Five on a Hike Together (13 page)

They stopped paddling but the raft drifted on, and Anne lost the chimney again! They had to paddle back a bit until it came into sight. By that time George had lost her steeple!

At last all four things were in view at once, and the raft seemed to be stil and unmoving on the quiet waters of the lake.

„I"m going to drop something to mark the place," said Julian, stil keeping his eyes desperately on Tall Stone. „George, can you manage to watch Tall Stone and Steeple at the same time? I simply must look what I"m doing for the moment."

„I"l try," said George, and fixed her eyes first on Tall Stone, then on Steeple, then on Tall Stone again, hoping and praying that neither would slip out of sight if the raft moved on the water.

Julian was busy. He had taken his torch and his pocket-knife out of his pocket and had tied them together with string. „I haven"t enough string, Dick," he said. „You"ve got some, haven"t you?"

Dick had, of course. He put his hand into his pocket, stil keeping his eyes on Tock Hill and passed his string over to Julian.

Julian tied it to the end of the string that joined together the knife and torch. Then he dropped them into the water, letting out the string as they went down with their weight.

The string slid through his hands. It stopped in a short while and Julian knew that the knife and torch had reached the bed of the lake.

He felt in his pockets again. He knew he had a cork somewhere that he had carved into a horse"s head. He found it and tied the end of the string firmly round it. Then he dropped the cork thankfully into the water. It bobbed there, held by the string, which led right down to the knife and torch on the lake-bed below.

„It"s done!" he said, with a sigh of relief. „Take your eyes off everything! I"ve marked the place now, so we don"t need to glue our eyes on the four bearings!"

He told them how he had tied together his knife and torch and dropped them on string to the bottom of the lake, and then had tied a cork to the other end, so that it would bob and show them the place.

They all looked at it. „Jolly clever, Ju," said Dick, „But once we slide away from this spot, and it would be an easy thing to do, we"d find it jolly difficult to find that cork again!

Hadn"t we better tie something else to it?"

„I haven"t got anything else that wil float," said Julian, „Have you?"

'I have," said George, and she handed him a little wooden box. „I keep the threepenny bits I collect in that," she said, putting the money into her pocket. „You can have the box.

It wil be much easier to see than the cork."

Julian tied the box to the cork. It was certainly a good deal easier to see! „Fine!" he said.

„Now we"re quite all right. We must be right over the loot!"

They all bent over the edge of the raft and looked down - and they saw a most surprising sight! Below them, resting on the bottom of the lake, was a boat! It lay there in the shadows of the water, its outline blurred by the ripples the raft made - but quite plainly it was a boat!

„The Saucy Jane!" said Julian, peering down, feeling amazed and awed to think that they had read the bearings so correctly that they were actual y over the Saucy Jane herself!

„The Nailer must have come here with the stolen goods - got out the Saucy Jane and rowed her to this spot. He must have taken his bearings very carefully indeed, and then holed the boat so that she sank down with the loot in her. Then I suppose he swam back to shore."

„Most ingenious," said Dick. „Real y, he must be a jol y clever fellow. But I say, Julian - how on earth are we going to get the boat up?"

„I can"t imagine," said Julian. „I simply - can"t - imagine! I hadn"t even thought of that."

Timmy suddenly began to growl. The four looked up quickly to see why.

They saw a boat coming over the water towards them - the Merry Meg, with Maggie and Dirty Dick in it. And the children felt quite certain that both were reading the bearings on their piece of paper in exactly the same way as they themselves had!

They were so engrossed in watching for Tal Stone, Tock Hill, Chimney and Steeple that they took no notice of the children at al . „I don"t think they guess for one moment that we"ve read the bearings and marked the place," said Julian. „How wild they"l be when they find we are right over the place they"re looking for! Watch out for trouble!"

The boat in which Maggie and Dirty Dick were rowing went this way and that as the two searched for the same objects that the children had already spotted. The four watched them, and George put her hand on Timmy to stop him barking.

The boat came nearer and nearer. Maggie was trying to keep in view two or three of the bearings at once and her head twisted from side to side continual y. The children grinned at one another. It had been hard enough for the four of them to keep all the bearings in view - it must be very dificult for Maggie, especially as Dirty Dick didn"t seem to be helping very much.

