Seaside Hospital

by Pauline Ash

  “I could,” he said steadily. “It wouldn’t mean I’d love him less, but the boy’s a fool and lazy into the bargain. If he’s not guilty, then all I can say is, I’m very glad to hear it. Who is it, then? Yourself? ... Nay, lass, I know it isn’t you, I just wanted to shock you into coming straight out with who it was,” he said contritely.

  “Don’t you know me better than that?” she asked sadly. “Do you think I’d blurt out the person’s name, because I was shocked? But there, it might just as well be me,” she said.

  “What do you mean by that?” he asked sharply.

  “Because it’s someone so near and dear to me, and I—I don’t know what to do. I just don’t know what to do.”

  “Here, here, lass, this won’t do,” he said, looking down in dismay at her struggle to keep her composure. “Don’t cry here, lass, in the middle of the ballroom.”

  With a tremendous effort, Lisa steadied herself and said huskily, “It’s all right, I won’t give way now. Sorry, Sir Jules, but sometimes I feel that I don’t know where to turn for the best.”

  “What about Carson? I thought by the looks of it that you two were going to make a match of it. I must admit that he’d be more up your street than my boy, lass, much as I’d have liked you for a daughter-in-law. Still, if Carson’s the one for you, then he’s the right chap to take your troubles to.”

  “Oh, do you like him?” Lisa asked, her face radiant.

  “Aye, I do,” Sir Jules said. “So do you. I can tell by your face. Well then; what’s the trouble? Go and tell him all about it, and let’s have no more of it!”

  “It isn’t as easy as that, Sir Jules. I love him; I don’t mind your knowing because you’re a dear, but I know there’s nothing in it for me. He doesn’t love me—or anyone—only the memory of the girl who died.”

  “Now what’s all this about, lass? Catherine Varnell was a right wild one, and no mistake, and I don’t think Carson thought of her as anything else,” Sir Jules exclaimed. “I’d have said it was a blessed relief to him when she ended up like that. How could the chap have married her, with his position at the hospital, and had it on his mind all the time that she was out with other fellows? For that was what she was like. He knew it, and so did everyone else.”

  “If you could hear him talk about her, you wouldn’t say that,” she said, her voice breaking.

  “Well, all I hope is that you find you’re wrong before long, lass. I wish I could clear it up for you, and this other business too. You see, there’s something been stolen tonight. If you could only tell me who it is you’re shielding! Because then if that person wasn’t here tonight, you’d have nothing to worry about in this case.”

  “And would I, if the person were here?” she asked swiftly.

  “Well, that’s a question, but the fact is, I got fed up with things being taken, so I laid a trap,” he said grimly. “I’ve had copies made. Such good ones, the thief’ll be hard put to tell if they’re real or not. The police have been warned. So if anyone’s found with one of the marked copies, then he’ll be for it.”

  “Why are you telling me this, Sir Jules?”

  “I know what loyalty is, lass, and how far folks will carry it. There’s a bracelet been stolen. Someone’s got it. They won’t want to keep it, now will they? They’ll try to get rid of it, unless they’re warned about what I’ve just told you. And only you and me and the police know it.”

  “You told me, expecting me to go and warn the person!”

  “That’s about it, and I don’t want any nonsense about putting the bracelet back on the quiet, Lisa lass. If your pal’s got it, then I’m to be told. Understand?”

  “I’ve been called back to the hospital, Lisa,” Randall Carson said, as he went to find Lady Frenton to say goodbye. “An emergency operation.”

  “Take me with you,” she begged quickly. “I’ve a dreadful headache,” she said, with truth.

  As she went to get her coat, she decided that as Jacky was obviously avoiding her, the only way to contact her would be to call her to the telephone from outside.

  On the return journey, Randall returned to the subject that bothered him most. “Didn’t you enjoy the party?”

  “No, not really,” Lisa admitted.

  “Why did you come in the first place?”

  “Oh, please don’t ask me. I had a good reason,” she said, as she wondered what he would say if she told him that Sir Jules had asked her to come in order to discuss the thefts.

