No Winding Sheet (Mrs. Bradley)

by Gladys Mitchell

  “So you want somebody to go along to this shop, visit the exhibition, and confirm your suspicions that the paintings on view are the work of Mr. Pythias, not of Mr. Pybus. You would be wiser to consult an expert on the subject.”

  “I’d like a bit of backing-up before I do that, ma’am.”

  “Well, it sounds an attractive assignment and if, in carrying it out, Laura and I find any trace of the missing boys, I will let you know.”

  15

  The Runaways

  “Let’s have another look at that letter,” said Maycock. The boys had returned from the caravan holiday on the Friday before school re-opened on the Monday, and the letter had been lying on the front-door mat. Mr. Travis was still at work and his wife, having picked up the letter and looked at the envelope, said, “Oh, no stamp. It’s for you from one of your schoolfriends, I expect. Well, you can’t go out to anybody’s house this evening. There’s all the unpacking to do and, anyway, you have Bob here and your father will expect you to stay in and tell him all about the holiday when he gets home.”

  She went into the kitchen to get the tea and the two boys went upstairs to the bedroom they were sharing. Here Travis opened the letter.

  “Oh, crikey!” he said, dismayed. The letter, like the envelope, was in printed capitals. It said,

  So you are wise to us, are you, you sneeking young swine well for once you have opened your silly mouths a bit to wide and we are wise to you so bewear we have you in our sites and will stop at nothing you thought you could hide in a carravan but you will have to come home sometime and then we shall get you this is annimos letter but if you know who we are well you know who we are so watch out.

  “But we don’t know who they are,” said Maycock, equally disconcerted. “We never saw them, did we?”

  “One of the chaps must have grassed on us. I bet it was that louse Preston. His tongue is always flapping.”

  “But that would mean he knows the murderers. I think it’s more likely to be Sparshott. His father’s the caretaker and they were both there that night when we tried to get the biro back. I bet old Sparshott is in with the murderers, or they wouldn’t have buried the Old Python in the quad.”

  “I think we ought to call him Mr. Pythias now,” said Travis, glancing nervously over his shoulder. “We don’t know that he can’t hear us and we don’t want his ghost flapping about and telling us off for cheek.”

  “Anyway, what are we going to do?”

  “Pretend to go camping, like we told the chaps we were,” said the leader firmly.

  “But we didn’t really mean it.”

  “Never mind that. I’d better leave a note and then about midnight we’ll sneak off on our bikes and get as far away as we can.”

  “My bike’s at home and I can’t go and get it without my mother knowing.”

  “Yes, and mine’s in our garage and mum’s put the car away and locked up. Looks as though we’ll have to foot-slog it.”

  They made valiant efforts to keep one another awake that night, but both succumbed at about eleven o’clock and it was five in the morning before they tiptoed downstairs, shoes in hand, and crept out of the house. They turned their backs on the road which crossed the heath on which Travis’s note to his father had stated that they would be camping and made their way south-eastward. Travis had decided that Southampton and a ship must be their objective. They must go abroad.

  By eight o’clock, leg-weary and ready for breakfast, they had reached the next town and here they went into a churchyard, rested by seating themselves on a flat tombstone, and waited for the shops to open.

  “When we’ve had something to eat,” said Travis, “we’ll get on to the main road and hitch a lift.”

  “Will they give boys a lift? I thought it was only hikers.”

  “Well, we are hikers, you ass. We’ve got our rucksacks to prove it.”

  They bought buns, sweet biscuits, cheese, and cans of fizzy drinks and then tried their luck as hitch-hikers, but nobody was interested in two young boys, it seemed, and no car or lorry pulled up to give them a lift.

  “Better push on, I suppose,” said Maycock. “I’m sick of standing here and seeing all the cars whizz by. Come on, shall we?”

  They covered another five miles, occasionally standing at the roadside and thumbing the passing cars and lorries again. When this failed, they trudged on once more. It was after they had left the main road and were branching off for a road which would take them across the New Forest and down to Cadnam that a car pulled up about twenty paces in front of them and the driver leaned across, lowered the onside window, and beckoned to them.

