Evans to Betsy

It was noontime when Betsy was finally released, and she rushed up to do her job at the spa. She was supposed to have wiped down the walls of the sauna and steam room by now. The spa was scheduled to open again at twelve-thirty. She hoped she wouldn’t get in trouble for being late. Luckily she didn’t pass anybody as she went through the foyer with its lovely underwater murals. She gave the sauna a quick once-over, then she went into the steam room. That was a harder job. Mildew grew so easily in the hot damp conditions and Betsy had to stand on tiptoe on the tiled bench to reach the corners at the very top. She was on the bench with her back to the door when she thought she heard a noise outside. Immediately the steam came on in a great rush. That’s funny, Betsy thought. She was supposed to trip the switch to turn the system on when she had finished. The room filled quickly with hot steam so that by the time she picked up her cleaning materials and climbed down from the bench, the door was hardly visible.

Betsy experienced a brief moment of panic and disorientation. Don’t be so daft, she thought to herself. People pay a lot of money to come in here and sit in this steam and you can’t wait to get out of it! She laughed at herself as she located the door and turned her shoulder to push it open.

It wouldn’t move.

Betsy put more effort into it and tried again. The door was stuck fast. She put down the cleaning rags and spray and tried with both hands. Behind her the steam kept on hissing as it poured out, filling the tiny room and raising the temperature. Betsy coughed. It was getting hard to breathe.

Not to worry, she told herself. The steam was on a timer. It came on, then a thermostat shut it off after a few moments. She’d seen it working. Seconds ticked by but the steam didn’t go off. The room was now so full of steam that the glass panel in the door was the only real thing in the world. Betsy could feel sweat and steam running down her face into her eyes. She hammered on the door with both fists, realizing that nobody was likely to hear her. The spa wasn’t scheduled to open for another half hour and Bethan had obviously done her share of the work and gone by now.

Half an hour. Could she hold out that long? The heat was overpowering. Betsy could feel the blood singing in her head. She was starting to feel dizzy. Help! she tried to shout. Help! But every breath she took only resulted in a fit of coughing. With the last of her strength, she pounded on the door again.

Suddenly the door was wrenched open. Bethan and Michael stood there, staring at her with frightened faces. “Betsy, what on earth were you doing in there?” Bethan demanded as a gasping, sobbing, red-faced Betsy staggered out.

“I—I couldn’t get the door open,” Betsy said.

“Oh, no.” Michael took her arm and led her to a chair in the foyer. “That damned door must be sticking again. Remember it stuck once before, Bethan? I thought the janitor had fixed it. I’ll get onto him again this afternoon.”

“It was horrible,” Betsy said. “The steam came on and it wouldn’t go off. It just kept on coming. I would have passed out if you hadn’t heard me.”

“Lucky I’d just gone to get Michael to show him a crack in one of the tiles,” Bethan said.

Michael gave Betsy an encouraging smile. “I think you probably had a bit of a panic attack, don’t you? I know what it’s like when the steam comes on—it is rather frightening. But it only lasts a minute or two, honestly.”

“It was much longer than that,” Betsy said. “The whole place was full of steam.”

“It only seemed longer, I’m sure.” He put a hand on Betsy’s shoulder. “Come on. Let’s go and get some lunch. I’ll make sure the janitor fixes that door properly this afternoon. We don’t want any panic-stricken guests, do we?”

Betsy allowed herself to be escorted up the steps between Michael and Bethan. Had she just panicked? she wondered. Had it not been as long as it seemed in there and would the steam have gone off by itself? She felt a bit of a fool.

“Thanks for rescuing me, anyway,” she said. “Sorry if I was making such a fuss.”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Evans, but she’s not here,” Mrs. Williams greeted Evan at the front door.

“She’s left, you mean?” Evan’s heart lurched at the thought of arriving too late.

“Oh, no. She just drove young Betsy to work at the center. She said she didn’t want to sit around doing nothing and she liked visiting the center.”

“So she’s down there now?”

“I expect so. She told me not to cook lunch for her, she’d be eating out, but she’d be back for dinner. I’m making her a steak-and-kidney pie tonight. You remember my pies, don’t you, Mr. Evans? I’m a dab hand with pastry, although I shouldn’t say it myself.”

Evan did remember her pastry. Vividly. He could almost taste the thick brown gravy with tender morsels of steak and kidney buried in it and the light, flaky crust on top. He sighed. “I’d better go and look for Miss Court then.”

But as he turned away from the front door, a car drew up and Emmy Court got out. Evan noticed a momentary flicker of alarm on her face before it became an expressionless mask again. “What do you want now?” she demanded.

“I’ve been asked to bring you down to headquarters to ask you a few more questions, if you don’t mind.”

“I do mind. I’ve already told you everything I know. I’ve already missed my flight home. Do you know what kind of penalty they charge to rewrite a ticket these days? I’m a student, you know, trying to live on a grant. I sure hope you guys are going to write some kind of letter to the airline for me.”

“I’m sorry, miss. I’m just doing my job. It shouldn’t take long and the sooner we get things sorted out, the sooner you can go home, isn’t it?”

Emmy glared at him, but she allowed herself to be shepherded to the squad car that Evan had borrowed from Sergeant Watkins.

“It’s harassment, that’s what it is. I’m going to complain to the U.S. embassy.” Evan said nothing and Emmy remained silent all the way down the pass. When they reached the Caernarfon police station, Evan ushered Emmy