They heard Maggie give sharp orders as the boat swung this way and that. Then it headed for them. Dirty Dick growled something to Maggie, who had her back to them, and she turned round sharply, losing the view of the things she was looking for.

Her face was ful of anger when she saw the raft so near - and in the place where she wanted her boat to go! Afraid of completely losing the view of the things she was keeping her eyes on, she turned back again and hastily looked to see if Tock Hil , Tall Stone and Steeple were stil al to be seen together. She said something in a furious voice to Dirty Dick, and he nodded with a sour face.

The boat came nearer and they heard Maggie say „I think I can see it now - yes - a bit farther to the right, please."

„She"s spotted One Chimney now," whispered Anne. „I expect they"ve got al the bearings. Oh dear - the boat wil bump right into us!"

It did! Dirty Dick rowed viciously at them and the bows of the boat gave them a terrific jolt. Anne would have fallen into the water if Julian hadn"t grabbed at her.

He yelled at Dirty Dick, „Look out, you ass! You nearly had us over! What on earth do you think you"re doing?"

„Get out of the way then," growled Dirty Dick. Timmy began to bark savagely, and the boat at once drew away from the raft.

„There"s plenty of room on this lake," shouted Julian. „What do you want to come and disturb us for? We aren"t doing any harm."

„We"re going to report you to the police," cal ed the woman, her face red with anger.

„Taking a raft that doesn"t belong to you, sleeping in a house where you"ve no right to be

- and stealing our food."

„Don"t talk nonsense," cried Julian. „And don"t you dare to ram us again. If you do I"l send our dog after you. He"s longing to come."

„Grrrr!" said Timmy, and showed his magnificent set of gleaming white teeth. Dirty Dick muttered something quickly to Maggie. She turned round again and cal ed to them.

„Now look here, you kids - be sensible. My friend and I have come down here for a quiet week-end, and it isn"t nice to find you four everywhere we go. Go back and keep out of our way and we won"t report you at al . That"s a fair bargain - we won"t even say anything about your stealing our food."

„We"re going back when we think we wil ," answered Julian. „And no threats or bargains wil make any difference to us."

There was a silence. Then Maggie spoke hurriedly to Dirty Dick again. He nodded.

„Is this your half-term?" she called. „When do you have to go back?"

„Tomorrow," said Julian. „You"l be rid of us then. But we"re going to enjoy ourselves on this raft while we can."

There was another hurried conference between the two. Then Dirty Dick rowed round a little, and Maggie began to peer down into the water. She suddenly looked up, nodded at Dirty Dick, and he rowed away again towards the end of the lake! Not another word did the couple say.

„I can see what they"ve decided to do," said Julian, in a pleased voice. „They think we"ll be gone by tomorrow, so they"l wait til the coast is clear and then they"l come and collect the loot in peace. Did you see Maggie looking down into the water to spot the boat? I was afraid she would also spot our mark - the cork and the box! But she didn"t."

„I don"t know why you sound so pleased," said George. „We can"t get the boat up, you know that - and I don"t feel pleased that we"ll have to leave tomorrow and let that horrid pair col ect the loot. I imagine they"l have some clever grown-up way of pul ing up the boat from the bed of the lake - which they wil do when we"ve gone tomorrow."

„You"re not very bright today, George," said Julian, watching the boat being rowed farther and farther away. „I told them we"d be gone tomorrow, hoping they would clear off and wait - and leave us time to get the loot ourselves. I think we can!"

„How?" said three voices at once, and Timmy looked inquiringly at Julian too.

„Well, we don"t need to pul up the boat," said Julian. „We only want the loot. What"s to prevent us from going down and getting it? I"m quite prepared to strip and dive down to the bottom there and feel about for any sack or bag or box. If I find one I"l come up for air, borrow a bit of rope from the raft and go down again - tie the rope to the sack and you can haul it up to the surface!"

„Oh Julian - it sounds so easy - but is it real y?" said Anne. George and Dick considered the proposal carefully. They were most impressed by Julian"s idea.

