THE LORRY LADY

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 129, 2 June 1934, Page 9 (Supplement)

THE LORRY LADY

(Author of 'Original Design,' eto.)

CHAPTER Xn.—Continued. As soon as their first fierce hunger was relieved, he began to cut again, clearing the briars from one side of him until the stone edge of the tunnel was exposed and above it a smooth bank. As soon as he had gained the bank, Bbe followed, and, helped by the pull of his hands beneath her shoulders, was eoon clear of the entangling thorns. Clear and free at last! It was still early morning, a little mist hung above the brook, a robin raised his sweet, thin whistle from the nearby trees. And as the two sat side by side and rested, too full of relief for speech, there was a feeling in the air as if the sun would shortly shine. He was the first to break their silence. "Whisky," ho said. "Drive the cold out of your joints. Then hot tea and bacon and eggs, eh? Come along. We'll get back to the'camp and see if those rascals have left us anything." i The last reflection proved unjustified. Mr. Sant's .code might be capable of condoning murder by starvation, but it prohibited petty theft. Carrow said afterwards that, not so much as a bottle of beer was missing, a tribute not only to Sant's code but to his follower's adherence thereto, for it is not to be supposed that "my friend Stone" would of his own altruism have refrained from helping himself to a bottle of beer that had lain a whole night unguarded. The small dose of whisky she would accept was strong, almost neat, and she hated the taste of it. But it restored warmth to her limbs as if by a miracle and filled her with a new energy to expend on a quick washing and tidying while the primus stove hissed and thesmell of bacon revived her blackberrystained hunger. It was hopeless to try to get the mud off her clothes. Her stockings were ruined and she tore them off and cast them aside with a positive sense of relief. She looked and felt like a tramp, but her heart was light. She would have to get some more clothes as soon as 6he reached civilisation, meantime she must fight the wetness with food and whisky. . Her driving overall in the car would make her sufficiently respectable at any rate for a lorry lady. But Carrow had other ideas. He rummaged about in the tent and produced a couple of vivid pullovers. "Put on one of these," he commanded. "You can have your choice." She chose a Fair Island pattern about four sizes too large for her. "Big man's size," she called it, and inside the tent effected the exchange to- emerge a moment later looking and feeling grotesque. She had pushed the surplus length of the thing down inside her skirt and rolled back the sleeves to expose her torn, sore fingers. Carrow said she looked fine, and proceeded to make a similar change of costume himself with distinctly more congruous effect. As they ate the sun fulfilled its promise, the whole day warmed, and but fo • aching muscles and the rawness of her fingers she could have felt reasonably comfortable. They smoked their cigarettes, -whilo Carrow pulled thorns out of his hands, and she made gentle efforts to manicure her torn nails. Their circumstances were once more approaching the normal, and yet with each trifling change that brought normality nearer she felt as if something precious were slipping away from her. Presently Carrow remarked that it ■was strange they had so far seen nothing of their gaolers of the previous night He rose and moved over the hill to scan the site of the entrance slab, bu*> reported that no one was on guard there. He surmised that the two had gone off on some mad quest, forgetting all aboiii, their night's business. Madmen, he averred, were liable to do things like that. The tarpaulin that had sheltered poor Shandy's barrel still lay over the stone, and near by the still body of the faithful beast seemed to reproach the sunshine. He promised it ruefully a funeral later, as soon as he felt capable of digging, in some choice spot among the ruins of the great house of Carrow. It seemed to Madie that she must eoon return to her business of lorry-driving. "I shall have time to get some dry clothes on the way back," she said. "You'll get no clothe 3 to-day, I'm afraid," her companion reminded her. "It's Sunday. You'd better not attempt to drive to Mexton to-day. Let's go the other way and call on your aunt. She'll fix you up with something and we can tell "her all about it." "All about what? I don't think it would be wise to tell a person like her anything," she objected. "Why on earth not? People have got to know we're going to get married, haven't they?" His air was one of innocent surprise. It was time to return to sanity. Last night they had been weak and sentimental in the stress of a common danger. To-day she could see too clearly that it would not do.. He was a man of culture and, she expected, of wealth. A man at any rate of rank and position superior to any that she had ever aspired to. She was at best a small haulage contractor with a hard life in front of her, but, at least a business woman. She insisted to herself on the business woman. It gave her strength and made a certain hardness of exterior seem natural. "Because we aren't going to be married." she told him firmly. "It would be absolutely ridiculous." His face set sullenly, obstinately. "But ; last night . . . "he began. "You've got to forget last night," she ; interrupted. "I'm going to. We weren't i ourselves then, at any rate I wasn't. It ( would be horrid if I thought you were - going to be capable of reminding me . ever again of last night." "And I thought you were perfectly J wonderful last night." The sullen lines , about his mouth were deepening. He j was obviously badly hurt by her atti- ( tude. Better hurt him badly now, she reflected, than to spoil his whole life. , "Well, whatever I was it wasn't tho real me," she said deliberately. "Look , here, this has all been very nice, but I ( hope you're going to be too much of a . gentleman to take advantage of anything I did or sai'd when I was cold and frightened. A girl wants comforting at J a time like that and she's liable to say things that aren't true, at least not true of her normal self." She found it difficult, and the hurt look on his face made it no easier for J her. \ "I see," was all he said, but his tone » was bitter. c She began to speak softly, -persua- > sivelv; "I don't want to be unkind, truly i I doii"t. But you're miles above me . . ." 1

