The Girl In The Cellar (9 page)

When the back door shut behind her all her pulses leapt. She stood for a moment, hardly able to draw breath, hardly able to think. And then her hand let go of the door-handle. She was out. She was free. She could go away and never come back again.

She began to move, to get away from the house. She wasn’t safe here—so near. And she must go carefully. No tripping over anything, no noise. She must take her time, step by step, step by cautious step. No use thinking what she was going to do. What she had to do now was to get away, to get as far as she could from the man, and from Lilian. She must keep her mind steadily on getting away.

The most dangerous part was the immediate part. She had to skirt the house and come out into the drive. She was on the path to the back door, the path on the east side of the house. Every day she had seen tradespeople come in and go round to the back. It was a driving road but a narrow one. There was a space to turn in behind the ornamental screen of cypress and rhododendron which hid the back door. If she followed this driving road it would bring her out on to the main road. She went on until she was clear of the yard, until her breath came easier, until she believed that she was really going to get away.

The back way out lay before her. She could go a little faster now, but not too fast. She came in herself, on the dreadful possibility that if she ran she might lose control. She had a terrible quick picture of herself running and screaming— screaming—She stood quite still and fought down the thing that wanted to run and scream. When it was under lock and key, she began to walk again. She did not dare to run.

She began to think what she must do. There were the trains, but she did not know when the last one went. And what would she do when she reached the other end? She didn’t know whether you were allowed to stop in the station. She didn’t even know if it would be safe to stop. Nothing was safe any more, even now, even here. Nothing was safe. She had a little time in hand and no more—just a little time whilst Lilian and the man sat talking—before they discovered that she had run away. She had a curious moment when she saw this time as a handful of jewels, bright and glistening. She had them, and she had nothing more at all. If she did not make good use of them they would dissolve and melt away and be utterly gone. They would not keep. She must use them now.

There was a sound in her ears. It was the sound of a car coming up behind her. It startled her broad awake out of her fancies and her dreams. She didn’t know where it came from, or where it was going to. It went past her, going very fast and with no thought of her at all. She stood for a moment and watched it go. Gradually the sound of it died away. The bright light was gone and she was all alone in the dark again. She began to run towards the station.

She didn’t know when it came to her, but it stopped her dead. One minute she was running with only one thought in her mind, to reach light, people, the station, and then all of a sudden she was standing still, checked as if by a wall. There wasn’t any wall, there wasn’t anything to stop her going on to the station except the fact that it was no good going on, because there wouldn’t be any train until 6:20 in the morning. It was Thomasina who had mentioned the 6:20 only yesterday, and she had laughed and said, ‘How frightfully early!’ But it wasn’t early enough—it wasn’t nearly early enough. It must be about twelve o’clock—perhaps half-past twelve. Six hours before any train would leave the station. What was she to do? She stood quite still and shuddered. But it wouldn’t do to stand still. At any moment they might find out that she had run away, and he would come after her. She made a great effort and looked about her.

The night was not dark. A little fitful moonlight and some cloud that veiled it from time to time. There was a house not very far away. She tried to think whose it could be. The house lay on the right of the road. On the left there were open fields with no hedge to screen her. If the man came down the road in a car looking for her he would see her on the field side. No use getting in there. She turned to the house. Suppose she were to knock them up—tell them the truth. She said, ‘I can’t,’ and was swamped by the unbelievable story she would have to tell. And he, the man—he would only have to say she was his niece, his sister, and she had lost her memory and given them all a terrible fright. She didn’t even know his name. He could make up anything he liked about her, he could put up a tale that anyone would believe, and she hadn’t so much as the shred of a fact to bring against him.

If she could only get to Miss Silver—if she could get to Jim. And then like a dizzying blow the thought struck her. Jim— wasn’t he in this? Lilian was. Something pulled at her heart. If Jim was in on this betrayal, she might as well give up. And then, quick on that, she found herself defending him. He wasn’t in on it—he couldn’t be. There were reasons why he couldn’t be. She would think of them presently. Not now—it didn’t matter now. What mattered at the present moment was that she should get off the road before anyone found her there.

