Cherry Ames 21 Island Nurse (18 page)

“That’s a pretty high rating in my book,” Dr. Mackenzie said with a smile. “No one could ask for more.” And he went on to the ambulance with his patient.

Cherry continued with her work, putting on a sterile pad over the injured area, then made a cravat type bandage that covered the injury and went over and around to hold the pad in place. She then gave him an injection, or booster dose of toxoid as a safety measure.

A group of people had grown about the wounded, although everyone was standing back so as not to interfere with Cherry. They watched her with respect and admiration as she moved from one patient to another.

While she went about her work, Cherry heard the group of islanders and the crew talking back and forth.

She gathered that the Balfourians knew a good many of the crew, for they called the various fi shermen by name. The fi shermen gave only brief or evasive answers to the probing questions.

Close by, Cherry heard one of the islanders and one of the crew in an exchange.

“I think ye said ye had thirty-six aboard, counting the captain,” said the islander. “But I counted less than
THE

WRECK

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that brought ashore. What became of the other poor lads. Did they drown?”

“Probably,” replied the other.

“Why probably. Don’t ye know?” persisted his questioner.

“The mate, Mr. Tweed, and some others lowered a boat and rowed for shore,” came the answer. “I don’t think they could make it in the storm, so they probably drowned.”

“I noticed the mate was missing,” remarked the Balfourian. “Weel, now, he may be alive—he and the others—the same as the rest of ye.” The man paused.

With his next words, Cherry’s heart began to thump with excitement.

The Balfourian continued, “Ah, ’twaud be a won-drous thing, this wreck, if every man jack aboard the
Heron
was saved!”

“Every man jack aboard the
Heron
!” thought Cherry.

The
Heron
! These men she was taking care of were members of the crew of the
Heron
. But some were missing. The mate, Mr. Tweed, and some of the men had lowered a boat and rowed for shore. Had they been drowned or had they reached shore safely? And what had become of Old Jock, who had stowed away?

How she managed to care for the rest of the
Heron’s
crew who had slight bruises, scratches and cuts, and sprains, she never knew. But apparently she did her job very well. When Dr. Mac returned that afternoon with a doctor and nurses from St. John’s to relieve them, he was amazed to fi nd all but a few of the men 172
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AMES,

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NURSE

perfectly able to return on the
Sandy Fergus
to their homes in St. John’s.

Dr. Mac sent Cherry back to Barclay House, saying that he had already sent Meg home, as well as Nurse Cowan, to get some sleep. He himself was going home and to bed before he dropped in his tracks. The doctor and nurses from St. John’s, who had arrived on the
Sandy Fergus
in response to his call, were ready to take over for a day or two.

c h a p t e r x i v

The Silver of the Mine

the next morning after breakfast, the four—

Cherry and Lloyd, Meg, and Dr. Mackenzie—stood in the bright sun on the brow of the cliff, peering down upon the sparkling waters of the little bay at Rogues’

Cave.

Dressed in sturdy clothes and equipped with ropes and miners’ safety lamps on lanyards round their necks, and knives in sheaths at their belts, the four could have been taken for a party of spelunkers—cave explorers.

Prepared for any emergency, Lloyd had a compass and from his belt hung a geologist’s hammer and pick, and binoculars.

“The tide isn’t low enough yet to get into Rogues’

Cave without wading,” Lloyd said.

“Then let’s start with the entrance to the Old Mine,” suggested Dr. Mac.

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AMES,

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In silence they made their way back along the cliffs and set off up the big hill of the abandoned mine. A gentle breeze rippled the grass and fl irted the brightly colored scarfs of the girls. In the blue, cloudless sky a naval helicopter from the nearby base hovered offshore, searching for the bodies of the four men missing from the
Heron
and now believed to be drowned.

The presence of the whirlybird was ignored by the group as they climbed the hill. None of them wanted to be reminded that the chances were against their fi nding Old Jock and Tammie or the missing men, either in the mine or the cave. But Cherry had con-vinced Lloyd and Meg and Dr. Mac that the search was well worth a try. The fact that Ramsay, the gardener, had found the
Heron’
s lifeboat high, dry, and undamaged on the sand dunes on a beach north of the cliffs was taken as a hopeful sign that the men had reached shore.