His angry 'shrug seemed to imply an intense impatience with her words.

B, EARDLEY BESWICK. o '

"Come, look here, my friend," she resumed, "for you are going to be my mend, I hope. You've got to think this matter out. And first of all you've got to ask yourself what your people would say." ' l l "I haven't got any people," he interjected, "at least not any that have the slightest call to be considered in a matter like this." "Then," she went on ignoring thai protest, "you've got to ask yourself what you know about me." "I know about as much as I want to know, as much as I ever shall know. I know about you i'n my heart." "The woman you know there is not a lorry-lady, a business woman. She's the companion of a few hours of camp life, and a few hours of danger when she's too scared out of her wits to be her natural self. Actually I'm a very hard business woman, and a business woman sometimes has to do horrid things to get business." "I don't believe it of you. You couldn't do a horrid thing if you tried. Anyway I've a Tight to know what the horrid things are, before I turn you down on them. Tell me what you have done." Then feeling ashamed she lowered her glance to the grass. She was finding this very difficult. "Only a few weeks ago," she began gravely, "after I had met you, I vamped a nasty fat shiny man in order to get a contract, made him take me out to lunch and sit near me, and encouraged him to make love to me in a cafe. Then yesterday I did nearly as much to a brewery manager at Burlingham. I don't mean it's really dreadful," she conceded, realising how absurd her confession must sound to him in spite of seriousness of voice and manner, and in spite of the real loathing she felt for herself in the role of husmess -getter, "but it's hardly the eort of school you would want your wife to be trained in." Carrow's scowl had <*iven place to a benignant smile. "Eose Madeleine," hfl he said impressively. "There was only one thing I did not know of you, and now there is not even that I do find it hard to forgive you, but what I did not know was that you had it in you to be such a silly little prig." It was, to say the least, untactful. Her anger flared at him. "I may be a prig," she said, "but I wasn't asking your forgiveness for that or for anything else." He seemed at the moment exasperatingly incapable of taking offence. "All right, if it pleases you I will hold you \inforgiven. You want •tobe a lorry-lady once again, and I have to remind you that.l have a valuable load of stones that you have contracted to take to Oxford for me. Do you mind waiting while I shovel them into a sack?". Of course she was overtired, but actually 6ho felt not that but belittled, angry, conscious that she had made herself foolish in his eyes, and not even the reflection that she had succeeded in putting their relations on a strictly*busine«s footing once again could compensate for that. She held back her tears until ho had vanished in search of his stones and shards. Men could never understand how hard it was for a woman to give up a thing like that, she reflected as she dabbed at her eyes, and longed for it to be all over and she driving away down the great roads, a business-woman with her life once again uncluttered by men. When he returned he was lugging a heavy sack. He dumped it on the" ground and began to lace up the tent. As be did so he whistled unconcernedly to himself. "Ready?" lie asked, and once mor-> swung the sack to his shoulders. They found the old lorry standing harmlessly by the roadside, tiiin vapour rising from her timbers in the sunshine. Carrow heaved the sack mightily and, as it fell rattling over the tailboard, the engine fired, begrn to throb intermittently then to "rev." freely. There was a scrambling sound from in front, and dashing round he made one fierce leap for the cab as the vehicle lurched onto the road.

