Five on Finniston Farm (10 page)

„What is all this, Junior?" said his father, half-annoyed too. „Sil y talk! You don"t know anything about castle-sites and dungeons and the rest!"

„I do, I do! I heard them all talking in the henhouse - I told you I did!" cried Junior, tugging at his father"s sleeve again.„Pop, they"ve found an old rubbish-heap too, that belonged to the castle - they cal ed it a - a - let me see now - a..."

„A midden?" asked Mr Durleston, suddenly taking an interest.

„Yes! That"s it. A kitchen-midden!" said Junior triumphantly. „With bones and shells. And then they looked for where the old castle might have been built - they said it couldn"t have been far away, and..."

„Well, they were right," said Mr Durleston. „A kitchen-midden would certainly pin-point the castle area! Mr Henning, this is extremely interesting. If you could get permission to excavate, it would be a..."

„Oh BOY!" said Mr Henning, interrupting, his eyes almost starting out of his head. „Can"t you see the papers - “American discovers old castle-site - unknown for centuries!

Excavates dungeons - find bones of long-ago prisoners - chests of gold coins...” "

„Not so fast, not so fast," said Mr Durleston, disapprovingly. „There may be nothing at all there. Let us not count our chickens before they"re hatched. And mind - not a word to the newspapers, Henning. We don"t want a crowd of people rushing to pry over the farm, sending up its price!"

„I didn"t think of that," said Mr Henning, a little cast-down. „Al right - we"ll go careful y.

What do you advise?"

„I should advise you to approach Mr Philpot - not the old Great-Grand-dad, but the farmer himself - and offer to put down, say, £250 for the right to excavate up on the hil there," said Mr Durleston. „Then if you strike anything interesting, you can offer a further sum for whatever"s down there - say another £250. If there is anything there, it wil be extremely valuable - so very, very old. Hmmm. Hmmm. Yes, that is my advice to you."

„And it sounds pretty good to me," said Mr Henning, excitement flooding him again.

„You"l stay here and advise me, won"t you, Durleston?"

„Certainly, certainly, if you are prepared to pay my fee," said Mr Durleston. „I think it would perhaps be advisable if I approached Mr Philpot, Mr Henning, not you. You might - er -

well - give something away in your excitement. You wil come with me, of course - but let me do the talking."

„Right, old man, you do everything!" said Mr Henning, feeling friendly with the whole world.

He clapped the listening Junior on the back. „Well done, son! You may have let us into something good. Now don"t you breathe a word to ANYONE, see?"

„Aw shucks!" said Junior. „What do you think I am? My mouth"s sewn up from now on! Think I"d split, Pop, when there"s a chance of getting even with those snooty kids? You go on up that hil when they"ve gone, and have a look yourself. Mr Durleston wil know if it"s the real thing or not!"

So, when the six children and dogs were safely out of sight, gone to help with various jobs of work on the farm, Mr Henning and Mr Durleston went with Junior to see the kitchenmidden and the supposed site of the old castle. Mr Henning became very excited indeed, and even the weary-looking Mr Durleston brightened up and nodded his head several times.

„Looks the real thing!" he said. „Yes, we"ll get going this evening - after that fierce old fel ow - the old Great-Grand-dad - has gone to bed. He might put a spoke in our wheels.

He"s as old as the hil s, but as cute as a jackdaw!"

And so, that evening, when Great-Grand-dad was safely in bed, Mr Henning and Mr Durleston had a private, very private talk with Mr and Mrs Philpot together. The farmer and his wife listened, amazed. When they heard that Mr Henning proposed to hand them a cheque for £250 merely for the right to do a little digging, Mrs Philpot almost cried!

„And I have advised Mr Henning that he should offer you further sums, if he finds anything he would like to take back to the States with him, as - er - as mementos of a very pleasant stay here," finished Mr Durleston.

„It sounds too good to to be true," said Mrs Philpot. „We could certainly do with the money, couldn"t we, Trevor?"

Mr Henning took out his cheque book and produced his fountain-pen, before Mr Philpot could say anything else. He wrote out the sum of £250, and signed the cheque with a flourish. He then presented it to Mr Philpot.

„And I hope there"ll be more cheques to come," he said. „Thank you, sir - I"l get men along tomorrow to start digging."

