RANSVESTIA

Once on the ground floor my urgent need altered from escape to finding somewhere to change my clothes. With mounting anxiety my eyes searched everywhere for a reasonable place—a girl can't just undress in the middle of a corridor—until I was alarmed by the sound of raised voices and approaching feet. In despair I darted through a half open door to find myself in the open air.

The rain had stopped again but it was still very dark and it was only by the occasional lightning flash that I could see that I was standing at one end of the hotel building with just the open country- side and, to my right, the main road. Nowhere was there a scrap of cover. I stared around shivering in the cool evening air trying desperately to think what to do. I had only a few seconds left for I could hear the voices approaching the door through which I had just passed. Then, like a miracle, I saw the little van standing on the road. The lights were out but I could just see that one of the rear doors was open. At least it was cover. I ran.

My relief was short lived for I heard the voices approach. Hardly daring to breathe I waited in the darkness of the van body. The door was slammed and the van lurched as two men got in. And at that instant there was the loudest thunderclap ever. The strike could only have been within yards of us.

"God!" yelled one of them, "this is getting bloody dangerous-let's get out of here."

"Ay-that one hit the hotel-I saw it in the mirror."

Instinct urged me to run back to see if I could help-perhaps people were hurt-but the starter whined and with a fearsome jerk— the van practically leaped into motion-we were away. Tensely I hung on tightly to prevent myself being thrown about as we roared along the not-too-well surfaced road. One bit of luck-there was a division between the body of the van and the men in front for if there hadn't been I would certainly have been discovered.

As time passed and we got away from the centre of the storm I calmed down sufficiently to take stock of my position. On the whole I thought it wasn't too bad as long as I could avoid being seen. I had escaped from the man in my room and once I was cleaned up and back in Keith's clothes-I can't remember any other time when I've

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