Boy's Cinema (1939-40)

Every Tuesday where .^shc was to become a schoolmisUess. That would be better than being a mere teacher in Dunnet, and more worthy of the degree she had obtained at Bristol University. She wandered from the window to a dressing-table, patted her dark curls, and was not dissatisfied with her reflection. In her own rather prim style she was quite good-looking, and her tweed costume and her brown tam-o'-shanter suited her well. Her face was flushed with excitement at the prospect of what she regarded as a great adventure. She turned from the dressing-table to the bed in which she had been unable to sleep the right before Her handbag was lying on its counterpane, and in the hand- bag was the passport, without which she could not leave the mainland. She took it out and frowned at the none too flatter- ing photograph of herself pasted inside it. There was another photograph in the bag, a mounted photograph of a young . man in clerical dress, and she was hold- ing that in her hand when an awkward servant-girl entered the room to carry off a couple of suitcases. "You'll be missing the Reverend John," said the girl, leaning over the bed-rail. "Yes." agreed Anne, "but he's promised to come up to Long Hope to see me." "I wouldn't like to be parted from my young man." "I don't like parting from all my friends," said Anne, " to go and live amongst strangers, but it's a bonny appointment." The maid went clattering off down the stairs with the suitcases, and Anne sat on the edge of the bed with the photo- graph of her fiance, the Rev. John Harris; but her thoughts wandered from that rather stolid young parson to the journey that was before her. It was the voice of her old landlady, Kate McGregor, that brought her to her feet: "Will ye never be ready in time for the train?" Anne put away the picture of the Rev. John Harris, tucked the handbag under her arm, gave a last look round the roon\ a?id went out to the stairs. She was at the foot of them, talking to the elderly spinster, when a high- powered black saloon car drew up outside the gate in the low stone wall of the front garden and a horn was sounded. The noise was almost musical, compared with the blast of old Sandy Ross' ancient hooter, and Kate McGregor dived into the parlour and looked out round the curtain of a window. The roadway was on a higher level than the ground floor of the house, but over the wall she could see the black saloon. A girl, dressed as a chauffeuse, was at the wheel, her hair either cropped short or hidden beneath her peaked cap, and the only passenger was a woman of ample pro- portions, white-haii'ed, and wearing furs. Kate McGregor sped to the front door and opened it, and as she did so the woman descended heavilv from the car and approached the gate. "Would it be troubling you too much to ask for some tea?" she asked in a cul- tured voice. "Trouble is what I'm here for," Kate McGregor responded in her blunt Scottish way, "but ye'll have to wait until I get this young lady on her way." Anne had stepped out at the door, and the maid was in the background, cumbered with the suitcases. The woman in furs regarded the slim figure in tweeds apprais- ingly while Kate scanned the road. "We're waiting for Sandy Ross, the carrier," explained Kate.. "This young lady's got to catch a train at five, and it's after four, now." No moving thing was tc be seen along the road, and she pursed her lips in a worried fashion. "It's very strange about Sandy Ross. I've always been able to set my clock bv him." "Sandy Ross?" The woman in furs echoed the name thoughtfully. "Well, we saw an old car with the name 'Alexander BOY'S CINEMA Ross" on it some five miles back. It seemed to have broken down. Can I do anything to help?" Ten minutes afterwards Anne was sil- ting in the back of the car beside the white-haired woman, and her luggage had been stowed upon the scat beside the girl at the wheel. Kate McGregor put her head in at the window to kiss her depart- ing lodger good-bye. " You've really got plenty of time to get to the station'," she said. "Be sure to keep warm dearie. You know you're a terror for taking colds." The engine was running. Anne leaned back in her seat, Kate retreated to the gate, and off went the saloon along the road, gathering speed as it descended the hill. "I was so afraid I'd have to wait till to-morrow," said Anne with a little sigh of relief. The girl at the wheel had not uttered a word, but the glass screen between hei- and her mistress was open and she could hear all that was said. She drove with the ease of long experience, and her face was as expressionless as the face of a statue. The woman, however, seemed to be politely interested in Anne and asked her m.any questions. Anne was quite ready to talk about her- self and the new post .she was to fill. She mentioned proudly the degree she had obtained at Bristol University. Her father, who was dead, had been an architect— not a schoolmaster—and had lived at Chester. No, she didn't know a soul in the islands, but John had promised to come and see her. Who was John? Oh, he was her fiance —the Rev. John Harris, curate at St. Augustine's, in Dunnet. Anne produced the photograph of John for inspection, and the woman who inspected it remarked that he had a fine brow. "He's a dear," said Anne. When the photograph was restored to the handbag the woman noticed the pass- port, and Anno let her look at that. too. "I had great difflculty in getting it," .she- said. ■It's almost impo-ssiblo for a civilicm to get to the islands in wartime." From time to time, while questions were put and answered, the girl at the vshecl watched Anne's reflection in her liMU- mirror, and from time to time she mad" a note upon a pad that rested on her knees. But Anne did not notice tiu:.-,e things; it was only after she had put the passport back into her handbag and turned to look out at the moorland she was leaving behind that she experienced any misgiving. The car was not on the road that led to the town and the stalicn. She sat bolt upright as she realised this circumstance, and then she leaned for- ward to speak to the girl at the wheel. "Haven't you taken the wrong turning? ' she asked a trifle agitatedly. The girl did not reply, did not even move her head; but her mistress smiled and said reassuringly: "This is a better road, so we shan't lose any time." The sun had set and a chill wind was blowing in from the sea. The windows of the car were open and Anne shivered slightly. "Quite sure you're not cold?" inquired her supposed benefactress. "Oh, I'm not a bit cold, reallv," s&id Anne. 'Remember what your old landladv told you."' The woman raised her voice. "Edwards, give Miss Burnett the Shetland scarf." The girl at the wheel passed over a long soft scarf, not to Anne, but to the woman, and the woman slipped it over Anne's head, draped it round her neck—and sud- denly held one end of it over her nose and mouth. The sickly sweet smell of chloroform assailed Anne's nostrils, and she felt her- self choking, losing consciousness. She tried feebly to tear the scarf awav: she tried to scream, but failed. Soft yet "strong The girl had taken cut the binoculars and she gave them to him without a word October ilst, 1909. 11