‘I shan’t come,’ he said. ‘I’m going to have a go at my radio set. It’s gone wrong.’
Bill had a marvellous radio, the finest the boys had ever seen. It was set at the back of the old hut, and there was no station that Bill could not get. He would not allow the boys to tamper with it at all.
‘Well, we’ll be along this afternoon, then,’ said Jack, pleased. ‘It’s awfully nice of you to lend us your boat like this, Bill. Really it is.’
‘It’s a pleasure,’ said Bill Smugs, and grinned. Kiki imitated him.
‘It’s a pleasure, it’s a pleasure, it’s a pleasure, poor old Kiki, wipe your feet, never mind, never mind, it’s a pleasure.’
‘Oh – that reminds me,’ said Jack, remembering his strange experience of the night before. ‘Bill, listen to this.’ He went off into a long account of his adventure on the cliff with Joe, and Bill Smugs listened with the greatest attention.
‘So you saw lights?’ he said. ‘Out at sea – and on the cliff. Very interesting. I don’t wonder you wanted to look into the matter. Joe apparently had the same curiosity about them. Well, if I may give you a bit of advice, it’s this – don’t get up against Joe more than you can help. I don’t much like the sound of him. He sounds a dangerous sort of fellow.’
‘Oh, he’s just a bit grumpy and hates children and their games, but I don’t think he’d really do us much harm,’ said Philip. ‘He’s been with us for years.’
‘Really?’ said Bill, interested. ‘Well, well – I expect your people would have a hard job to get anyone in Joe’s place if he went. All the same – beware of him.’
The boys went off with the two girls. Philip was rather inclined to laugh at Bill’s warning, but Jack took it to heart. He had not forgotten his fear the night before when the handyman had caught him.
‘I think Bill’s right, somehow,’ thought Jack, with a little shiver. ‘Joe could be a very dangerous sort of fellow.’
16
Strange discoveries
The next three days the children worked hard at rowing and sailing, until they were perfectly at home in Bill’s boat, and could handle it almost as well as Bill. He was pleased with them.
‘I must say I do like to see children sticking to things, even if it means hard work,’ he said. ‘Even old Kiki has stuck to it too, sitting on the sail, over-balancing half the time, but not dreaming of letting you go by yourselves. And as for Lucy-Ann, she’s the best of the lot, because she has had to fight seasickness a good part of the time.’
That afternoon, having first seen that Joe was safely in the yard at the back of the house, pumping up water from the deep well there, the children went to examine Joe’s boat carefully, to see if they could possibly handle it themselves.
They stood and looked at it bobbing on the water. It was bigger than Bill’s, but not very much. They felt certain they would be all right in it.
‘It’s a pity Kiki can’t row,’ said Jack. ‘She could take the third pair of oars and we could get along fine.’
‘Fine,’ said Kiki. ‘Fine. God save the Queen.’
‘Idiot,’ said Philip affectionately. He was as fond of Kiki as Jack and Lucy-Ann were, and the bird went to him readily. ‘I say, Freckles – I wonder when Joe is going to town again. I’m longing to try my hand at the boat; aren’t you?’
‘I should just think so,’ said Jack. ‘I keep on and on thinking of that Great Auk I saw. I shan’t be happy till I’ve seen it close to.’
‘Bet you won’t find it,’ said Philip. ‘It would be awfully funny if you did, though – and came back with it cradled in your arms. Wouldn’t Kiki be jealous?’
To the children’s delight, Aunt Polly announced that Joe was going shopping the next day. ‘So if you want anything, you must tell him,’ she said. ‘He has a long list of things to get for me – you can add anything you want to it, and give him the money.’
They put down a new torch battery on the list. Dinah had left her torch on one night and the battery was now no use. She must have a new one. Jack added another roll of film. He had been taking photographs of the sea-birds round Craggy-Tops, and now wanted a new film to take to the Isle of Gloom with him.
They waited anxiously for Joe to depart the next day. He seemed irritatingly slow. He started up the car at last and backed it out of the tumbledown shed where it lived. ‘Now don’t you children get into mischief while I’m gone,’ he said, his sharp eyes watching them suspiciously. Perhaps he sensed that they were wishing him to be gone for reasons of their own.
