At this, a berserk rage overcame Mandsell. Like most young men, the thing he detested chiefly was the thought that someone was trying to make a fool of him. He leaned over the counter and gripped the small proprietor by the tie. He drew him towards the counter until the little man’s head was half-way over a pile of fancy scarves stacked almost under Mandsell’s nose.
‘Come off it! ’ the young man said fiercely. ‘ Don’t you dare try to pull this stunt on me! I don’t know what was in the parcel, but I’m jolly sure —’
At this moment the shop-bell rang and in walked two middle-aged women. Mandsell, with a last despairing tug at the proprietor’s tie, turned and walked out. He walked fast. As he walked, three thoughts were in his mind. One was that there was something mysterious, not to say fishy, about the parcel; the second was that he was unlikely to get any reply, favourable or otherwise, from his publisher until Tuesday morning at the earliest; the third was that his publisher’s telephone number had always been on the letter of acceptance which he had received when he sent in his book.
He began to slacken his pace. Then a desperate idea came to him. He went back to the shop. It was empty. The two customers had gone, and the proprietor was not to be seen. Mandsell rapped imperatively on the counter and the man came shuffling out. He looked surprised and alarmed when he saw the young man, but, recovering quickly, said:
‘You hop it, or I’ll call the police!’
‘I’ve already done that. Parcel or receipt, please. They’ll be here directly.’
‘Nothing doing. You’re mistaken. I haven’t got no parcel of yourn. I may have a parcel for a lady named Faintley, but that ain’t nothing to do with you.’ The man’s tone had altered. Mandsell felt victorious.
‘All right. There’s the clerk at Hagford Station who handed me the parcel, you know. I’ve got a witness.’
‘What’ll you take to forget him?’
‘Take? I’ll take a receipt.’
‘Oh, come, now, mister! I’m not putting my name to nothing. What will you take? That’s what I ask you. Five quid any good?’
‘Since you ask me… yes.’ (It would satisfy Mrs Deaks for the moment.) The man opened the till. He took out four one-pound and two ten-shilling notes and thrust them across the counter.
‘Get out of here! ’ he said thickly. ‘And, remember, that’s blackmail money, that is! I’ve got you where I want you when I want you if you pick up them notes. What about it?’
Mandsell picked up the notes.
‘There’s one thing… you can hardly demand a receipt,’ he said, as he put them into an inside pocket. ‘ Thanks a lot. I’ll repay you when my ship comes home. I regard this as temporary accommodation only. Meanwhile I must admit that it comes in handy. So long. I’ll be seeing you! The police won’t – this time!’
He went straight back to his lodgings and gave Mrs Deaks four pounds, the result of a bluff which had worked.
‘Well, I must say, sir!’ she observed, immensely surprised.
‘I know it isn’t much,’ said Mandsell, ‘but if you wouldn’t mind trusting me a bit longer…’ He was immensely pleased with himself, the man of action, and went up to his room to complete and polish the short story for which his recent experiences had given him the idea. He intended to spend the whole evening on the job. Mrs Deaks was bringing him tea and supper. But between him and his work came niggling, unanswerable questions.
What was in the parcel, that the man Tomson had been prepared to pay him five pounds blackmail money? (For blackmail, surely, was what it must amount to, as the shopkeeper himself had pointed out.)
Why could not the woman who called herself Miss Faintley have accomplished her own errand?
Who was the man who should have been her correspondent and who had walked out of the telephone booth just before she rang him up, and why had this man not waited any longer? Ringing people up on a public telephone was always a chancy sort of business. Of course, they had chosen a box which was not likely to be used much during the evening, but the woman could have had no guarantee that somebody else would not have been in the box at the time she had arranged to speak.
If the parcel was required so urgently at Tomson’s it must be important. If so, why had she been in such a hurry to give her instructions that she had not even troubled to verify whether or not she was talking to the right man? Was she in desperate straits about the parcel? (That seemed likely, judging by the shopkeeper’s reactions.) Was she also unaccustomed to talking on the telephone, so that all voices (particularly men’s voices) were exactly alike to her?