  “Oh, golly!” exclaimed Travis. “It’s Old Piebald! I know the number of all the staff cars and that’s his. We don’t want a lift from him! He’ll tell Old Scarface on Monday he saw us.”

  Mr. Scaife, however, was never in receipt of this information for the simple reason that on neither the Monday nor the Tuesday had Mr. Pybus, the art master, any idea that the boys had not turned up at school or that Mr. Travis had been to see the headmaster.

  “What do we do?” asked Maycock. “Make a dash for it? There’s trees over there.”

  “Be your age, you ass. Leave this to me. Come on. He’s waiting for us.”

  “Well, well!” said Mr. Pybus, with the uneasy geniality of a despised although not altogether unpopular pedagogue. “Pilgrim’s progress is it, or are we off to join the Foreign Legion? Can I give you a lift? I am going to Southampton, if that’s any help to you.”

  “Oh, thank you, sir,” said the bold Travis, “but my father is meeting us with the car. We’re going across to the Isle of Wight for the day, sir, from Lymington.”

  “It’s a shorter crossing than from Southampton, sir,” said Maycock, making his contribution.

  “Why, so it is. Oh, well, have a good day.”

  “He’ll have forgotten by Monday that he ever saw us. That’s if he even knows our names, which I doubt,” said Travis. “I once signed one of my paintings Eva Brick and he never queried it. Preston—no, it wasn’t Preston, it was Prouding—betted me I wouldn’t, but I did and Old Piebald never said anything.”

  They watched the car until it rounded a bend and then Maycock said, “Perhaps we ought to have gone in his car. After all, it’s Southampton we want.”

  “I know, but the less he sees of us the better. If we’d gone all the way to Southampton with him he might have remembered us on Monday and found out we weren’t in school.”

  Long before they reached Cadnam both boys were desperately tired and Maycock announced that he had a blistered heel. They still had some food left, although the drinks had gone and the cans had been discarded. They retreated into one of the New Forest plantations and decided to spend the rest of the daylight hours there and push on as soon as night fell.

  “We don’t want to be spotted by anybody else,” said Travis. “Old Piebald was bad enough and next time it might be somebody who would remember us. We’ve got to get to Southampton by the morning and then see what the prospects are for smuggling ourselves on board a liner. It ought to be easy enough if we can find a big enough ship. I expect most of the crew will be on shore leave, and there will be a gangplank down. We need only wait our chance. I went over a big liner once with my father and there were simply dozens of places where we could hide. We’ll have to wait until the ship is too far out for the captain to put back and then they will give us some grub and tell us to work our passage. It’s always being done.”

  “Won’t they wireless the shore and say we’re on board?”

  “Oh, we’ll have to give false names and addresses, that’s all. The captain won’t know any different.”

  “How much further would you say it is?”

  “Oh, not far now, I reckon.”

  “What will happen if we don’t get a ship?”

  “We’ll have to hang on until we do. I can get money out on demand at a post office when I show them my savings book and we’ll just lie up somewhere in
the docks area and watch and wait. It’s quite simple.”

  “If we go into the post office or buy grub, somebody will spot us. We’ll have been missed and they’ll be looking for us, the murderers, I mean, or our mothers or the police or somebody.”

  “Our mothers won’t worry. I put in the note we were staying Sunday night with my aunt.”

  “Well, what about the murderers? I bet they will find out we’ve left home.”

  “We’ll do the post office—that’ll be me—and the shop—that’ll be you—separately. We mustn’t be seen together more than we can help. The murderers will be looking for two of us, won’t they? I’ve read about people on the run and seen it on films. Usually it’s a man and a girl and so long as nobody actually sees them together it’s perfectly all right.”

  They ate the biscuits they had left, and shared the cheese and then lay concealed until dusk. When they moved back on to the road, Maycock was limping.