„I"l have a formal agreement drawn up," put in Mr Durleston, thinking that he saw a rather doubtful look coming over Mr Philpot"s face, as he took the cheque. „But you can cash the cheque straight away. Well, we"ll leave you to talk over it!"

When the twins and the four heard of this, the next morning, they were astounded. Mrs Philpot told the twins first, and Harry and Harriet ran at once to find the others. They listened, amazed and angry.

„How did they know all that? How did they guess where to find the castle-site?" said Dick, fiercely. „I bet it"s that snoopy little Junior who put them on to this! I bet he spied on us! I thought I saw two people up on that hil after tea yesterday. It must have been Mr Henning and that friend of his - with Junior. Gosh, I could pull that kid"s hair out!"

„Well, I suppose there"s absolutely nothing we can do now!" said George, angrily. „The next thing we"ll see is lorries rol ing up with men inside, and spades and dril s and goodness knows what!"

She was quite right! That very morning the hil became quite a busy place! Four men had already been hired by Mr Henning, and they all went up the hil in their lorry, bumping slowly along, past the kitchenmidden mound, and on up to the shallow basin-like depression near the summit of the hil . Spades, forks and dril s rattled in the lorry. Junior was mad with joy, and danced about at a safe distance, yelling defiance at the six children.

„You thought I didn"t know anything, didn"t you! I heard everything! Serves you right! Yah!"

„Timmy - chase him!" ordered George, in a furious voice. „But don"t hurt him, mind. Go on!"

And off went Timmy at a gallop, and if Junior hadn"t leapt into the lorry and picked up a spade, Timmy would certainly have rol ed him over and over on the ground!

Now what was to be done? The children almost gave up - but not quite! There might be something they could do - there might! Why was Julian suddenly looking so excited?

SNIPPET AND NOSEY ARE VERY HELPFUL!

„LISTEN!" said Julian, lowering his voice, and looking al about to make sure that no one was near. „Do you remember what you told us, George, about a secret passage from the castle to the old chapel?"

„Yes! Yes! I do!" said George, and Anne nodded, her eyes bright. „You mean the story that old Mr Finniston told us, down at the little antique shop, about the Lady of the castle taking her children in safety from the burning castle, by way of an underground passage to the old chapel? Gosh, I"d forgotten that!"

„Oh, Julian! Yes, George is right!" said Anne. „Are you thinking that the passage might stil be there, hidden underground?"

„What I think is this," said Julian. „If the Lady and her children escaped underground, they must first have fled down into the cel ars of the castle - and so the passage or tunnel must have started from there. They couldn"t have escaped in any other way because the castle was itself surrounded by enemies. So she must have gone with her children to hide in the cellars - and then, when the castle fel , she took them safely down the secret passage that led to the old chapel. So that means..."

„That means that if we can find the secret passage, we can get into the cellars ourselves -

perhaps before the workmen do!" cried George, almost shouting with excitement.

„Exactly," said Julian, his eyes shining. „Now don"t let"s lose our heads and get too excited.

Let"s talk about it quietly - and for GOODNESS" sake keep a watch for Junior."

„Timmy - on guard!" said George, and Timmy at once went some paces away, and stood up straight, looking now in this direction, and now in that. Nobody could come within sight now, without Timmy giving a warning bark!

The children settled down beside a hedge. „What"s the plan?" asked Dick.

„I vote we go to the old chapel, take a line from there to the castle-site, and walk slowly up that line," said Julian. „We might possibly see something that would guide us as to where the secret passage is. I don"t know what - maybe the grass might be slightly different in colour - a bit darker than the surrounding grass, just as it was on the castle-site.

Anyway, it"s worth trying. If we do see a line of darker grass, or something like that, we"ll dig down underground ourselves, hoping the secret passage is underneath!"

„Oh Ju! What a wonderful idea!" said Anne. „Come on, let"s go down to the chapel straight away!"

So off they all went, Timmy, Snippet and Nosey the jackdaw too. He loved being with Snippet, though he teased him unmerciful y. They arrived quickly at the chapel door and went in. „I always feel as if there ought to be an organ playing when I"m inside," said Anne, looking round the stacked sacks of grain.

„Never mind about organs," said Julian, standing at the open door, and pointing up the hil . „Now see - there"s the place where the old castle stood - where the men are already at work - and if we take a fairly straight line to it, we should be more or less walking over the old passage. I should think the men who made it would drive as straight a tunnel as they could, to save themselves work. A grinding one would take a long time."