Answer came there none, and Mandsell, secure in his lodgings for another week or two, shrugged, and continued with his work. Nevertheless, his mind was far from easy. The five pounds were all very well… in fact, undeniably useful… but what, he,wondered, did the acceptance of them entail? Had he become an accessory to crime? Did the parcel contain pornographic postcards or ‘curious’ literature? Did it contain atomic secrets, or even a new kind of time-bomb which could not be safely left at the station beyond a certain limit of hours?
Suppose he had helped to bring nearer the spectre of another world war! Suppose he had assisted to blow up the Prime Minister or Miss Gracie Fields!
Well, the matter was out of his hands. If any of these things happened, he hoped he would never know. He took out his remaining pound, turned it over, and then went out and bought himself a drink.
Chapter Two
MARK
‘The way of an eagle in the air; the way of a serpent upon a rock; the way of a ship in the midst of the sea.’
Proverbs XXX. 19
« ^ »
Mark was angry with his parents. At thirteen he considered himself old enough to tour France on his bicycle with his friend Ellison. That his parents… his mother in particular… should condemn him instead to a fortnight at the seaside village of Cromlech seemed the height of unreasoning injustice. That Ellison’s parents had been equally obstructive served only as a mild palliative, and, anyway, Ellison was not staying in Cromlech, so that Cromlech was quite intolerable.
Mark brooded, kicking a stone in front of him down the rough path which led from the panoramic cliff-top to the beach. Two further insults smouldered in his breast. Not only was a teacher from his school staying at his hotel, but, through the treachery of Mark’s father, Mark had been compelled to accept an invitation from this loathsome interloper to visit the cathedral town of Torbury, a complete waste of a whole fine day. What was worst of all, the wretched teacher was a woman!
‘Hope her beastly breakfast chokes her!’ thought Mark, referring to his teacher. ‘Silly clot!’ He swung his towel moodily at a clump of sea-pinks. ‘My last bathe for twenty-four hours, I expect! Hope I get cramp and drown! That’ll show them!’
His thoughts continued along an already well-worn track. If only it had been a decent master… Mr Taylor, perhaps, or Mr Roberts… he would not have minded so much; but of course it would have to be old Semi-Conscious! Faintley! What a name! Fancy anybody with a name like that not changing it! Of all the cissy-sounding names ever inherited by human beings, Faintley seemed to Mark, during these embittered hours, the most ridiculous and undesirable.
The path wound right and left in its serpentine progress down the cliff. Sometimes it broke into a cascade of broad, uneven steps, and occasionally, at a bend, there was a seat and a view of the coast. Mark, intent on his wrongs, and also on his swim, ignored these amenities and flopped his rubber-shod feet uncompromisingly downhill.
Trees and shrubs grew thickly; ferns appeared in modest, dim, damp places; over the bay the gulls swooped, hovered and cried. There was a very faint mist on the sea. In spite of himself, Mark began to feel better. He glanced at his wrist-watch, a present for a respectable end-of-the-year report (although even that old Semi-Conscious had tried to muck up with her usual bit of sarcasm and a C where Mark would have awarded himself a B minus). He noted that the time was half-past six. Breakfast at the hotel was not until
nine. He would swim for about twenty minutes… it was too cold to stay in long in the early morning… and then when he was dressed he would walk along the sands to the far arm of the bay. He had spotted a path which led over the further headland. It might be a private path. He jolly well hoped it was… a spot of trespassing would just about fit his mood.
But his mood was altering rapidly. It occurred to him that he and Ellison had brought to perfection… or near it; you could not pull it off with Snotty Joe, the senior assistant… the art of losing the teachers-in-charge on school outings. It would be rather a rag to lose Faintley, and have a day out by himself. He had plenty of money. He had been saving it secretly for weeks in the hope of making that cherished trip to France.
He decided he would show his father and Miss Faintley that you could take a horse to Torbury but you could not get it into the Cathedral if it did not want to go!