CHAPTER XIII. Engaging of a Driver's Mate. It was an exciting little struggle that Madie watched from the grass verge. Mr. Sant was up in front, driving, or trying to drive. Pop was half in and half out of the cab, clinging on with both hands, while Carrow dragged wildly at him. A "baby" car coming from Burlingham direction pulled up with a squeal of brakes as the lorry swung across the, road in front of it. Mr. Sant desperately crashed in his second gear, and stalled the engine. A grave, elderly stranger got out of the "baby" car and moved in obvious perplexity to investigate. Pop's grip suddenly gave way, and he and Carrow rolled over on the road. Carrow was up in a moment, and, disdaining Pop, who sat where he had fallen and rubbed the back of his head, sprang into the cab. Mr. Sant slithered awkwardly out from the driving side. His face was working—his eyes wild. He ran to the rear of the lorry, and, reaching over the tailboard, made a futile effort to raise the sack of stones and shards. Carrow followed him out of the cab, but made for the startinghandle. "Jump in," he shouted at Madie, and she moved automatically to obey just as the stranger, laying a hand on the madman's arm, began to expostulate. Madie was hardly in the cab before the engine started witli a rush, and in a moment Carrow scrambled up beside her. "Drive off quick!" he shouted. She obeyed, and the old lorry pulled into the straight. There wae no stallin ■* of the engine as she let in her second gear. She knew that engine better than did Mr. Sant. She ran up to speed and let in the top gear with a businesslike thump. They were away, rattling down the great road,- and in the distance behind them an angry little group gesticulated by the roadside. "Of all the cheek!" remarked Carrow. "They must have been hiding in the cab with the engine already warmed up, waiting for us. Guess they spotted our escape and thought it wiser not to interfere. The sight of us coming down the hill with a sack must have just about driven them mad. They'd imagine it was crammed with treasure." He laughed light-heartedly. "Gad, that fellow with the little car must be wondering what sort of a shindy he's run into! He'll wonder still more if Sant starts one of his pedantic explanations." She drove steadily, making no reply. She still felt a little sore with him and imagined that it was going to be rather hard to maintain the business woman attitude with him as her passenger. She wondered how far he would accompany

her. There was a honk from the rear, and she glanced into her mirror to observe the "baby" car pulling out from behind. "It's them!" she cried. "They've stolen the poor man's car!" "Don't let them pass!" snapped Carrow. "We shall have no end of trouble with them if they get in front. They'll try to stop us at all costs." She pulled out obediently, squeezing the little car towards the roadside. From her mirror she could catch the enraged look on Mr. Sant's face as he fell behind once more. "Keep it up," Carrow encouraged her. "If we can get them to follow us into a town we'll give them in charge for stealing the other fellow's car." She kept it up for miles, finding it exhilarating, if slightly inconsiderate towards oncoming traffic. Every time Mr. Sant strove to pass them she pulled out until he yvas forced to slow down and drop dejectedly into their track once more. How long they might have gone on thus it would be hard to say, but as they neared the crest of a hill, the lorry well over on its wrong side, she glimpsed the shining snout of a great limousine approaching. She swung sharply and managed to give it room to clear—just loom. It whizzed angrily past, and from behind came the crash of a collision. Seeing her pull in, Mr. Sant had seized the opportunity to pull out. They stopped as soon as her brakes would do it. Carrow, as he scrambled out, just said: "Stay where you are," and, feeling a trifle limp, she stayed. But she could not resist looking back from the side of her cab for one moment. A glance told her enough. The big limousine was standing half on the verge. The "baby" car was a crumpled wreck a few yards away. People were climbing out of the limousine, but there was no sign of life from the valiant "baby." She shuddered, and then, making a determined effort, sought her case of first aid requisites, and, with a set face, climbed into the road. She knew there would be the sort of job to be done that she esteemed it a woman's duty to face, however ghastly it might prove. When she reached the roadside group they were disentangling the limp form of Ginger Stone. They laid him on the grass, and she bent over him to sponge the blood from his face. His eyes flickered open, vague hurt eyes, and he seemed to recognise her. Suddenly he smiled quite sensibly. "I'm all right, miss," he said. "What's happened to the guv'nor?" The light went out of his eyes almost as ho spoke. His mouth drooped open, revealing tobacco-stained fangs. She knew instinctively that she had heard the last speech of Ginger Stone. Poor, weak, vicious little man. Sant had had a hold on him more powerful than that on which he doubtless replied. If it was only with a threat that he had been able to overcome the rebellion of an outraged loyalty, the loyalty had been there none the less, the pathetic loyalty of an ignorant waif for something he apprehended to be finer and stronger than himself. And it had not been entirely a solf-deception, for behind the crazed, disreputable aspect of the object of his hero worship there was indubitably the wraitli of scholarship and of nobility of a sort. When she arose from his side and moved towards the wreckage of the little car Carrow stood in her way. "You can't do any good here," he said gravely. "Sant's killed, and he isn't very tit to look at, poor chap. Co and see if the women in the other car want any aid. How's Stone l ?" "Dead," she said. "Poor old Top!" "Yes, poor old Pop," she repeated, and she felt as if she could have wept for that ungraceful little man. | (To be concluded.) j