She went to the right and climbed up half a dozen steps to the front door of the house that stood there, and as she did so a car came up the road behind her, going slowly.

Jim Fancourt went to Scotland Yard as soon as he got up to town. He walked in on Frank Abbott, who was writing, and said with hardly a preliminary, ‘She doesn’t know anything.’

Frank laid down his pen and lifted his eyebrows.

‘She?’ he said.

Jim frowned.

‘Anne—the other girl—the one who found her dead. I told you all about it.’

Frank’s brows went a little higher.

‘All?’ he said.

‘All I knew. I’ve got a little more, but not much.’

‘What have you got?’

‘I went down and saw Anne. She identified the bead I showed you. It was one of a string round Anne Borrowdale’s neck. She said the string was broken. She says she saw the beads there in the cellar—she did see them. I told her about going to the house with Miss Silver, and it all fits. She doesn’t remember going down to the cellar. Her recollection begins half-way down the stairs like I told you. She went down, and made sure that the girl she saw was dead. I told you all that, didn’t I? And when she was sure, she wanted to get away, and I don’t blame her. Do you?’

‘No.’

‘When she was sure the girl was dead she put out the torch and came up the stairs. I told you about all that—her walking along the street, and getting on the bus, and meeting Miss Silver. Well, I went down yesterday and saw her. I told her that I’d been to look for the house, and I showed her the bead. She turned awfully pale when she saw it, and she said the beads that had been round the girl’s neck were like that. I pressed her, and she stuck to it. She said she was sure she had seen them. She shuddered violently when she said it—it evidently brought the whole thing back. She said, “They were there— but the string was broken!” I pressed her about going to the house. She couldn’t remember anything—anything at all— before the moment when she found herself on the cellar stairs with the consciousness that something dreadful had happened. It was after that that she sat down on the steps and waited for her head to clear. She found the bag, got out the torch, and saw the dead girl at the foot of the steps.’ He made an impatient gesture. ‘I told you all that! What’s the good of going over and over it! But it was then that she saw the beads that had been round the girl’s neck. And the string was broken—this one had rolled away and got behind some boards that were leaning up against the wall. Everything else had been cleaned up—washed—tidied away. There was just this one bead behind the boards, and it proves the whole story, doesn’t it?’

‘Well—we’d like to see the girl. Anything more?’

Jim frowned.

‘No—not really. She says that she thinks the house was empty when she was in it.’

‘Why?’

‘She says why didn’t they kill her too if they were there?’

‘How did she get into the house?’

‘She doesn’t know. Everything’s a blank up to the moment she came to in the dark on those steps—’ He paused, and then said, ‘I think she’d seen the dead girl and dropped her own torch—she thinks she had a torch. There was a broken one on the ground by the dead girl. The one she used afterwards was in the bag—the black bag which she thinks must have belonged to the dead Anne. It was lying on the steps beside her. She put out her hand and felt it there when she was sitting down and trying not to faint. She picked it up and opened it, and there was a torch inside, besides some loose change and ten pounds in notes in the inside pocket. I told you all that. She says she doesn’t think the bag was hers, or the money, or the torch. As far as she is concerned she starts from scratch—there on the cellar steps without a penny.’

Frank Abbott frowned.

‘Give me her description.’

‘Whose—the dead Anne’s, or the living?’

‘Both.’

Jim said, ‘This Anne, the living one, she’s tall and slim. She’s anything between twenty and twenty-five—I should say nearer twenty—say twenty-two, twenty-three. Brown hair—dark brown—curly—’

Frank Abbott said, ‘That’s nothing to go by. Very few girls let themselves have straight hair nowadays. Any distinguishing marks?’

‘No. How do you suppose I should know? There aren’t any that show.’

‘And the dead girl?’

Jim stared at him.

‘What’s the good of describing anyone? What’s the good of a description? The dead Anne was a little thicker set and not so tall—about the same age. She had curly hair—it would be naturally curly, I should think, because there wouldn’t be permanent-waving machines out where we were, and she’d been there more than a year with her father.’

Frank Abbott looked up sharply and said, ‘Were you married to her—this girl who is dead?’

‘Not really—there was some kind of a ceremony.’