Almost happy at last, Mark took the last flight of steps with a leap and a stumble, and began to plough through dry sand. He pulled off his sweater and shorts, remembered to unstrap his wrist-watch, kicked off his shoes. The fresh air played round his bare shoulders. Gosh… it was cold! He had better get in quick! The tide was making, so that was all right, thank goodness. It was not a good thing in those waters to swim on an outgoing tide. Mark summoned his resolution… his thin body was sensitive to cold… took a breath and dashed boldly forward and into the icy, green sea.
He had been swimming for about twenty minutes and was lazily floating on his back when an addition to his first plan occurred to him. Suppose he could contrive, somehow or other, to make old Semi-Conscious look a fool! He realized that the close co-operation of one’s form-mates was usually necessary to ensure the success of such an enterprise, nevertheless he toyed with the idea and had arrived at the unchivalrous stage of visualizing Miss Faintley, in the hands of two large vergers, being frog-marched in ignominy from the Cathedral when, turning over with the intention of taking a final quick swim before making for the shore, he became aware that his privacy had been invaded by a young woman. Mark was in no mood for this. He despised the whole sex, and had no intention of sharing the sea with an Amazonian girl, particularly with one who obviously could give him forty yards in a hundred and still beat him.
He dog-paddled into shallow water and waded out, but the young woman swam towards him and called out cheerfully:
‘Hullo! How did you find it?’
‘Cold,’said Mark.
‘Oh, I don’t know. It doesn’t seem bad to me.’ She turned from him, ducked into a wave and went out to sea like a torpedo. Mark watched in envious admiration; then, afraid that she might turn, and, seeing him watching, imagine that he admired her prowess, he picked up his towel and began to rub his hair. He was dry and dressed in a very few minutes, but by the time he had tramped along the sand to the opposite side of the bay (it was much farther off than he had supposed) the tide was so high that it was impossible to get round the bend and climb up the headland path.
He turned and walked back along the beach. The girl was still in the sea. Mark, in spite of a strong natural aversion to females, had the instincts of a sportsman. He stood at the edge and waved. The girl caught sight of him and came swimming in.
‘I say,’ shouted Mark, ‘it isn’t safe to stay in much longer. The tide’s nearly turning, I think.’
‘Thanks for telling me. Where are you staying?’
‘The Whitesand.’
‘Good. So are we.’
‘I haven’t seen you there.’
‘Came late last night in my cabin cruiser and turned up at the Whitesand at two a.m. Had to knock them up. They weren’t pleased. Well, see you later on, I expect.’
She made for the shore. Mark shuffled away through loose sand, sat down on the first set of steps, shook surplus sand out of his shoes and tramped stolidly skywards towards breakfast. Her cabin cruiser! It only needed that! And he had to go to Torbury Cathedral with the Faintley!
The beginning of the excursion with Miss Faintley was fully as futile and exasperating as Mark had known it would be. To begin with, although the bus ride took fully an hour and three-quarters, Miss Faintley refused to travel on top.
‘No, Street,’ she said, ‘I dislike the smell of stale tobacco smoke.’ And, to Mark’s intense annoyance, she even gave him a slight but unmistakable push to ensure that he really did go inside the bus.
‘All right. You wait,’ thought Mark. He insisted upon taking the gangway seat and upon paying Miss Faintley’s fare as well as his own. He was so ruffled that he contemplated paying full fare for himself by way of asserting his independence, but reconsidered this rash plan and paid a half-fare as usual. During the journey Miss Faintley chatted unceasingly. Mark gave her half his attention. The other half was busy with plans of escaping as soon as he possibly could. It ought to be fairly easy. Torbury was a big place. There would be bookshops on the way to the Cathedral. The Faintley would be certain to want to look at books. She always did, even on school outings; yes, even on the one to the Science Museum, Mark reminded himself.
‘Excuse me, but I want to buy a film for my camera,’ he said, when at last they got off the bus and were passing a chemist’s shop.
‘Very well, Street. I’ll be looking in the window next door. There seem to be some interesting books.’ Miss Faintley seemed pleased, Mark thought.
