was no longer starred with fireflies. There were only lights. Foggy lights, too, although there was no rain.

"What ages you and your man were parked outside," said Rosamond. "Was he nice, and what's his name?"

"Brown."

Parnell glanced at Rosamond.

"Rather a useful sort of name— Brown," he observed.

Teddy turned upon him suddenly.

"But he's your friend. You ought to know all about him."

Parnell laughed

"I've a bit of a confession to make. I mistook him for another chap I knew slightly. But, probably, he's one of the Browns of Peckham. And his coat was the right cut."

Both Parnell and Rosamond began to laugh. Their mirth moved Teddy to righteous wrath.

"I call that rotten. You don't know what kind of suspicious character you were palming off on me. I've read that these society crushes are thick with detectives, looking out for cat burglars."

"Don't worry," said Rosamond. "No one would carry you off, even if you paid him for it. Sheik-stuff does not appeal to the modern partner. No nerve."

Teddy was moved to defence of her late partner.

"Mr. Brown has the necessary nerve, anyway," she announced defiantly.

"How do you know?"

Teddy remained silent. Whatever happened she would not give the crasher away.

Presently Parnell stopped the car. "Let's park here!" he said.

It was easy to tell at which house the ball was in progress. But in spite of lights and awning, Teddy curled her lip.

"What dingy street!"

"It's only Mayfair, darling," said Rosamond. "Considered not too bad an address. For a country lass, you seem to be giving yourself airs."

"I only meant I liked the other house better," explained Teddy.

Already she felt a hundred years older than the girl of last night. She thought with longing, of the brilliant scene she had just left.

In a dream she followed the others into the ballroom. Second-rate decorations, to her eyes; dim illuminations and a poor crowd.

She heard a whisper pass between Parnell and Rosamond,

"You must find Teddy a partner."

"Quite. Why, here's luck! Teddy, our friend Mr. Brown is here, looking for you!"

Teddy blinked, as suddenly the lights grew brighter. The adventurous blue-black eyes were laughing down into hers.

Then she remembered her suspicions.

"I thought you said you'd not been invited here," she said.

"Well— have you?"

"No. But that's different." Brown laughed.

"A little thing like the lack of an invitation doesn't beep me away. I judge a house by its door knocker, and I rather fancied the cut of this one. Mercury—  the god of dishonest people. Besides, I wanted to see you again."

"But think of the risk!" cried Teddy.

"Isn't that pretty cool, coming from you?"

"You mean I like risks. But I invited to go down the coalmine."

Brown shrugged his shoulders.

"I'm here, any way. Won't you dance?" Teddy pinched her little finger.

"I'm not sure that I want to dance with you."

"Why, what's wrong? I don't seem the success I was ten minutes ago. What happened in the car to change the whole course of my destiny?'

Teddy's lips softened.

"First of all," she said, "will you answer me two questions truthfully?"

"Nothing to do with the income tax?"

"Don't be silly! First, is Brown really your name?"

"No."

"But— why?"

"I chose that name to go with Smith."

Teddy's colour rose.

"My name is Smith," she said. "I was born and christened Teddy Smith, and I can prove it in a Court of Law."

"Think again before you swear to it!" warned Brown.

Teddy laughed.

"Of course, my name is really Theodora. But I am Smith."

"What's the second question?" asked Brown.

"Well—it's rather a personal one. But— are you really an uninvited guest?"

"Yes."

"Oh, dear!" cried Teddy, in dismay. Brown only laughed at her.

"What are you going to do about it? Expose me to my hostess? That is, if you know who she is."

"I may know better than you."

"Then point her out to me!"

Teddy looked around for Rosamond and Parnell, but they had spun away. She felt abandoned to her fate.

Her humiliation lay in the fact that she really welcomed her fate. Suddenly she decided to accept the situation. If the crasher liked to run the risk, it was none of her affair....

The Charleston claimed them. Later, when Teddy met Rosamond she spoke quite kindly of the house.

"I understand now what you mean. This place isn't so showy as the other, but it has atmosphere. That ceiling is Adams, isn't it?"

Rosamond put her tongue in her cheek as she nodded, and Teddy danced off again.

Sitting on the stairs, Brown related some of his war experiences. They meant much to him, but were not so sensational as Teddy expected.

"Didn't you get the V.C.?" she asked. "No. But I got the gate."

"But I'm sure you did something really cheeky. Held up a regiment of Germans with a penny pistol, or rescued your colonel under fire."