Frank’s hand lifted and fell again.

‘You told the Americans that she was your wife.’

‘Only way I could get them to take her.’

Frank remarked dispassionately, “There’ll be a row about that.’

‘Can’t be helped. If she’d been alive—but she isn’t, poor girl, she’s dead. It’s the other one, the living Anne, who’s got to be considered now. There’s something going on, I don’t know what, but yesterday a man turned up to see her. I’ve just come up from there, and she told me about it. Now listen—this is what she said. She was planting bulbs, and he came up the garden by himself. She thought he had mistaken the way. When she was telling me about it she was frightened—so frightened that she nearly fainted. We were out on the hillside above the house. I took her out there because I didn’t want anyone eavesdropping.’ He paused.

Frank said, ‘Go on.’

‘I said, “He’s frightened you—what did he say?” And she said—’ He paused.

For a moment he was back on the hillside. He was alone with Anne and she was speaking—‘He said we’ve got to have a talk, and I wouldn’t want to have it in public. I—I turned faint like I did just now, I don’t know why.’ He came back to the office with the voice dying away in his ears—‘It frightened me—it frightened me—’

Frank was looking at him. Jim went on speaking. He repeated her words, the description of the man, and his last words.

‘He said, “I’ll go for now. You’ll remember that we know where you are. And here are some orders for you. You’ll not tell anyone you’ve seen me, or what I’ve said. And when you get your orders you’ll do what you’re told right away, and no nonsense about it! Do you understand?” Then he said, “You’d better!” and he went away. And that was all.’

Frank Abbott said, ‘Very peremptory.’

Jim frowned and said, ‘Yes.’

Anne’s heart fainted in her. He had caught her. She put her hand on the handle of the door to steady herself. And it turned. It wasn’t a locked door barring her way to safety. It was open, and she was safe. The door swung in, and she with it. She shut it behind her, locked it, and leaned against it in the darkness. She felt faint with the narrowness of her escape. And then from the back of the hall in which she was standing a door opened and light shone out. A voice which was young, quite young, said sleepily, ‘Is that you? How late you are!’

There was a girl, and she was yawning. Behind her there was a partly open door to a lighted room. The light was dangerous. It was the dead middle of the night. There oughtn’t to be any light in a sleeping house. She moved so quickly that she had no time for anything except that one thought. The darkness was safe, the light was dangerous. She was along the passage and at the door, and in the same moment she was in the room and the door shut on her and on the girl. She leaned against it, drawing quick breaths and saying the first thing that came into her mind to say.

‘I’m so sorry. There’s a man—chasing me. Oh, please do help me!’

The girl looked at her. She was a little thing, and plump. Her fair hair was untidy, as if she had been asleep on it. She had on a short skirt and a flannel blouse, and she had kicked off her shoes. They were lying higgledy piggledy in front of a chair by the fire. Her round brown eyes were full of sleepy surprise. She said, ‘Who are you?’

‘I’m Anne—’

‘Anne what?’

Anne said, ‘I don’t know.’

‘Do you mean you’ve lost your memory?’

‘Yes.’

‘Oh—how odd—’

Anne said, ‘It’s very uncomfortable.’

‘It must be. Would you like some tea?’ Her tone was brightly matter-of-fact.

And then quite suddenly there came a knocking on the front door. Every scrap of colour left Anne’s face. She had been pale before, now she looked as if only terror kept her alive. The girl nodded and said ‘All right.’ She put out her hand to the electric light switch and turned it off.

The hope of darkness… The words came into Anne’s mind and stayed there. She was covered and protected. She remained standing, her hand on the back of an upright chair and her whole reliance on this little creature with the steady brown eyes. Five minutes ago she hadn’t known of her existence, and now she was in the dark in a strange house, and all her reliance was upon this girl, younger than herself.

The girl went past her out of the room. The knocking on the front door came again.

A quiet came upon Anne. There were two things that might happen to her, and she saw them quite clearly. The girl could have gone upstairs to get away from her. She could have gone upstairs to her room, and she could lock herself in. And she could speak from her window and find out who was knocking at the door. And if she believed what he would say she would give Anne over to him.