  At the hospital gates, Randall said, “There’s no time now, but I must talk to you later, Lisa. We’ve got to have a few things out. There’s so much I don’t understand.”

  She nodded and escaped to the nurses’ residence.

  Mary had said that she was going to be out late with Jerry, Lisa recalled. So many things now worried her and jumbled themselves up in her mind. Randall knew there was someone she was shielding, and fully expected her to bring that person to him for treatment, but he did not know it was Jacky, nor that Jacky was her own sister.

  Sir Jules would have to know, too, Lisa realized, unless she could warn Jacky. But even if she did manage to warn Jacky not to try selling the “planted” copy of the original bracelet, what good would it do? If Jacky only wanted it to keep and to look at, she would not keep it indefinitely. She never did. How could it be returned, now that Sir Jules was on the lookout for it? And if Randall and Sir Jules ever found out that Jacky was the kleptomaniac, what chance had Jacky with Derek, or indeed any other young man? And what of her stage career?

  Somehow, she must see Jacky. She still had an hour left. Changing out of her party dress into a skirt and thick jersey, she hurried out of the nurse’s residence to the telephone booth, turning over the idea that if Jacky had stolen the bracelet, there might be a chance of her putting it back while she was still in the house.

  But Jacky, too, had left early. She should be home at her lodgings by now. Feverishly, Lisa telephoned her there, only to be told by Jacky’s landlady that she had not arrived.

  Lisa went back to the hospital. She could do no more. She must wait for the morning to contact her sister. Jacky could do little with the bracelet tonight, if she had it.

  The night porter called to Lisa as she went through the gates. “Thought I’d just catch you, Nurse. Your boyfriend can’t wait till the morning—had to write you a letter tonight,” he said, with a wink. “Oh, and here’s a phone message from the other chap. My, you’re a one, aren’t you, eh?”

  The letter was addressed to her in Jacky’s wild scrawl.

  “The most awful thing has happened! I must see you. I’m scared! I daren’t go to my lodgings. I don’t know what to do. Meet me at the Wattle Stone at eleven tonight. I’ve got to talk to you.”

  It was signed Jacky.

  Lisa was appalled. There was not enough time to get to the Wattle Stone and back, especially as Mary was not there to let her in. Home Sister was very strict about curfews. What could she do?

  A clock struck somewhere, reminding Lisa that there was a bus that would take her to that end of town, even if she stayed only a little while with Jacky. There was a wild hysterical streak in Jacky that came to the surface when trouble threatened to engulf her.

  Unconsciously dropping the notes in her haste, Lisa ran for the hospital gates, but even as she got there, the bus skimmed by and did not stop.

  There were two cars outside. One was Randall’s, the other, in front of it, the big crimson car belonging to Ellard Lindon. As Lisa came to a halt just outside the gates, Ellard leaned over and opened the door, as if expecting her.

  “Get in, Lisa. Is that all you’ve brought?” he said, eyeing the big shoulder bag that she had been using since she had last seen him. “Good girl. Travel light. We’ll get you some more things when we get to Paris.”

  “What are you talking about, Ellard?”

  “You sound as if you’ve forgotten the trip I told you about,” he said, laughing shortly. “I suppose you didn’t get my telephon
e message. I worded it carefully so it wouldn’t give much away. Oh, well, you’re here on time, so it’s all right.”

  That was the moment when Lisa remembered the other slip of paper the porter had handed to her.

  She searched for it, but knew at once that she must have dropped both of them. She prayed no one would find them, then gave her mind to Ellard and where he was going.

  “Look, Ellard. I’m only going to the headland. I’ve got to meet Jacky there,” she said, through stiff lips.

  “Don’t be silly, Lisa. We haven’t time. The plane leaves at—” he began, but Lisa was almost at the end of her tether. He saw the swift movement of her hand go to the door handle and he heard her say, on an unfamiliar taut note, “Take me there, Ellard, or I’ll jump out. I mean it!”

  “All right,” he said, in a resigned voice. “I daresay it won’t take much longer to drop you there, but it’s a funny place to go and meet even your crazy sister, isn’t it?”

