“Hullo, Maggie,” he said, then added softly, “How good it is to see you after yon desiccated old maid. She has been holding forth. Like the bridegroom, I couldn’t get away once she fixed me with her eye.”
“What was she holding forth about?” I asked, exploring the contents of a sandwich.
“Usual stuff. You know—honour and glory and the noble tradition of the Telephone Exchange. And a bit of polly-prying about you.”
I muttered under my breath, borrowing a phrase or two from Bertie. Clark laughed and glanced at the clock above my head.
“I must go. Wait for me to-night and we’ll have a bite of supper somewhere. I am going back to the trunkroom, Sarah,” he called on his way out.
Compton raised her eyes slowly from the piece of paper over which she had been poring, her arms stretched either side of it protectively. Her eyes meeting mine gave me quite a shock. I tried to analyse the strange combination of emotions that they held. Usually pale and dull, they were gleaming not only in excitement, but also with a certain degree of surprise. She stared straight through me. Not with the idea of ignoring my presence. She just didn’t see me.
After my evening meal I sauntered up to the flat roof. If there was any stirring of air anywhere it would be there, and I was not due back in the trunkroom for another quarter of an hour. As I mounted the concrete stairs that wound around the lift-well, I noticed that old Bill had gone off duty. The lift was stationary at the eighth floor.
Situated on a hill with no very big buildings near, a view of remarkable distance and beauty can be had from the roof of the Exchange. On that particular night, the mountains in the east seemed to rise straight out of the suburbs. They were dark blue, which coupled with their apparent nearness usually meant rain. But although the sky was heavy with clouds, no breeze stirred to break them into action. It was more likely that a blustering north wind would start the following day, bringing the dust and hot breath from the Mallee district to make us limp and exhausted until the wind swung round to the south bringing relief and rain.
I struck a match for my cigarette without bothering to protect it, and the first plume of smoke hung blue and still around me. Leaning over the waist-high rail that ran around the low parapet, I could see far below the glass roof of the basement annexe. It was a foolish thing to do, for like the majority of people, heights always made me giddy. Immediately I started to imagine myself falling. It was so real that I could feel the force of gravity tearing at my body and knew exactly the splintering crash of glass I would make on the annexe roof. It was insanely tempting to see if my ideas were correct. It was here that I was dragged from the last sickening thud by the most extraordinary sound. There was a small cabin set on the roof, containing the lift paraphernalia, the walls of which provided shelter for a few garden seats. From the other side of it I could hear a voice repeating: “Peep you, peep you . . .” At least it sounded like that.
‘The madhouse has claimed another victim,’ I thought, going to investigate. It was Sarah Compton, sitting hunched on a bench and staring at her slip of paper again. Her sandy head jerked in rhythm with that absurd “peep you.” The look of complete satisfaction on her face vanished when she saw me. She tried to cover a certain confusion by asking sharply: “Why aren’t you back in the trunkroom?”
“I was a few minutes late coming out. Anyway,” I added sarcastically, “aren’t I working the same time as you? Four until eleven?”
Compton ignored this, and glared at my cigarette.
“You’re smoking again,” she remarked, rather obviously, I considered. Belonging to the diehard set who began their telephonic career when Central had but a few subscribers, she resented any forward behaviour which might, as she thought, cast a slur on the fair name of the Telephone Department. I told her that that sort of idea went out of fashion in the early twenties.
“It is not prohibited out of the building,” I retorted gently. “In fact, it is now permissible to smoke in the restroom, so—er—put that in your pipe and smoke it!”
Compton grew very flushed. “I shall report you for your rudeness.”
“Nonsense!” I said briskly. “I am off duty now, and so are you. We are just two females, suspended up here more or less like Mohammed between heaven and earth. Come, come, Miss Compton,” I went on, putting just a nice shade of pity in my voice. I detested the woman and felt I owed her something. “Let us forget that you are a monitor and that I am a telephonist, and enjoy this beautiful evening amicably.”
My flow of eloquence must have stunned her. Without speaking she turned to where the sun was settling for the night behind the bay, making the ships anchored around the Port appear black-etched against the sky. She was so quiet that, as I glanced casually at her profile, I knew that she had forgotten my existence again. Her head was raised slightly. With her rather hooked nose and thin wide mouth she reminded me of a bas-relief plaque I had once seen of a Red Indian brave. In fact, although it must sound incredible to those who knew Sarah Compton, she looked both noble and dignified.
The Post Office clock down town struck. I took a last draw before stamping on my cigarette.
“Well, duty calls,” I said brightly. For some unknown reason, I was feeling as though I had behaved rather badly. “Are you coming, Miss Compton?”
She stirred with a sigh and turned towards me. Her pale eyes shone full of tears in the twilight.
‘Heavens! How awful!’, I thought, aghast. But she seemed to control herself. We walked slowly together over the asphalted roof to the stairs. It was just as I had opened the door that she grabbed my arm so fiercely that I let out a yelp.
“Hush!” she whispered, staring over her shoulder. “Someone went into the lift cabin!”
I peered fearfully through the gloom to where the cabin was now a black box against the sky. Compton’s nervous condition was infectious. We stood very still, her hand still on my arm. There was no movement from the lift cabin. No light shone from its tiny window. I shook myself free of Compton’s grasp and said bracingly: “Rot! The door is closed. Come on, or we’ll be late. Anyway, why shouldn’t there be someone in the lift cabin? It may have been one of the mechanics going in to oil up the works.”
I was beginning to have had enough of Compton and her histrionics. She followed me obediently and without a word down the single flight of stairs. The lift was still standing at the eighth floor. Sliding open the doors, I continued in my brisk tone of voice: “This will be quicker than walking. Hop in.”
I knew Compton was one of those not uncommon individuals who hated riding in an automatic lift. While there was a special attendant, she was fairly happy, but to trust herself to a telephonist she disliked must have taken all her will-power. The lift was worked by a lever when Bill was on duty. Now, after hours, I pressed the button marked sixth, thinking how silly it was of Compton to be nervous of lifts. She was very still in her corner. I could see the pale blur that was her face. A pleasant draught of cool air came through the open emergency exit in the roof as we settled gently at the sixth floor. But when Compton put her hand on the doors ready to slide them open we started to move again, upwards. That was a thing that happened every day, although I must admit that it gave me quite a fright. I heard a gasp from Compton and told her shortly not to worry, at the same time jamming my thumb hard against the emergency button and bringing the lift to a standstill between the seventh and eighth floors.
“Blast!” I said, as nothing happened when I pressed the sixth button again. It was very quiet and warm in that dark cage, lighted only by the small red globe above the indicator board. But for that first gasp my companion remained as still as a corpse. My imagination started to leap, so much so that I found it hard to suppress a scream when some object whistled