That morning, after a good night’s rest, Cherry, Lloyd, Meg, Dr. Mac (who had come over at Meg’s invitation), and Sir Ian had all been present at breakfast in the Barclay dining room.

Sir Ian, who had not been told that Old Jock and Tammie were missing, was in the best of spirits. He had no sooner sat down at the table, then he announced,

“I am expecting James Broderick this morning. Just after the telephone line was repaired earlier, Mr. Broderick called and left word with Higgins that he was fl ying over from St. John’s. Mr. Broderick had an appointment

THE SILVER OF THE MINE

175

to see me the day of the storm, but caudna make it, of course.”

“Mr. Broderick is fl ying over this morning!” Lloyd said, startled. “Could I ask what he’s coming for?”

“Ye caud,” answered his uncle. “But since it’s a matter strictly between him and me, there’s na need to tell ye, nephew.”

There was a glint in Sir Ian’s eye as though he were exhilarated over the coming meeting. Cherry had never seen the mine owner look stronger or better than he did that morning. His face was wonderfully alive and he held himself proudly.

“Why, he reminds me of descriptions I’ve read in old stories of knights just about to go into battle,” Cherry thought. “It is as though the prospect of the battle stimulated them and made them reel full of confi dence.”

Sir Ian had eaten his breakfast, without making any further comment. Then he had gone off to the library

“to do some paperwork,” he said. He was not to be disturbed under any circumstances.

After he had left, Cherry had shown Lloyd, Meg, and Dr. Mac, Old Sir Ian’s secret journal and the leather pouch containing the torn page and the silver.

Then she had told of the night in the tower room and Tammie’s disappearance.

Her suggestion that they search the Old Mine and Rogues’ Cave for Old Jock and Tammie, and at the same time solve the mystery of the silver, had been received with enthusiasm by her three listeners.

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AMES,

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NURSE

“I think it’s about time we found out what this whole thing is about,” Lloyd had declared at once.

As they pushed their way to the top of the hill now, each of them was torn between hope one moment and despair the next of what they might or might not fi nd in the underground tunnels.

They reached the summit.

Meg and the doctor pushed ahead through the bushes and began to examine the big rock that Cherry had found so interesting on the day Little Joe Tweed had vanished as if by magic.

“Do look, Lloyd,” Meg said, “this is the oddest sort of rock. I don’t remember ever having seen it here before, not even when we came up here as children.”

“Yes, it has a very peculiar texture,” Dr. Mac said.

“Like pumice.”

Lloyd looked at it for the fi rst time. “It
is
pumice,” he replied at once.

“That’s the rock I was telling all of you about,” Cherry said. “Only it has sunk much deeper into the ground since I saw it last—probably washed down by the heavy rain.” Turning to Lloyd, she asked, “Did you say it was
pumice
?” Suddenly she remembered a rock she had held in her hand when she and Tammie were in the tower. It had been feather light.

“Why, that’s where the entrance to the mine used to be!” exclaimed Meg. “Someone has taken away the old boards that used to cover it and set a rock over it.” Lloyd caught Cherry’s eye and they exchanged a sig-nifi cant glance. They both knew the nature of that rock.

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With a wink at Cherry, Lloyd announced, “Stand back, everybody, while I give a remarkable demonstra-tion of weight lifting.” Suiting his action to his words, he grasped the mass of grayish-colored rock and rolled it aside with little effort.

“Ah, a Hercules!” cried Dr. Mac, laughing.

“As you see,” explained Lloyd in a carnival hawker’s nasal twang, “it’s light as foam, for that is precisely what it is—foam spewed up by a volcano and hardened into rock. It’s not native to the island. Somebody brought it here from a faraway volcanic region.” The three applauded Lloyd.

“Well, there’s the mouth of the mine shaft,” he said, pointing at their feet.

They all looked down into the cavity that had been covered by the rock. The opening was just large enough for a man to enter.

They tied rope about their waists mountain-climber fashion—Lloyd, Cherry, Meg, Dr. Mac—in that order.