  “She’s in trouble again.”

  “You’d better tell me about it,” he suggested.

  Steadied, Lisa recounted briefly what had happened.

  “And what do you propose to do about it this time?”

  “I don’t know, Ellard,” she admitted dispiritedly.

  He was alarmed. She rarely used that tone. “Oh, well, it’s a good thing I’m here,” he said, rallyingly. “If it’s money she wants, I can let her have some. Or perhaps it might be as well to take her with us,” he said slowly, an idea forming in his mind. The plane might hold Jacky as well, and if she went, then Lisa would feel bound to go too.

  Lisa was not listening. Her mind was on what she would say to Jacky.

  “That car behind us,” Ellard muttered uneasily.

  He swung sharply to the right, taking the road to the headland, and the headlights behind him disappeared.

  “Oh, good, it wasn’t interested in us,” she heard him mutter. They climbed steadily, and at last the beam of his headlights picked up a lonely little figure, standing by the Wattle Stone—a great prehistoric boulder that was one of the sights of the district. Ellard slowed down, ran the car up onto the grass verge and put out the lights.

  Randall Carson’s emergency operation was over. He was tired and it was getting late. He scrubbed up, changed, and left the hospital. Outside the nurses’ residence he could see Lisa standing with her back to him. As he drew closer to her, she dropped two pieces of paper as if unaware of the action and ran for the hospital gates.

  Randall picked them up and hurried after her. By the time he was outside, the bus went whirling by. He saw Lisa pull up short and stare after it, her shoulders sagging tiredly.

  Puzzled as to where she would want to go at this hour, he started to go after her, when the door of a parked car opened, and a man called to Lisa. Randall recognized the car as Lindon’s and he heard Lindon’s voice as Lisa climbed inside.

  She moved as if she was too dazed to know what she was doing. Before Randall could stop her, the car moved off, but not before he had caught what Ellard had said about buying clothes for her in Paris.

  Thoroughly disquieted, Randall pushed Lisa’s pieces of paper into his pocket and jumped into his own car. He could not think what had happened to change things since he had seen her last, but was determined to find out what it was all about.

  It wasn’t easy to keep the crimson car in sight, although the busy streets were now quiet. A police car came out of a side turning and wedged itself in between them, and although Randall overtook the police car to keep Ellard’s car in sight, the police car again overtook him and wedged itself in between. At last, the uneasy conviction took hold of Randall that it was the crimson car that the police were interested in.

  Who were they chasing? Ellard? Or Lisa, because of the person she was shielding? As his car ate up the miles, the conviction grew that it was Lisa—and that Lisa knew, and was going to Paris with Ellard to escape the trouble.

  But that did not sound like the Lisa he knew. She would never run away. Here Randall’s anxious thoughts surveyed her curious friendship with Ellard Lindon. Did Ellard know about the one she was shielding? Was he blackmailing Lisa to go with him? Or was he helping her?

  His thoughts were interrupted by a bend in the road, where the right fork wound upward to the headland, and the left fork swung in to the London road. Following the police car, Randall ignored the cliff road, but as the car in front turned, Randall saw that the crimson car was not there. Away ahead of them for miles stretched the main road, but Ellard’s car was not on it. They had lost him.

  Randall pulled up, furious with the police car for blocking his view. He remembered the notes Lisa had dropped, and he got them out and read them.

  Ellard’s telephone message was brief, purposely couched so that the porter would think it was just a friend leaving. “PASSING TONIGHT AT ELEVEN. MY PLANE LEAVES ELEVEN-THIRTY.” And he was taking the plane to Paris, and should have been just ahead of them on the London road. Only he wasn’t. He could not have got out of their sight in that little time.

  The other note was more helpful, and Randall saw where he had gone wrong. He should have taken the headland road, to the Wattle Stone.

  As he reversed and went back, he saw the police car also reversing, and before he had gone far they honked for him to move over and let them pass.