There were several people in the chemist’s shop. Mark waited to be served, and, whilst he was waiting, he saw that his way of escape was assured. The shop had a second entrance from a street at the back. He obtained his film and left by this further door. Out in the street, he turned and hurried back towards the bus station. A bus was just moving off. He leapt on board, climbed to the top and discovered that the bus was turning into the very street in which he had abandoned his teacher. He looked out of the window, but there was no sign of Miss Faintley.
‘Gone in to browse and forgotten all about me, the silly ass,’ thought Mark.
‘Where do you want, sonny?’ inquired the conductor. Mark replied (with a vague recollection of the map which Miss Faintley had insisted upon showing him):
‘The river. Do you go there?’
The conductor said, ‘Twopenny half,’ and clipped him a ticket. Mark got off at the bridge, stood himself a stodge at a café… fish and chips, apple pie and ice cream… and then went for a two-shilling steamer trip. He spent a thoroughly satisfactory day, had tea at the same café upon his return, and had prepared a convincing, innocent-sounding story for his parents by the time he got back to the hotel. There was only one snag. He had no idea of what Miss Faintley’s story would be. His parents, however, were out when he arrived, so he bathed and changed and went down to the lounge, hoping to find Miss Faintley and try out on her the rather reproachful remarks he had concocted.
‘I’d no idea where you’d got to,’ he would say, ‘so after I’d looked for you… not knowing Torbury and it being such a whacking big place… where did you get to, Miss Faintley? I mean, I know I must have kept you waiting a jolly long time while I bought my film, but the shop was simply packed with people, and once I’d gone in I didn’t much like to walk out again without buying anything… they might think I’d shop-lifted something…’
By this time Miss Faintley would have interrupted to give her version, Mark hoped, and the rest of the conversation would follow accordingly. Unfortunately, Miss Faintley was not in the lounge, and the story, as told to Mark’s parents at dinner, did not seem nearly as convincing as Mark had hoped. However, Mark’s father (with who knows what personal recollections of boyhood!) stemmed the tide of his wife’s remonstrances.
‘It’s all right, Margaret. Nothing’s happened. The only thing is… where has Miss Faintley got to? She certainly isn’t in here, and dinner goes off at nine.’
Miss Faintley was not at breakfast, either. Mark did not go for an early swim; it was raining. He met the girl who had spoken to him the morning before, and found that she was accompanied by a quietly-
discomforting old woman as yellow as the gamboge in Mark’s paint-box and as extravagantly dressed as a macaw. The younger woman came up to him after breakfast.
‘The rain’s stopped. I’m going in. Coming?’ Mark thought he might as well. He said as much, and went upstairs to get his things. When he came back into the hotel vestibule the manager was there, talking to his father. Both turned to Mark. ‘What about this Miss Faintley who took you out yesterday? You know she hasn’t come back to the hotel,’ the manager said. Mark said he was sorry. He did know, but had no helpful observations to offer.
‘I suppose you mean she hasn’t paid,’ he said. ‘She’s a teacher at our school, so I suppose she’ll pay all right, in the end, you know.’
‘I hope so, but that isn’t what’s worrying us, sonny. I’ve rung the hospital and the police station at Torbury. Neither knows anything about her.’
‘Any reason to suppose there’s any funny business?’ asked Mark’s father.
‘No, but one has to inquire when guests don’t come back at night. Have you known the lady long, Mr Street, may I ask?’
‘I forgot when she first came,’ Mark replied at a glance from his father. ‘Nobody at school likes her much,’ he added, ‘but you don’t seem to think of her doing anything queer. Of course, she might have got drowned,’ he added helpfully. At this moment his acquaintance of the previous morning, her handsome frame draped in slacks and a Sloppy Joe, came to the foot of the stairs. She carried a waterproof bag. Thankfully Mark gathered up his own belongings and followed the girl to the swing-door. In less than ten minutes they were both in the water.
‘What’s the trouble?’ the girl asked, as both of them surfaced. ‘The manager looked a bit jaundiced, I thought… or is that my imagination?’
Mark explained, quite truthfully, exactly what had happened on the previous day.
‘Of course, if I’d known, I wouldn’t have left her,’ Mark concluded.
‘Why not? You couldn’t have known she would drop out like that. Where do you suppose she’s got to?’
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