The Happy Adventurers by Lydia Miller Middleton (best thriller novels of all time TXT) 📖

“If we are going to look for Mr. Brown we will have to hurry,” said Prudence, who had gone to the entrance of the cave and was scrutinizing the beach; “by the look of the shadows I should say it was a good bit after seven. In not much more than an hour we must be sitting down at breakfast tidy and brushed.”

They found when they came out that there was a footpath up to the Duke’s Nose—a very steep and boulder-strewn path, but quite a possible one for them all; so they went for it manfully and womanfully and were soon at top. But alas! the door of the hut was closed and locked; no one answered their repeated knocks, and they came to the unwilling conclusion that the place was empty.

“Blow!” said Dick at last. “Why couldn’t the old treasure-hider put his old treasure in an easier place?”

“If he had, someone else would have found it,” Mollie remarked sensibly, “and anyhow it is a lark searching for it.”

At that moment a man’s figure could be seen coming towards the hut; he was swinging a billy-can by the handle.

“That’s the man I saw last night,” exclaimed Grizzel; “I expect he is Mr. Brown.”

The man was rather surprised to see six children congregated before his hut door at that hour of the morning. Prudence was pushed forward as spokeswoman. “Please, are you Mr. Brown?” she asked, in her most polite voice.

“I am, miss. Anything I can do for you?”

“We found this piece of paper,” she said, showing the latest message to him, “and we brought it to you like it says.”

The man grinned broadly—he had a nice grin, the children thought— “You’ve found it, have you? Well, that beats me! That’s darned clever of you. Our little Missie will be no end bucked to hear that bit o’ news; she was mighty taken up with her messages, she was. You’ll have to wait a bit, though. I can’t leave this place before twelve noon. You be on the beach above where that big hump o’ seaweed is at twelve-thirty to-day, an’ you’ll see—” the man broke off and grinned again.

“What?” asked several excited people at once.

“That’s tellin’,” said Mr. Brown; “just you wait an’ you’ll see somethin’ to your advantage, same as it says here.”

It was terribly hard to have to leave the treasure at this thrilling stage, but there was nothing else to be done, especially as it was getting late, and they would have to hasten their steps as it was, if they were to reach home in time for a proper tidy-up before breakfast. Mamma was very particular about many things, but she was particularly particular about coming to table with clean hands and freshly brushed hair.

*

They were at the trysting-place long before half-past twelve. Nobody had a watch, but the Australian children had a device of their own for telling the time.

“You stand on one foot,” Hugh explained, “and twirl round with your other big toe in the sand—like this. That makes a circle to fit your own shadow. Then you stand in the middle and see where the shadow hits the circle. And then you guess the time near enough for all practical purposes. It’s quite simple.”

“Did you invent that sort of clock yourself?” Mollie asked deferentially.

“There wasn’t much to invent,” Hugh replied modestly; “it’s on the same principle as a sundial. I only applied my legs.”

“God invented Hugh’s legs and the sun,” Grizzel said; “Hugh only put in the squiggly toe.”

“But that’s just it,” Jerry argued; “like Newton and the apple. The simple things are there all the time, and no one sees them till the right person comes along. I think that’s a jolly ingenious idea. You’d have to know exactly where due north was, of course, and you’d have to have the sun. That’s the trouble in London; the sun just slops about the sky, and half the time you can’t see him at all.”

The children now twirled round and round like dervishes, making shadow-clocks till there were hardly any shadows left, as the sun rose higher and higher in the heavens. It also became warmer and warmer; so they decided to sit in a row with their backs to the sea and their eyes firmly fixed upon the hut, determined not to miss the sight of the treasure for a single moment.

“Let’s play ‘I went to market with a green umbrella’,” Prue suggested, “and we can think of all the things the treasure might be.” The green umbrella had been to market about twenty times when a voice behind them made them all start.

“Well, now—to be sure!”

And there was Mr. Brown, with nothing in his hands—no sack upon his back.

“How did you come, Mr. Brown?” Mollie asked. “We looked and looked.”

“Grand sentries you’d make—all lookin’ one way,” said Mr. Brown. “Suppose you look at the sea for a change.”

Six pairs of eyes turned to gaze at the sea—and six pairs of feet instantly began to run, for there, drawn up on the beach, was a boat!

“How’s that for a tidy craft?” asked Mr. Brown. “Is she pretty shaped? How do you like her paint? Look at her nice little oars. Eight, she holds—nice-sized party eight is, sort o’ cosy an’ cheerful.”

The children looked from the boat to Mr. Brown and back again. Nobody thought any more of stilts or sewing-machines, or even of bull-dogs; the only thing on earth worth having at that moment was the wonderful boat around which they were standing. Her outer dress was of bright, dark green, with a scarlet line round the rim; inside she was pure white. A little railing of delicate iron scroll-work ran round her stern, and across it curved a board, with the boat’s name in scarlet and gold: The Belle of Canada.