‘We never get into mischief,’ said Philip. ‘Have a good time – and don’t hurry back.’
Joe scowled, put his foot on the accelerator and shot off at his usual breakneck speed. ‘Can’t think how the old car stands those bumps and jerks,’ said Philip, watching it go across the cliff and disappear down to the road on the other side. ‘Well – he’s gone. Now, what about it? Our chance has come.’
In great excitement the children ran down to the beach, and made their way to the big boat. The boys got in. Dinah untied the rope and gave it a push.
‘Take care of yourselves,’ called Lucy-Ann anxiously, longing to jump into the boat with them. ‘Do take care of yourselves.’
‘Okay!’ yelled back Jack, and Kiki echoed the word. ‘Okay, okay, okay, shut the door and wipe your feet!’
The girls watched the boys rowing hard, and then they saw them put up the sail as soon as they were out on the open sea. There was a good wind and they were soon moving along at a fine speed.
‘Off to the Isle of Gloom,’ said Lucy-Ann. ‘Well, I hope Jack brings back the Great Auk.’
‘He won’t,’ said Dinah, whose common sense told her that it would indeed be a miracle if he did. ‘Well, I hope they find the entrance to those awful rocks all right. They seem to be managing the boat well, don’t they?’
‘Yes,’ said Lucy-Ann, straining her eyes to follow the boat, which was now becoming difficult to see, owing to a haze over the water. The Isle of Gloom could not be seen at all. ‘Oh dear – I do hope they’ll get on well.’
The boys were having a fine time. They found that although Joe’s boat was heavier and more awkward to manage than Bill’s, it was not really difficult. There was quite enough wind and they were simply rushing through the water. It was most exhilarating to feel the up-and-down movement, and to hear the wind in the taut sail, and see the waves racing by.
‘Nothing like a boat,’ said Jack happily. ‘One day I’ll have one of my own.’
‘They cost a lot of money,’ said Philip.
‘Well, I’ll make a lot, then,’ said Jack. ‘Then I’ll buy a fine boat of my own, and go sailing off to distant islands inhabited by nothing but birds, and won’t I have a marvellous time!’
‘I wish we could see the island,’ said Philip. ‘This haze is a nuisance. I hope we’re going in the right direction.’
Before they saw the island, they heard the thundering of the waves on the ring of rocks around it. Then quite suddenly, after what seemed a very long time, the island loomed up, and the boys felt the spray from the breaking waves falling finely around them.
‘Look out – we’re heading straight for the rocks!’ cried Philip in alarm. ‘Take down the sail. We’ll have to row. We can’t manage the boat in this wind – it’s got too strong. She’s going too fast.’
They took down the sail, got out the oars and began to row. Jack tried to see the high hill. But it was much more difficult to spot the hill in reality than it had been to see it on the map. The hills seemed more or less the same size. The boys rowed round the ring of rocks, keeping well out of reach of the current that swept towards the island.
‘There’s a high hill – see, to the left,’ suddenly said Jack. ‘Pull towards there, Tufty. That’s right. I believe that’s the one we want.’
They pulled hard at their oars, panting and perspiring. Then, as the hill came right into view, the boys saw, to their delight, a gap in the ring of rocks – a narrow ga
p, it is true, but decidedly an opening through which a boat might pass.
‘Now – careful,’ warned Philip. ‘This is the tricky bit. Watch out. We may get swung off our course and run into the rocks. And anyway, although there are none showing just there, in the gap, there might be some just below the water that would rip the bottom from our boat. Careful, Freckles, careful!’
Jack was very careful. Everything depended on getting safely through the gap. The boys, their faces strained and anxious, rowed cautiously. Kiki didn’t say a word. She knew that the boys were worried.
The gap or passage was narrow but long. It was anxious work getting the boat through. Various strong currents seemed to be doing their best to drive her to this side or that, and once the boys felt the bottom being scraped by some rock that was not far below the water.