„Well, it may turn out to be much more difficult than it sounds, but I"m jolly wel going to try it," said Julian, and began to strip off his jersey.

Anne felt the water. It was very very cold to her warm hand. „Ugh! I"d hate to dive down to the bottom of this horrid cold dark lake," she said. „I think you"re brave, Ju."

„Don"t talk rubbish!" said Julian.

He was ready to go in now. He dived neatly into the water with hardly a splash. The other three craned over the edge of the raft to watch. They could see him down, deep down in the water, a ghostly figure. He stayed down such a long time that Anne got worried.

„He can"t hold his breath all that time!" she said, „He can"t!"

But Julian could. He was one of the star swimmers and divers at his school, and this was easy to him. He came up again at last, and panted hard, trying to make up for holding his breath so long. The others waited patiently. At last his breathing grew more even and he grinned at them.

„Ah - that"s better! Well - it"s there!" he said, triumphantly.

„Is it!" said everyone, thril ed. „Oh Julian!"

„Yes. I dived right down to the boat - almost got there with the force of my dive - had to swim just a couple of strokes perhaps. And there was the poor old boat, rotting to bits.

And in one end is a waterproof bag - almost a sack, it"s so big. I ran my hands over it, and it"s waterproof al right - so the loot must be packed in there."

„Did it feel heavy?" asked Dick.

„I gave it a tug and couldn"t move it," said Julian, „Either it"s wedged in somehow or is real y heavy. Anyway we can"t fetch it out by diving down for it. I"l have to dive down again, fix a rope to it, then come up - and we"ll give a heave-ho and up she"l come!"

Julian was shivering. Anne picked up the blazer she had brought and gave it to him to dry himself with. Dick looked hurriedly over the raft. There were certainly bits and pieces of rope sticking out here and there, some of it half-rotten, and a short length was tucked into a space between two planks of the raft.

It was much too short though - and surely the other bits and pieces would never join to make a long enough rope?

„The bits of rope we"ve got won"t do, Julian," said Dick. Julian was drying himself and looking towards the end of the lake, where Two-Trees stood. He was frowning. The others looked too.

The boat had reached the bank there, and had been pul ed up. One of the couple, the children couldn"t see which, was standing up on the bank - and something was glinting in the sun, something he or she was holding!

„See that glint?" said Julian „Well, that"s either Maggie or Dirty Dick using field-glasses.

They"re going to keep an eye on us while we"re here - just to make sure we don"t suddenly spot the boat, I suppose! They don"t guess we"ve already found it. I bet they were worried when they saw I"d taken a header into the water just over the sunken boat!"

„Oh - so that"s what the flash is," said George. „The glint of field-glasses! Yes - they"re watching us. Blow! That wil put an end to us trying to haul up the loot, Ju. They"d see it and wait for us!"

„Yes. No good trying for that now," said Julian. „Anyway, as Dick says, we"ve not got enough rope. We"ll have to get some from the boat-house."

„But when do you propose to get the bag out of the sunk boat?" asked Dick. „They"l keep those field-glasses on us even if we go out again this afternoon."

„There"s only one time to go when they won"t have their glasses watching us," said Julian, beginning to dress himself very rapidly, „and that"s tonight. We"ll go tonight! My word -

what an adventure!"

'Don"t let"s," said Anne, in a small voice.

„There"l be a moon," said George, excited.

'Smashing idea!" said Dick, thumping Julian on the back. „Let"s go back now so that they won"t have any suspicions of us, and make our plans for tonight. And we"d better keep an eye on them too in case they row out to this spot themselves this afternoon."

„They won"t," said Julian. „They daren"t run any risk of us spotting what they"re doing. They wil be sure to wait til we"ve gone."

'And til the loot is gone!" said George with a laugh. „I say - I do hope those two wretches haven"t gone and taken our food again!"

„I hid it down in the cellars beyond our room - and locked the door leading there - and here"s the key," grinned Julian, holding up a large key.

„You never told us!" said George. „Julian, you"re a genius! How do you manage to think of things like that?"

„Oh - just brains!" said Julian, pretending to look modest, and then laughing. „Come on - if I don"t get warm quickly I"l have a most almighty chil !"