Read Online The Runaways by Victor Canning - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Victor Canning
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from the green whisky bottle he shook out five poundsâ worth of fivepenny pieces and wrapped them in his handkerchief. Then he went through the pile of Ordnance Survey maps and, after some time, found the one he wanted. It was Sheet 166 and on the red cover the town of Warminster was marked with a lot of others. Smiler liked and knew about maps. When he and his father had gone off on their trips they always used a map.
Smiler spread the map on the floor and he soon found Warminster. A mile and a half south of it was the village of Crockerton in the valley of the River Wylye. Smiler picked out the side road running down to the river bridge at Ford Cottage. He decided to take the map with him. Mrs Bagnall was not likely to miss it on her weekly visit.
Next, Smiler went up to the bathroom. In ferreting through the bathroom cabinet he had seen two things which he had remembered when he was tussling with his problem.
One was a bottle of tanning lotion and the other was a tube, in a packet, of hair colouring. Dark Brown, the label said. There was a leaflet of instructions with the tube. Smiler read them carefully. One, wet your hair and apply half the cream as you would a shampoo. Two, lather it up and then rinse it off and squeeze, surplus water from the hair. Three, apply the rest of the cream and lather well. Now leave the foam on for five, ten or twenty minutes according to how dark you want the hair to go. Four, rinse until the water runs clear. Then set your hair in your favourite style. Smiler grinned. His favourite style!
He stripped off his shirt, ran some water into the basin and set to work. It wasnât as easy as the instructions made it sound. He got the stuff over his face, neck and hands. It was a chocolate brown colour but when he tried to wash it off his hands and face it paled to a sort of sunburnt red. But â after twenty minutes â it looked all right on his hair. He wouldnât have called it dark brown, but it was brown enough â though there was a slight greenness about it. He then took the tanning stuff and worked it into his face and hands and around the back of his neck. It didnât cover the freckles by any means but it looked all right. Quite good, really, Samuel M., he told himself. After that it took him some time to clean up the basin using an old nail brush and a piece of soap from the bath holder. He combed his hair in his natural style, which was straight back without a parting, admired himself, and then began to explore the house for clothes. He was going to keep his own jeans, but he wanted some shirts and socks and something to replace his brown tweed jacket. The clothes he had been wearing at his escape he knew would have been listed in his description by the police.
Major Collingwood was a small man, Smiler soon realized. He found two old blue flannel shirts that would be a fair fit, three pairs of thick woollen socks, a thick grey pullover with a hole in the elbow and a well-worn green anorak with a penknife in one of the pockets. In a cupboard under the stairs he found, too, a pair of Wellington boots that fitted him. As his own shoes were the worse for wear he took them.
Conscious of the liberties he was taking and not overlooking the fact that the moment he went out into civilization he might be unlucky and be picked up, Smiler felt he had to try and put himself square with Major Collingwood. He went to the desk in the sitting-room and found a pencil and some sheets of note-paper. It took him some time to get the letter the way he wanted it and he screwed up the spoilt sheets of paper and put them in his pocket.
His letter read:
Dear Major Collingwood, I hope you find this and will understand that I am really only borrowing and will make it alright when my Dad comes back, like paying for the food, and so on, and making up the bottle fivepenny pieces if I donât get to do it myself â the fivepenny pieces, I mean â when I get the job I hope to
Smiler spread the map on the floor and he soon found Warminster. A mile and a half south of it was the village of Crockerton in the valley of the River Wylye. Smiler picked out the side road running down to the river bridge at Ford Cottage. He decided to take the map with him. Mrs Bagnall was not likely to miss it on her weekly visit.
Next, Smiler went up to the bathroom. In ferreting through the bathroom cabinet he had seen two things which he had remembered when he was tussling with his problem.
One was a bottle of tanning lotion and the other was a tube, in a packet, of hair colouring. Dark Brown, the label said. There was a leaflet of instructions with the tube. Smiler read them carefully. One, wet your hair and apply half the cream as you would a shampoo. Two, lather it up and then rinse it off and squeeze, surplus water from the hair. Three, apply the rest of the cream and lather well. Now leave the foam on for five, ten or twenty minutes according to how dark you want the hair to go. Four, rinse until the water runs clear. Then set your hair in your favourite style. Smiler grinned. His favourite style!
He stripped off his shirt, ran some water into the basin and set to work. It wasnât as easy as the instructions made it sound. He got the stuff over his face, neck and hands. It was a chocolate brown colour but when he tried to wash it off his hands and face it paled to a sort of sunburnt red. But â after twenty minutes â it looked all right on his hair. He wouldnât have called it dark brown, but it was brown enough â though there was a slight greenness about it. He then took the tanning stuff and worked it into his face and hands and around the back of his neck. It didnât cover the freckles by any means but it looked all right. Quite good, really, Samuel M., he told himself. After that it took him some time to clean up the basin using an old nail brush and a piece of soap from the bath holder. He combed his hair in his natural style, which was straight back without a parting, admired himself, and then began to explore the house for clothes. He was going to keep his own jeans, but he wanted some shirts and socks and something to replace his brown tweed jacket. The clothes he had been wearing at his escape he knew would have been listed in his description by the police.
Major Collingwood was a small man, Smiler soon realized. He found two old blue flannel shirts that would be a fair fit, three pairs of thick woollen socks, a thick grey pullover with a hole in the elbow and a well-worn green anorak with a penknife in one of the pockets. In a cupboard under the stairs he found, too, a pair of Wellington boots that fitted him. As his own shoes were the worse for wear he took them.
Conscious of the liberties he was taking and not overlooking the fact that the moment he went out into civilization he might be unlucky and be picked up, Smiler felt he had to try and put himself square with Major Collingwood. He went to the desk in the sitting-room and found a pencil and some sheets of note-paper. It took him some time to get the letter the way he wanted it and he screwed up the spoilt sheets of paper and put them in his pocket.
His letter read:
Dear Major Collingwood, I hope you find this and will understand that I am really only borrowing and will make it alright when my Dad comes back, like paying for the food, and so on, and making up the bottle fivepenny pieces if I donât get to do it myself â the fivepenny pieces, I mean â when I get the job I hope to
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