‘That was a narrow shave,’ said Philip, in a low voice. ‘Did you hear that nasty scrape?’
‘I felt it too,’ said Jack. ‘Hallo – we seem to be all right now. I say, how marvellous, Tufty – we’re in a channel of perfectly calm water!’
Beyond the rim of rocks was a channel or moat of brilliant blue, calm water, gleaming in the summer sun. It was strange to see it after the turbulence of the waves that raced over the rocks. They could hear the thunder of these still.
‘Not far to the island now,’ said Philip, thrilled. ‘Come on – I’m frightfully tired – at least my arms are – but we simply must get to land. I’m longing to explore.’
They looked about for a good landing place. The island was very rocky indeed, but in one place there was a tiny cove where sand gleamed. The boys decided to land there.
It was quite easy to land and haul the boat a little way up the beach, though it took all the boys’ strength to pull it up. But Bill had shown them the knack of hauling, and soon they were free to explore the deserted island.
They climbed the rocky cliff behind the little cover, and gazed over that side of the Isle of Gloom.
It was the number of birds that first took the boys’ attention. There were thousands upon thousands, all kinds, all sizes, all shapes. The noise they made was tremendous. They took little notice of the boys, who stood watching them in wonder.
But they were not as tame as they had hoped. Sitting birds flew away as soon as the boys went near. They seemed as wild as those at Craggy-Tops. Jack was disappointed.
‘Funny!’ he said. ‘I always thought that birds on a deserted island, where no men ever came, were completely tame. It says so in all my books, anyway. These are quite wild. They won’t let us go really near them.’
There were a few tress to be seen, and what there were grew in sheltered spots, bent over sideways by the wind that blew across the island. Underfoot was a kind of wiry grass which grew in tufted patches here and there. But even that did not grow everywhere, and the bare rock thrust up in many places.
The boys left the cliff and walked inland, the cries of the thousands of birds in their ears. They made their way towards the hill that towered up in the centre of the isle.
‘I want to see what those funny buildings are that I saw through the glasses,’ said Jack, remembering. ‘And oh dear, I do want to find a Great Auk. I haven’t seen a sign of one yet. I keep on looking and looking.’
Poor Jack was in a terrible state of excitement, expecting to see a Great Auk at any moment, and, instead, seeing all kinds of birds he had already seen at Craggy-Tops. It was disappointing. He hadn’t expected to see a procession of Great Auks – but one, just one, would have been marvellous.
There were plenty of big razorbills with their curiously-shaped beaks, plenty of skuas, gulls, cormorants and other birds. It was a paradise of sea-birds, and Jack was lost in wonder at the number of them. How he would like to spend a few days on this island, watching and taking photographs!
They came to the hills, and found a pass between them. Here there was more grass and a few tiny wild flowers, sea-pinks and others. One or two stunted birches grew on the hillsides.
Between the hills lay a small valley, and in it was a stream, running off into the sea on the other side of the island. The boys went to have a look at it because it seemed rather a curious colour.
It certainly was a strange colour. ‘Sort of bright blueygreen,’ said Jack, puzzled. ‘I wonder why. I say, look! – there are those queer buildings, up on that hill. And do you notice, Tufty, how the rocks change in colour here? They are not black any more, but green. And some of them look like sandstone. It’s queer, isn’t it?’
‘I don’t think I like this island much,’ said Philip, with a shudder. ‘It feels lonely and odd – and sort of bad.’
‘You’ve been listening to old Joe’s tales too much,’ said Jack, with a laugh, though he himself did not like the ‘feel’ of the island either. It was so mournful and desolate, and the only sounds to be heard so far inland were the incessant cries of the sea-birds circling overhead.
They climbed halfway up a hill to see the ‘buildings’. It was difficult to make out what they were, they were so old and broken down – not much more than heaps of stones or rocks. They did not look as if they ever could have been places to live in.
And then, close to one of these ‘buildings’, Philip discovered something strange. He called Jack in excitement.
‘I say! Come and look here! There’s a terrific hole going right down into the earth – simply terrifically deep!’