  That note burned itself into Randall’s brain. Jacky, it was signed. Where had he heard the name? It was connected with the Frentons, with that dancer at the Coronet. He had heard Derek call her Jacky. What was her connection with Lisa, that she could imperiously demand that Lisa break hospital rules to meet her on a lonely headland at night?

  Then he recalled that there was a likeness between the two girls, and the truth now glared at him. Of course; why hadn’t he realized it before? The two girls must be sisters. Jacky was the girl whom Lisa was shielding, the girl who suffered from kleptomania.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “Where’s Jacky!” Lisa cried, opening her door at once.

  “What’s the idea?” she heard Ellard shout. “Here, she’s running off, Lisa!”

  To her dismay, Lisa saw Jacky running down the moonlit cliff path to the beach.

  “Jacky, come back! It’s me, Lisa!” she shouted going after her, but her sister took no notice.

  She followed the beam of Jacky’s flashlight, and could hear Ellard close behind her, but Jacky had had a good start.

  Frustrated, Lisa stopped short and waited for Ellard to catch up. “It’s no good chasing after her. She’s making for the caves. It’s your fault, Ellard. She only wants to talk to me. Don’t come any nearer till I find out what it’s all about.”

  He nodded curtly and waited, but as soon as Lisa had climbed up to one of the caves, he broke into a run and followed them. This was a high entrance, well above the waterline, but he could hear them talking clearly.

  “Why didn’t you come alone?” he heard Jacky say. “I must have money. I’ve got to get away! Don’t you understand, if anyone else knows about it, I won’t stand a chance!”

  “It’s only Ellard, Jacky, and he’ll probably help you. We know about the bracelet,” Lisa said urgently. “It’s only a copy, but it’s marked. Don’t you see?”

  “I know it’s only a copy.” Jacky said impatiently. “That’s just it. I tried to raise money on it tonight—a friend of mine—he said it was a fake and he wouldn’t touch it. I need cash, don’t you see—”

  “Then let Ellard come and talk to us. He’s actually offered—” Lisa broke in desperately.

  She wondered afterward if she could have made Jacky understand, but at that moment Ellard called out to them.

  “Come out!” His voice rang sharply through the cave, distorted and unfamiliar. “The tide’s coming in—we’ll be cut off!”

  Jacky did not recognize his voice, and panicked.

  “It’s the police you brought with you!” she screamed. She extinguished her flashlight plunging the cave into darkness.


  Lisa blundered to the cave mouth. “Ellard, you promised to keep away!” she shouted furiously.

  “Tell her she can come with us on the plane!” he shouted in answer, but his voice was drowned by a new sound at the back of the cave, where the hysterical Jacky was trying to press farther back out of sight.

  “The cave roof’s falling in!” Jacky screamed. “My foot! It’s trapped!”

  Ellard was furious. “Look, Lisa,” he said, taking her shoulders and shaking them, “time’s running out. There’s a plane waiting to take us to Paris, all three of us. Is that clear!”

  “I’ve told you—I’m not coming with you. Neither is Jacky. All I want you to do is to get help.”

  “But I can’t—we haven’t time!”

  “Ellard, all you have to do is go to the telephone booth just up the lane from where your car is parked. Dial the emergency number you’ll find on the front of the coin box and ask for the ambulance. That’s all I want you to do. Then you can go and get your plane. But I’m not coming with you!”

  Suddenly it came over Ellard that, desirable as Lisa was, her very unwillingness to come with him might well be an embarrassment to him if he forced her. Shrugging, he hurried out of the cave and up the beach.

  As he climbed to the top of the cliffs, he halted in dismay and dropped sharply to the ground. Where he had left his car in darkness was now a blaze of light from the headlights of a big car, and a lot of powerful flashlights. He did not need to wonder who those people were around his car. The police had arrived.

  Crouching as much as possible, he reached the cover of some bushes and did some quick thinking. It was certain that he could not reach the plane by road now, but he recollected that behind him was a rough path doubling back across the fields, along the side of some woods, to the airfield. With a bit of luck he could reach the plane on foot, before the pilot grew tired of waiting for him and took off.