  “I can’t go much further,” he said. “I wish I hadn’t come.”

  “Would you rather be murdered, you ass? Come on!”

  But Maycock’s luck was in. A long-distance lorry driver picked the boys up in his headlights and, having driven past them, he pulled up and told his mate to ask what they were up to at that time of night. Being informed by Travis that they were bound for Southampton, the mate said that the lorry was going there and reported back to the driver.

  “There’s a late coach behind me,” said the driver. “I’ll stop him. He’ll be going back empty or near enough. I know him. He’ll take these kids, I daresay. Been out for the day and got lost in the forest, I wouldn’t wonder, young dunder’eads. Tell ’em to hang on a minute while I flash down the coach.”

  Travis was too tired and Maycock too unhappy to argue or attempt to escape, so, while the driver’s mate waited on the roadside with them, the driver made signals with his rear lights to the oncoming coach and the boys soon found themselves on their way in comfort. The coach driver was not too pleased about it and told them that he would have to set them down before the coach reached the city centre.

  “You’ll have to find your own way from Totton,” he said. “I can’t go out of my way. I’m late back from the tour already. Where do you live?”

  “Almost on top of the docks,” said Travis. “We went for a day on our own in the New Forest and got lost. We’ve been walking for hours!”

  “You look like it.” He was better than his word. He took them through Totton and as far as the central station. He had to wake them before he could set them down. “Here we are, then. Know where you are now, don’t you?” he said. “Hop out quick. I’m not supposed to stop here.”

  The boys went into the railway station. They were surprised to see by the station clock that it was still only a little after eight-thirty. The lights in the booking hall gave the impression that their surroundings were friendly and reassuring. There was a station buffet. They collected food and cups of tea. Later on, they went into the waiting-room and sat beside a motherly-looking woman who said, “Wasn’t it rough coming over?” Not knowing what she was talking about, they agreed. The waiting room was warm, although the bench on which they were seated was rather hard. People came and went. A man came up to the motherly woman and said, “Oh, here you are. I’ve got the car outside.” She got up, smiled at the boys, and went out with the man. Still later, a railway official came in and said, “Hullo, what do you think you’re doing here at this time o’ night?”

  “Waiting for our mum. She’s gone to the Ladies,” said Travis.

  “Oh, ah.” He went away and, miraculously as it seemed, they were not disturbed again and managed to get some sleep. At seven the next morning they left the waiting room, bought food and tea again at the station buffet, and then set out again.

  “We’d better ask how to get to the docks,” said Maycock. “Your map doesn’t really show the way, does it?”

  “Near enough,” replied Travis, dumping his rucksack and stooping to take his father’s Ordnance map out of it. He unfolded and they scanned the large sheet. “No, it’s not really much help,” he admitted.

  He had returned the map and shouldered the rucksack again when a thin, dark individual came up to Maycock and said, “Want to earn a bit of pocket money, sonny?”

  “His mother told him not to speak to strange men,” said Travis in a high, mincing voice. The man took Maycock by the sleeve.

  “What about it, then?” he said. Maycock kicked him hard on the shin. The man, with an oath, let go and both boys took to flight and almost collided with a policeman.

  “What’s all this, then?” he said, gripping Travis.

  “Sorry,” said Travis. “Choirboys and we’re late for early service.”

  “OK.” He nodded and moved on. At the turning to the esplanade, the boys slowed to a walk. Both the man and the constable were out of sight.

  “What was that man’s game, do you think?” asked Maycock, as they walked on again.

  “No idea, but I reckon he was a spiv. What job could he give you on a Sunday unless it was something fishy? Besides, his eyes were like Prouding’s and I wouldn’t trust Prouding further than I could throw him. He’s a wart.”

  They followed the esplanade until, at the end of a left-hand turning, they could see the Bar gate. Travis led the way towards it and they halted to look at the structure and then to debate whether to turn right or left. Travis won, as usual, and they found themselves on the quay, in sight of the water and two long piers at one of which a ferry steamer was tied up.