"I couldn't. I was my colonel. I don't know why you harp on this idea of my nerve. Are you getting hungry?

"Yes. It's ages since the last supper."

"Then we'll go down. They made a feature of the spread in this house. None of your bite-and-toothful affairs here.

Teddy cried out as she caught sight of the supper room through the glass doors.

"Fruit growing on real trees! Yes? What's that?"

A fat, powdered footman repeated his request.

"Your card of invitation, madam?"

Teddy had turned and pointed out the golden Rosamond and her cavalier, who were standing a few paces from them down the queue.

"They have mine." ... ,

Suddenly the smile left her face as she remembered that Brown was a crasher and had no card....

The inevitable show-up was at hand.

She made a lighting decision to stand by him.

"I don't think I want any supper," she said, "Let's dance again!"

To her surprise he merely nodded to the footman as he drew her through the doors.

"You know you're hungry," he said, "and so am I."

Teddy gasped as he steered her to tactfully placed table apart from the mob.

"But you hadn't an invitation."

"Didn't need one. Mrs. Eddystone is my aunt."

Teddy felt as though a jam of ice had melted round her heart as Brown went on.

"Quaint idea this, of showing cards. There were 200 extra guests at my aunt's last affair and some people never got a crumb, so she vowed she d be even with the crasher. I hear there's some idea of wearing a badge.''

"But why didn't they ask you for our invitation cards at the door?" asked Teddy

"Because it's impossible to know who have already shown theirs, with people drifting in and out all the time... But would you excuse me a moment? There are some people over there I know."

In blissful content Teddy watched him fight his way through the crowded room. Then her glance shifted to the glass doors of the supper room.

She was just in time to see Rosamond and Parnell interrogated by the powdered footman, so she stood up in order to attract their attention.

Her movement caught Rosamond's eyes. Her face scarlet with mortification, she made a frantic signal to Teddy before she practically ran away on the heels of the vanishing Parnell.

In incredulous horror Teddy watched and interpreted the ignominy of their departure. In that moment she realized her own position.

She was a crasher.

She had crashed into the houses of total strangers— smoked their cigarettes, eaten their food, drunk their wine. That she had been an innocent offender made no difference to the cold fact.

As her brain grew clearer she understood the reason why they had left their wraps in the car and made such informal entries. Unused to London, she had thought it to be the custom.

She had been completely taken in. If she had questioned how Rosamond— a mannequin at three pounds a week— could have gained the entry to such houses, she had the explanation in the fact that the invitations had proceeded from that young exquisite, Parnell.

Looking up, she realized that the worst was in store. The footman, to whom she had pointed out Rosamond as her sponsor, was advancing in her direction.

Teddy tried to grapple with her exact problem. She knew that if a total stranger were found in any one's house, at home, he would be handed over to the police. In any case, she would be the victim of a horribly unpleasant scene. Parnell and Rosamond had made their get away, but she was trapped.

At any moment Brown might return to the table, to be the witness of her exposure.

"Not before him!" she murmured desperately.

The footman's circuitous advance was blocked by an eddy of fresh guests. It was her moment for action. Her quick eyes had already noticed a door at the far end of the room.

She slipped through the press like an electric hare, praying that the footman had lost sight of her. It was exactly like a bad nightmare, and she wished that she could wake up and find herself where she was last night, in the safety of the dark, scented country.

As she ran, her brain worked like a racing engine. The door might be locked. If it were, she was doomed. Or it might lead to the servants' quarters, in which case she was still doomed.

But she banked on the chance that it might lead to a room which would communicate with the great hall. Once there she could leave the house with dignity.

As her fingers, gripped the door handle her heart fluttered with suspense. To her joy the knob yielded easily. In another second she was on the safe side of the door with the supper room shut out. Then she discovered that both surmises had been wrong, for the door led to a spiral staircase.

"Never mind!" she said. "It will probably lead to a passage which connects with the gallery."

If she could only reach the great central staircase she would be safely shuffled again into the pack of the guests and could make a speedy exit.

It was the work of a minute to rush up the stairs. They ended in a short passage barred by another door.

She opened it cautiously, only to be met with fresh disappointment.

She found herself in a small apartment— probably a dressing room— which, in turn, led to a large bedroom. From the nearness of the orchestra Teddy could tell that this room opened out directly to the central gallery, which was her goal. She could see its door, which was slightly open, outlined in brilliant light, and could hear laughter and footsteps.

Holding her breath, she advanced a step into the bedroom. It was the most wonderful apartment she had ever seen, with its aquamarine walls and coral and diver furniture. A subdued light filtered through a great mother-of-pearl bowl, suspended from the. ceiling.