Jack ran over to the hole and peered down it. It was a large hole, about six feet round, and it went so far down into the earth that the boys could not possibly see the bottom of it.
‘What’s it for?’ said Philip. ‘Is it a well, do you think?’
The boys dropped a stone down to see if they could hear a splash. But none came. Either it was not a well, or it was so deep that the sound of the splash could not be heard.
‘I shouldn’t like to fall down there,’ said Philip. ‘Look! – there’s a ladder going down – awfully old and broken – but still, a ladder.’
‘It’s a mystery,’ said Jack, puzzled. ‘Let’s go and look around a bit. We might find something to help us to clear up such a peculiar problem. A shaft going down into the depths of the earth, in a lonely island like this! Whatever was it made for?’
17
Joe is angry
To the boys’ intense surprise, they found more of the deep narrow holes, all of them near the curious old ‘buildings’. ‘They can’t be wells,’ said Jack. ‘That’s impossible. No one would want so many. They must be shafts, sunk down deep into the earth here, for some good reason.’
‘Do you think there were mines?’ asked Philip, remembering that coal mines always had shafts bored down through the earth, so that men might go down and get the coal. ‘Do you think there are old mines here? Coal mines, for instance?’
‘No, not coal,’ said Jack. ‘I can’t imagine what. We’ll have to find out. I expect your uncle knows. Wouldn’t it be exciting if it was a gold mine! You never know.’
‘Well, it must have been worked out hundreds of years ago,’ said Philip. ‘There wouldn’t be any gold left now, or it would still be worked. I say – shall we go down and see what there is to be seen?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Jack doubtfully. ‘The old ladders aren’t much good, are they? We might fall hundreds of feet down – and that would be the end of us.’
‘What a pity, what a pity!’ remarked Kiki.
‘Yes, it would be a pity,’ said Philip, with a grin. ‘Well, perhaps we’d better not. Hallo! – here’s another shaft, Jack – a bit bigger one.’
The boys peered down this big one. It had a much better ladder than the others. They went down it a little way, feeling very daring. They soon came up again, for they did not like the darkness and the shut-in feeling.
And then they made a discovery that surprised them even more than the shafts. Not far off, piled under an overhanging bit of rock, were some empty meat and fruit tins.
This was such an extraordinary find tha
t the boys could hardly believe their eyes. They stood and stared at the tins, and Kiki flew down to inspect them to see if there was anything left to eat.
‘Where do you suppose those came from?’ asked Jack at last. ‘What a queer thing! Some are very rusty – but others seem quite new. Who could come to this island – and why – and where do they live?’
‘It’s a mystery,’ said Philip. ‘Let’s have a jolly good look all round whilst we’re here, and see if we can find anyone. Better go carefully, because it’s quite plain that whoever lives here doesn’t want it known.’
So the boys made a careful tour of the island, but saw nothing and nobody that could explain the mystery of the pile of tins. They wondered at the green rocks on the southward side of the island, and again puzzled over the green colour of the stream that ran into the sea there. There were many more birds on the seaward side, and Jack kept a sharp look-out for the Great Auk. But he did not see one, which was very disappointing.
‘Aren’t you going to take any photos?’ asked Philip. ‘You said you were. Hurry up, because we oughtn’t to be much longer.’
‘Yes – I’ll take a few,’ said Jack, and hid behind a convenient rock to snap a few young birds. Then, having one more film left, a thought struck him.
‘I’ll take a snap of that pile of tins,’ he said. ‘The girls mightn’t believe us if we bring home such a queer tale, but they’ll believe it all right if we show them the photo.’
So he snapped the pile of tins too, and then, with one last look down the big, silent shaft, the boys made their way back to the boat. There it lay, just out of reach of the water.
‘Well, let’s hope we make as good a trip home as we did coming out,’ said Jack. ‘I wonder if Joe is back yet. I hope to goodness that the girls have dealt with him somehow if he is.’
They pulled the boat into the water and got in. They rowed over the smooth moat to the exit between the rocks, where spray was being sent high into the air from waves breaking on either side. They managed to avoid the rock that had scraped the bottom of the boat before, and rowed quite easily out of the passage.