Something in her mind refused to accept this as a possible happening. It didn’t even frighten her very much. Perhaps that was because she was past being frightened either much or little. She waited, listening with all her ears—with more than her ears—with the whole of her, body and soul.

The tapping on the door came again.

This time it was followed by the sound of a window upstairs being thrown open. A sleepy voice called out, ‘Is that you, Aunt Hester?’

‘Well, no—’ It was a man’s voice. It was his voice.

‘Oh! What is it? What do you want?’

‘I just wanted to enquire, have you seen or heard anything of my ward? She is missing.’

‘Your ward?’

‘Yes. She’s been ill. She’s not fit to be out alone. If she’s with you—’

‘And what would make you think she was with me? If you’ve lost someone, go and look for her! Don’t come here, wakening me up and frightening me to death!’

The voice from the other side of the door became softer.

‘I do apologise—I really do. If my niece is there—’

‘Your niece is not here! How many more times do you want me to say that?’

‘She isn’t there?’

‘No, she isn’t!’ The window above shut with a bang.

The man on the other side of the front door put his hand on the knocker. Anne heard it make a faint creak. Then his hand dropped again. He stood for a moment or two, and then she heard his footsteps going away down the path, down the four steps that led into the road. She heard him go, and she went on listening. Every sense seemed to be stretched. She could follow his footsteps in the road, she could hear him get into the car. He banged the door with a heavy decisive slam, and the car moved off, slowly at first, then quicker and quicker until it was gone.

Anne felt the stiffness go out of her. She hadn’t realised how cold she was. It came over her now. She stood quite still where she was and waited, she didn’t know for what. Now that it was over and he was gone, she groped her way to a chair and sat down, her head against the back of it and her eyes shut. She heard the girl come back into the room, dimly. She heard her voice, but she couldn’t speak or answer. There was an interval—light in the room. It was warm—blessedly warm. Someone was shaking her by the shoulder. A voice was saying, ‘I’ve made some cocoa—you’d better have it.’

She opened her eyes. She didn’t know what a desperate appeal they held. She couldn’t do any more than she had done. Her eyes said, ‘Help me—help me.’

The little plump girl patted her shoulder.

‘Drink this up and you’ll feel better.’

It was cocoa, warm and sweet. She drank it up. It seemed strange at first, but as she went on it was comfortable and warm. Her eyes were open and she was dazedly conscious of the room and the girl.

When she had finished the cup it was taken from her, and the girl said, ‘It was a good thing you locked the door when you came in. I had left it open—I’m awful about doing that. But the thing is, my aunt was coming back. She had been up to town for the day, and then when she rang up to say she’d met a friend and been persuaded to stay the night, I put off locking the door until I went to bed, and I sat down to read and went to sleep. And when I woke up I thought she’d come after all. It’s an awful warning, isn’t it?’

Anne blinked at her.

‘I suppose it is. But if you hadn’t left the door, I wouldn’t have got in.’ She shuddered suddenly, violently.

The girl had a little painted tray in her hand. She scooped up the cup that had had the cocoa in it and laughed.

‘I shan’t tell Aunt Hester, or she’ll preach like mad. She’s all right, but she does hold forth.’ She put down the tray and the cup and said briskly, ‘Now the thing is, what am I going to do with you. Have you got any ideas?’

Anne looked ahead and turned her eyes away. She couldn’t do anything with tomorrow yet. Wait till it comes…

She was just going to speak when the girl said, ‘It’s half-past one. I think we had better go to bed. I’ll lend you a nightgown. It’ll be rather short, but that doesn’t matter. I always sleep with my feet tucked up. You can too. Then in the morning we can think about what we’re going to do. My aunt won’t be back till lunch-time, if then.’

Anne took hold of the table edge to get up, but the effort spent itself, swept away by a flood of gratitude. She said in a low, stumbling voice, ‘That’s good of you. You don’t even know my name—I don’t know it myself. I’m Anne, that’s all I know.’

‘I’m Prissy—Prissy Knox. Come along up! You look as if you wanted a good sleep.’

All at once Anne felt that was true. She got up. And that was the last thing she remembered at all clearly.