The Flight of Gemma Hardy_ A Novel - Margot Livesey [118]
Leaving the chips, seizing my suitcase, I hurried back the way I had come. The bus was approaching and I stepped into the headlights, waving my free hand. It stopped. Beyond the glare of the lights, the driver pointed to the NOT IN SERVICE sign. I set down my case and put my hands together. Reluctantly he opened the door. “I’m going to the garage. There are no more buses tonight.”
“Please,” I said. “I lost my purse.”
At once he pulled over and beckoned me aboard. I searched beneath what I thought was the seat where I had first sat. I searched behind and in front of the seat I had occupied for the rest of the journey. The driver fetched a torch and shone it back and forth over the dirty floor.
“It must be here,” I kept saying as the beam caught matchsticks, sweet wrappers, a cigarette end, a pink comb.
He picked up the last. “Are you sure this is where you lost it?”
“I had it when I got on. I paid for my ticket. Then I got off, and it was gone.”
But even as I spoke, I understood what must have happened. The man who had put his hand on my leg had put his hand somewhere else. Or perhaps the purse had fallen out when I jumped up, pretending to feel sick, and he had pocketed it. All day I had been careless about closing my handbag, behaving as if I were still on the Orkneys.
“Maybe you dropped it and someone picked it up?” the driver persisted. “You were the first one off. If you’re lucky, they’ll take it to the police station in the morning. Is there anything in it to prove it’s yours?”
“The bus tickets,” I said faintly.
“Well, off you go home now. Call at the station in the morning.” He switched off the torch and returned to his seat.
At Claypoole I had seldom seen money, and at Blackbird Hall weeks had passed without my needing more than sixpence for the church collection. Now I was in the world where I was going to need money every day and I had none. I picked up my suitcase and climbed down into the street. The bus, my last link with my old life, drove away, and I forced myself to walk back to the fish-and-chips shop. There were still no other customers. The man was listening to the radio; I recognised one of Vicky’s favourite programmes.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I lost my purse on the bus. I don’t have any money.”
His lips tightened and I braced myself for an outburst. Then he seemed to take in my raincoat, my suitcase, my bedraggled hair. He added a couple of chips to the bag and held it out. “Come back and pay when you can.”
“I will,” I promised fervently.
For a few minutes sitting at the counter, eating the chips one by one, I almost forgot my troubles but soon the bag was empty. I waved my thanks to the man, now occupied with other customers, and once more picked up my suitcase. At the street corner I set it down and stopped to think. It was nearly nine o’clock, dark and chilly. Where could I sleep? Recalling the men in Inverness, I thought I could look for a bench at the railway station, but that seemed too public; besides, there were laws against loitering. A park would be safer. I was wondering how to find one when, nearby, a bell chimed the hour. At once that seemed like the answer. My uncle had always left the door of his church open. In the sixteenth century, he’d told me, a person could seek sanctuary for thirty-seven days.
The town was not quite deserted—a few teenagers loitered on street corners, a couple of dog walkers were patrolling—but to ask directions to the nearest church at this hour seemed suspicious. Stopping periodically to switch my suitcase to the other hand, I followed the main road into town. I passed more shops and a large hotel. In the morning, I thought, I would apply there for a job. There was no question now of going to Oban. I needed food and shelter as soon as possible. Glancing up a side street, I glimpsed a second hotel. I walked over to take a closer look. Just beyond the hotel, across the street, was a church set back on a grassy mound.
A man with a walking stick and a small white dog was coming up the hill. I waited for him to tap