“Do you mean—” Hugh began, but he was too overpowered to finish, because it was all very well to talk about cameras and things in the abstract, but that such a thing as a real, life-sized boat—and such a beautiful boat too—should fall into their hands in this casual way was too wildly improbable to be true.

But it was true, nevertheless. That lovely little boat was really theirs!

The way it happened was this, Mr. Brown explained: the year before— while the Campbells were in the hills—a little Canadian girl, visiting her Australian relations, had come with them to stay in the very cottage the Campbells were in now. She was very ill when she arrived. The doctors feared consumption, and said that open air all day long was the best medicine she could have. So the boat was bought—“and a fine price they paid for her too,” Mr. Brown remarked—and the little girl was half her time on the sea, and got so sunburnt and sturdy that before she left she was rowing the boat herself—“an’ you’d never know she’d had a mite the matter with her,” Mr. Brown said. When the time came for her to leave she took a fancy to give her boat to some other children, so that they might have as happy a summer with it as she had had. But it wasn’t enough to give it in the usual way of giving—she made up the plan of the message in the bottle, which she left with Mr. Brown.

“But I wasn’t in no hurry,” he said. “I kep’ my eye on the cottage children. The last lot were a rampagin’ set o’ young ruffians, smashin’ everything they set hands on. I soon saw that this chap was a different sort altogether, hammerin’ an’ tinkerin’ away at his raft, and careful of her as if she was a lady—he’s the sort for little Missie an’ me, I said to myself, so in the bottle went, only an hour or two before you found it.”

“And suppose no one had found it, or the other bottle?” Dick suggested.

“Not much danger o’ that, with six pair o’ sharp eyes an’ inquisitive headpieces around,” Mr. Brown answered, with a laugh. “The only bit I wasn’t sure about was the Duke’s Nose, for not many knows it by that name; but little Missie would have it—said it was more romantic like, though what’s romantic about a duke’s nose it beats me to see—just like any other nose, I don’t mind bettin’.”

“Hugh says Jerry’s nose is like a duke’s,” Grizzel said, so that all eyes were immediately fixed upon poor Jerry’s nose.

“Jolly romantic, especially when I have a cold in the head!” he exclaimed.

“Well now, jump in, the lot o’ you, an’ I’ll row you along to your Pa,” said Mr. Brown.

“Do you know Papa?” asked Grizzel, whose round blue eyes had never left Mr. Brown’s face since he began his story.

“Yes, I know your Pa. There ain’t many round here that don’t. Now then–-”

As Mr. Brown talked he had pushed the boat out, with some help from the boys, and had lifted the girls in. Now he took the oars, and, with a few powerful strokes, he sent the boat skimming over the sparkling blue sea.

All the children could row, more or less, but Mr. Brown gave them some useful hints. “An’ you mustn’t ever go far out to sea by yourselves,” he said, “nor yet too near the rocks except it be a calm day like to-day. Remember that a good sailor won’t ever run his ship into danger unless he can’t help himself, no more than he would his wife. If you want to go a regular excursion to the Port or such, you can always get one of us to go with you, unless, of course, your Pa can take you. But you’ll get plenty of fun, an’ learn a lot too, playin’ round here—you’ll learn the feel o’ the sea, which is something quite different from rowin’ on a river. An’ don’t you be givin’ the raft the go-by,” he added, addressing himself to Hugh; “there’s a lot goes to a raft an’ you never know when your knowledge o’ handlin’ one may come in useful. That’s a tidy one you’ve made, but it wants a bit o’ tar. I’ll bring some along one o’ these days an’ show you how to use it—there’s your Pa wavin’ to you.”

An excited party of children landed on the beach and told their story to Papa, whose consent had to be won before the lovely boat was really theirs. He was as delighted as they were themselves, and an expedition was planned for that very evening, to include Mamma and her guitar.

“If you will give me the little girl’s address I will write and tell her all about how we found the bottle,” Prudence said to Mr. Brown, “and we will all write and say ‘Thank you’ for her beautiful idea.”

“She’s back in Canada now,” Mr. Brown answered. “She’d be mighty pleased to hear from you.”

It was difficult to sit down soberly to boiled mutton and batter pudding after these exhilarating adventures, but it had to be done, and after dinner the girls had to “sit quietly with their needles” for an hour; but at last tea-time came, and evening followed, and the whole family except Baby embarked upon the first voyage in The Belle of Canada. It was delightful to float about on the moonlit water and listen to Mamma’s lovely voice. She sang a Canadian boat-song, in honour of the little hostess in far-away Canada:

“From the lone sheiling of the misty island Mountains divide us, and the waste of seas— Yet still the blood is strong, the heart is Highland, And we in dreams behold the Hebrides.

“Fair