„I can"t see that the grass is any different in colour, along the line I"m looking," said Dick, squinting, and everyone agreed, very disappointed.

„So there"s nothing to help us!" said George, mournful y. „Al we can do is to walk in a straight line up the hil , and hope to find something that wil tel us if we"re over a tunnel.

Hollow-sounding footsteps, perhaps!"

„That"s very doubtful, I"m afraid," said Julian. „Stil , I can"t see that we can do anything else. Come on, then. Al right, Tim, you can come back to us. Look at Nosey, on Snippet"s back again! That"s right, Snippet, roll over and get him off!"

„Chack!" said Nosey, crossly, as he flew up in the air. „Chack!"

The six children walked up the slope in as straight a line as they could. They came right up to where the men were digging, without having seen or heard anything of any help at al .

It was most disappomting. Junior saw them, and yelled loudly.

„Children not allowed here! Keep off! My Dad"s bought this place!"

„Fibber!" shouted back the two Harries at once. „You"ve got the right to dig and that"s all!"

„Yah!" yelled Junior. „You wait! Now don"t you set that great dog on me again! I"l tell my Pop, see?"

Timmy barked loudly, and Junior disappeared in a hurry. George laughed. „Silly little fathead! Why doesn"t somebody box his ears? I bet one of the men wil before he"s many hours older. Look at him trying to use that dril !"

Junior was certainly not at all popular. He made himself a great nuisance, and in the end his father put him roughly into a lorry and told him to stay there. He howled dismal y, but as no one paid any attention, he soon stopped!

The six children went slowly back down the gentle slope of the hil , taking a slightly different line, stil hopeful. The jackdaw flew down to Harry"s shoulder, chacking loudly, bored with all this walking! He suddenly saw Snippet sitting down to scratch his neck, and at once launched himself at him. He knew that the poodle always shut his eyes when he scratched himself, and that that was a very good time to give him a well-placed peck!

But unfortunately for Nosey the poodle opened his eyes too soon, and saw the jackdaw just about to perch on him! He snapped at him - and got him by the wing! „Chack-chack-CHACK!" cried the jackdaw, urgently cal ing for help. „CHACK!"

Harry ran to Snippet, shouting, „Drop him, Snippet, drop him! You"l break his wing!" Before he could reach the pair, the jackdaw managed to free himself by giving Snippet a sudden peck on his nose, which made him bark in pain. As soon as he opened his mouth to bark, the jackdaw dropped on the ground, and scuttled away, his wing drooping, unable to fly.

The poodle was after him in a second! The twins yelled in vain. He meant to catch that exasperating jackdaw if it was the last thing he did! The squawking bird looked anxiously for a hiding-place - and saw one! A rabbit-hole - just the thing to hop down in a trice! In he went with another loud squawk, and disappeared from sight.

„He"s gone down that rabbit-hole!" said Dick, with a shout of laughter. „Clever old bird.

You"re outwitted, Snippet!"

But no - Snippet wasn"t! He disappeared down the hole too! He was as smal as a rabbit, and could easily run down a burrow. He had never done more than sniff at one before, being rather scared of dark tunnels - but if Nosey had gone down, well, he would too!

The children stared in surprise. First the jackdaw - now Snippet! The twins bent down by the hole and yel ed. „Come back, Snippet, you idiot! The hil "s honeycombed with old warrens

- you"l get lost for ever. Come back! Snippet. Snip-Snip-Snippet, can you hear us? COME HERE!"

There was silence down the rabbit-hole. No chack, no bark. „They must have gone deep down," said Harry, anxiously. „There"s a perfect maze of burrows in this hil . Dad said there used to be thousands of rabbits here at one time. Hey, Snippet - COME HERE!"

„Well, we"d better sit down til they come back," said Anne, feeling suddenly tired with excitement and with climbing up hil and down.

„Right," said Julian. „Anyone got any sweets?"

„I have," said George, as usual, and took out a rather grimy packet of peppermints. „Here you are; have one, twins?"

„Thanks," they said. „We real y ought to be getting back - we"ve plenty of work to do!"

They sat sucking their peppermints, wondering what in the world the jackdaw and Snippet were up to. At last Timmy pricked up his ears and gave a smal bark, looking at the entrance of the burrow as he did so. „They"re coming," said George. „Timmy knows!"