Then Lloyd eased himself down into the hole, the bottom of which was perhaps six feet below the surface of the ground.

“Okay,” he told them in a moment. “There’s a ladder leading down, a little way ahead. It’s new from the looks of it. Someone built it recently. Defi nitely, this shaft is being used.”

“Switch on your lamps up there,” he ordered. “Come on, Cherry. Meg, you and Doc follow.” Cherry slid down into the cavity. Lloyd was already descending the ladder, a few feet in front of her. With 178
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her heart thumping in her throat, she slowly, rung by rung, went down to the top level of the mine where Lloyd stood on the dirt fl oor of the tunnel.

The others joined them and they began exploring the tunnel by the light of their lamps. The tunnel extended to the right and the left, but only for a short distance in each direction. Water dripped from the roof, forming little pools. The earthen fl oor was muddy and marked with many footprints.

“Men have been going and coming through here regularly,” remarked Lloyd. “Those are men’s footprints, as you can readily see, and that’s the only thing they can possibly mean. Men enter the shaft by rolling away the rock. When Little Joe Tweed disappeared that day, Cherry, he must have done just that. They came down the ladder, which was made probably to replace an old, rotted one, and they go . . .” He played his fl ashlight about.

Another ladder in front of them led downward.

“Here’s where they go,” Lloyd said, and began at once to lower himself on it.

They all descended two more ladders before they came to the place where the central shaft of the Old Mine ended and there was no further means of descent.

As before, the tunnel extended to the right and to the left. But this time, there was another tunnel cutting in at an angle and sloping gently in a southeasterly direction, so Lloyd told them upon consulting his compass.

“I guess it’s a case of counting eeny, meeny, miney, mo, or isn’t it, Engineer Barclay?” asked Meg.

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179

“It is not, Miss Barclay,” returned Lloyd. “That tunnel running in a southeasterly direction goes toward Rogues’ Cave. Notice the footprints. And notice all the shoring is new wood. Notice that the tunnel itself has been recently dug. And let me remind you that Cherry told us that Old Jock wanted to fi nd out what was being smuggled
out through Rogues’ Cave
.”

“Lloyd, did the men—whoever they are—dig this tunnel so they could get to the cave?” Cherry asked.

“Exactly,” replied Lloyd. “You see, there was never a tunnel that ran to the cave from this mine. There was just the shaft which you see goes straight down from the top of the hill. Then there were tunnels running to the north and south from this shaft, as you saw when we descended.”

With Lloyd in the lead, the four walked down the sloping tunnel, the glimmer of their lamps guiding them in the darkness.

The journey down the tunnel seemed endless to Cherry. But Lloyd said they had gone perhaps only a quarter of a mile when they came upon a wall of stone that had been broken through to form a low, jagged doorway.

Lloyd bent his head and was on the point of entering the passage beyond when he drew back quickly.

“There’s a light down there a little way and I heard people talking,” he said in a whisper fi lled with suppressed excitement.

Cherry felt her spine tingle. She was so anxious to fi nd out what was beyond the doorway that it was all 180
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she could do to restrain her impulse to rush past Lloyd.

Meg and Dr. Mackenzie started to whisper questions.

“Sssh,” Lloyd warned them. “Don’t talk. Follow me without making a sound.”

One by one, they went through the doorway. They saw immediately the glow of a light and moved toward it very, very slowly. Then, just beyond a turning, on their left was a sort of large alcove off the tunnel. From the alcove came the sound of men’s voices talking in a dull, quiet way.

“Put out your lights,” Lloyd said to Cherry and the other two.

Then, in the dark, very cautiously, keeping close to the wall of the tunnel, they crept up to the entrance and peered into the alcove.

The place had been blasted out of the rock and was quite large, though it seemed smaller than it was, for piled up like cordwood about the fl oor, were sackfuls of what was unmistakably rocks. Among the heaps, four men sat on the fl oor about a wooden box, playing cards by the light of a miner’s lamp.

“That man on the right is Little Joe Tweed,” Cherry quickly whispered in Lloyd’s ear.