  “Why don’t we do what we told Old Piebald we were going to do?” asked Maycock.

  “Such as what?”

  “Cross to the Isle of Wight. It might be much easier than trying to get on board a liner and smuggle ourselves away. Nobody would think of looking for us on the Isle of Wight.”

  “What about Old Piebald himself, you ass?”

  “You said he’d never remember seeing us, and if anybody asks that lorry driver or the coach driver anything, they’ll be able to say they only spotted us going to Southampton.”

  “And how far is it from Southampton to the Isle of Wight? There’s a ferry from there same as from Lymington.”

  “They wouldn’t think like that. We told Old Piebald we were going from Lymington and that’s what we’d naturally do because it’s a much shorter crossing and nearer our homes. Well, they’d soon find we didn’t do that, so they’d never think of Southampton.”

  “Well, you may be right and I expect there’d be awful trouble if we were found on board a liner and we’d be found sooner or later because of food. Trouble is, I’m not sure we’ve got enough money. I mean, we could pay the fare, but then there’s keeping ourselves until the police find the murderers and it’s safe to go home.”

  “You said a post office would give you cash on your savings book.”

  “They would in England. I’m not sure about the Isle of Wight. It might be like the Isle of Man and have its own laws and things. Look, I’ll tell you what we’ll do. We’ll lie up here in the station again tonight and then tomorrow, when the post offices will be open again, I’ll take out some money and we’ll cross by the first ferry that’s going.”

  “Won’t they wonder what we’re doing at the station again? That porter, or whatever he was, saw us in the waiting room, you know, and”—Maycock giggled—“you can’t pretend your mother is still in the Ladies.”

  “Perhaps there’s another station somewhere. A place as big as Southampton is bound to have more than one, I should think. Look at London.”

  “Never been there.”

  “We went up to London to Waterloo, and my dad told me there’s Paddington, Kings Cross, Euston, and umpteen others and they’ve all got waiting rooms and refreshments and even shops.”

  “Let’s ask if there’s another station, then.”

  “I’m not so hot on asking. The less we speak to other people the safer we are. I don’t even like that coach driver knowing we’re in S
outhampton. We’re not safe until the police catch the murderers.”

  They began to retrace their steps, but, at Travis’s suggestion, they divagated from their outward route and found a park. Here they sat on a bench with a woman who was reading a Sunday paper. She looked up from the crossword puzzle she was doing and asked, in an American accent, “Would you guys know the name of a planet discovered by Sir William Herschel? I guess I know my planets, but I just can’t seem to bring this one to mind.”

  “Uranus,” said Maycock.

  “Why, thank you! Yes, I guess that’s right. The last ‘u’ fits with my downs column. I always say there’s no way of beating a real good English education. I guess you attend a first-class school.”

  “I’m interested in astronomy, that’s all,” said Maycock.

  “My, my! Would that be one of your special studies at your school?”

  “No, it’s just a hobby.”

  “I’m afraid we have to be going,” said Travis, looking at his wristwatch. “What did you want to get talking to her for, you fool?” he said angrily to his friend when they were out of earshot of the bench.

  “What did it matter? She’s only a woman.”

  “Of course it matters. I’ve told you. Get it into your fat head that the fewer people who know we have been here the better.”

  Maycock was silent until they had left the park and were headed back towards the town. Then he said, “I’m sick of this. I’m going home.”

  “All right. You go. Get yourself murdered. Who cares?”

  They walked on, aimlessly now, and found themselves presently in the shopping centre. The shops were closed, but a man was standing gazing in at one of the shop windows. Maycock was the first to recognise him. He caught Travis’s sleeve and pointed with his other hand.

  “Look! There’s Old Piebald again!” he said. Almost before he spoke, Travis, too, had recognised the man. He bundled his companion into a shop doorway.

  “Take your school cap off and shove it in your pocket,” he said, “and turn up the collar of your raincoat and sling your rucksack on the ground and stand in front of it, with your back to the street. He may be coming this way.”