Teddy took another step, when she was arrested by the sounds of a rustle and a cough.

To her horror she realized that someone was in bed. A frail old lady, in a plum satin peignoir was propped up amid the monstrous cushions of the bed.

Suddenly Teddy remembered that Brown had told her of Mrs. Eddystone's mother, who— after listening to the wireless until every station had closed down— insisted on her door being ajar in order to enjoy the dance music.

She slipped back into the darkness of the dressing room. It was maddening to he thus arrested, with safety only the other side of the door. For half a minute she considered the idea of making a dash for it.

Her commonsense rejected the plan. If the old lady screamed, she had a vision of every one pursuing her down the stair* case, with the absurdity of. a comedy film.

She walked over to the open window of the dressing room. Outside was a small balcony, supported by slender iron pillars, which arose from the verandah on the ground floor.

To Teddy, who had made many an escape from her bedroom window, it was the easiest descent.  The only danger lay in detection from the road.

She stood for some time in hesitation, fearing to venture. Presently, however, she gritted her teeth. It meant the murder of her orchid frock, and she kissed one fragile petal as she climbed over the balcony.

"What a night!" she murmured as she lowered herself down the pillar, foot by foot, to the sound of rending georgette.

Before she reached the bottom she knew that her luck was out. A circle of light played on her face, and she literally fell into the arms of a waiting policeman.

Resisting an instinctive desire to kick, Teddy spoke with dignity.

"Thank you. Mr. Officer. Not that I required any help. May I ask why you are detaining me?"

"What are you doing here?" was his stern response.

"Surely you could see I was merely leaving the house."

The policeman looked at her closely as he propelled her towards the front door.

"We must see about that," he said.

Teddy felt that the bad dream was growing intolerable. She felt she must wake up, or die, when she saw the tall figure of Mr. Brown on the doorstep. He won staring down the street. When his eyes fell upon her he gave a cry of greeting,

"I was just looking for you," he said. "Where did you get to?"

Teddy realized that his recognition might prove her salvation.

"Will you kindly explain to this officer that I'm a guest and not a cat-burglar?" she said haughtily. "You see, he saw me coming down from that window."

Mr. Brown's adventurous eyes lit up as she indicated the balcony. She thanked her lucky stars that she was dealing with a quick wit.

"Great!" he said. "Then you've won. What did I bet you you wouldn't do it?"

The policeman looked prim, but his disapproval vanished in the rustle of a note. Almost in the same second Brown hailed a taxi.

"I'll take you home. Nip in!"

Teddy sank back on the seat, suddenly humiliated by the shame of her adventure. She nearly broke down when she tried to explain.

"Honestly, I believed Rosamond was a properly invited guest. Honestly, I never dreamt we were crashers. Honestly, I didn't!"

"Of course not," agreed Brown. "It was a horrible suck-in for you. Now, when shall I see you again?"

"Never."

In spite of his appeals, she turned from him with averted face.

"You don't understand. I feel too humiliated. I never want to see you again. No, it's no good. Never!"

"That's done it," said Brown ruefully. "Now, will you, in turn, believe me when I tell you that I'm a crasher, too, for the first time in a pure life?"

"You— a— crasher?"

Teddy's eyes were sparkling as she turned and faced him— the chasm which divided them bridged. "Tell me all!"

"Your fault," grumbled Brown. "I was a common-or-garden guest at the  first house, of course: but I wanted to see you again, so I determined to be a crasher, for the first and last time, at the Eddystones'. I went straight to that fat, powdered footman, and said, 'Didn't know my aunt was giving a dance. Tell her I'm here, at once!' I mumbled a name, and slipped him a note, feeling sure the chap wouldn't bother about the message. That was why, when we met at the supper room. I got by him, through my bluff, plus his guilty conscience. But I lived a lifetime in that second. I felt I couldn't stick being exposed before you, and I vowed I'd never crash again...  What a night!"

"What a night!" echoed Teddy.

They were passing Piccadilly Circus, where once a winged god used to surmount a fountain. But, even in his exile by the Thames, Eros heard their laughter.

_______________

Table of Contents

- Introduction
- 1:  Cheese
- 2: Waxworks
- 4: An Unlocked Window
- 5: White Cap
- 6: Falling Downstairs
- 7: Green Ginger
- 8: The Holiday
- 9: The Sham Shop
- 10: The Call of the Tiger
- 11: At Twilight