Five Go Down to the Sea (11 page)

Julian had his compass and was going by that, leading them down lanes, across fields, along little paths, and sometimes along no paths at all! He felt sure, however, that they were going right. They were making for the coast, anyway.

„Look, there are two hil s side by side, or cliffs, are they?" said Anne, pointing. „I believe they are the hil s between which we saw that tower."

„Yes, you"re right," said Dick. „We"re nearly there. I wonder how people got there when the tower and the house were lived in. There appears to be no proper road at al ."

They walked on, over a rough field. They soon found themselves in a very narrow, overgrown lane, deep-set between hedges that almost met overhead.

„A green tunnel," said Anne, pleased. „Look out for those enormous nettles, Ju."

At the end of the lane an overgrown path swung sharply right, and there, not far from them, was the tower! They stood and stared at it. This was where the light had flashed a hundred years ago to bring ships to their doom, and where the light had flashed only the other night.

„The tower"s fal ing into ruin," said Dick. „Large pieces have dropped out of it. And I should think the house is in ruin, too, though we can"t see enough of it at the moment, just a bit of the roof. Come on. This is going to be fun!"

The tower didn"t look the frightening thing it had seemed on the stormy night when the boys saw the flashing light. It just looked a poor old ruin. They made their way to it through high thistles, nettles and wil ow-herb.

„Doesn"t look as if anyone has been here for years," said Julian, rather puzzled. „I rather wish we"d brought a scythe to cut down these enormous weeds! We can hardly get through them. I"m stung all over with nettles, too."

They came to the house at last, and a poor, tumbledown ruin it was! The doors had fal en in, the windows were out of shape, and had no glass, the roof was ful of holes. An enormous climbing rose rambled everywhere, throwing masses of old-fashioned white roses over wal s and roof to hide the ugliness of the ruin.

Only the tower seemed stil strong, except at the top, where parts of the wall had crumbled away and fallen. Julian forced his way through the broken doorway into the house. Weeds grew in the floor.

„There"s a stone stairway going up the tower!" he called. „And I say, look here! What"s this on each stair?"

„Oil," said George. „Someone"s been carrying oil up in a can, or a lamp, and has spilt it.

Julian, we"d better be careful. That somebody may be here stil !"

Dick and Anne came hurriedly up to the old stone stairway when they heard what Julian and George had said. Oil! That could only mean one thing, a lamp in the tower.

They all stood and looked at the big splashes of oil on each step.

„Come on up," said Julian at last. „I"l go first. Be careful how you go because the tower"s in a very crumbly state."

The tower was built at one end of the old house, and its walls were thicker than the house walls. The only entry to it was by a doorway inside the house. In the tower was a stone stairway that went very steeply up in a spiral.

„This must once have been the door of the tower," said Dick, kicking at a great thick slab of wood that lay mouldering away beside the stone doorway. „The tower doesn"t seem to hold anything but this stone stairway, just a look-out, I suppose."

„Or a place for signal ing to ships to entice them on the rocks," said George. „Oh, Timmy, don"t push past like that; you nearly made me fall, these stone steps are so steep."

As Dick said, the tower seemed to hold nothing but a stairway spiral ing up steeply. Julian came to the top first and gave a gasp. The view over the sea was astonishing. He could see for miles over the dark cornflower-blue waters. Near the coast the churning of the waves into white breakers and spray showed the hidden rocks that waited for unwary ships.

George came up beside him and stared in wonder, too. What a marvel ous sight, blue sky, blue sea, waves pounding over the rocks, and white gulls soaring on the stiff breeze.

Then Dick came up, and Julian gave him a warning. „Be careful. Don"t lean on the walls at all, they"re crumbling badly."

Julian put out his hand and touched the top of the tower wall near him. It crumbled and bits fell away below.

Big pieces had fallen away here and there, leaving great gaps in the wall round the top of the tower. When Anne came up also, Julian took her arm, afraid that with such a crowd up there someone might stumble against a crumbling wall and fall from the tower.

George had hold of Timmy"s collar and made him stand quite stil . „Don"t you go putting your great paws up on the wall," she warned him. „You"l find yourself down in the nettles below in no time if you do!"

„You can quite well see what a wonderful place this is for flashing a light at night over the sea," said Dick. „It could be seen for miles. In the old days, when sailing ships got caught in the storms that rage round this coast at times, they would be thankful to see a guiding light."

„But what a light!" said Julian. „A light that guided them straight on to those great rocks!

Let me see now. Are those the rocks near those coves we went to the other day?"

„Yes, I think so," said Dick. „But there are rocks and rocks, and caves and coves round here. It"s difficult to tell if they are the same ones we saw."

„The ships that sailed towards the light must have been wrecked on the rocks down there," said Julian, pointing. „How did the wreckers get there? There must have been a path from here somewhere."

„The Wreckers" Way, do you think?" said Dick.

Julian considered. „Wel , I don"t know. I imagine that the Wreckers" Way must have been a way leading to the sea from inland somewhere, certainly a way that was convenient for the vil agers to use. No, I"l tel you what I think happened!"

„What?" said everyone.

„I think, on a stormy night long ago, the people who lived here in this house went up into the tower and flashed their false light to any ship that was sailing out on the waters. Then, in great excitement, they watched it sailing nearer and nearer, perhaps shown up by lightning, perhaps by the moon."

Everyone imagined such a ship, and George shivered. Poor wretched ship!

„When the ship reached the rocks and crashed on them, the signal ers in the tower gave a different signal, a signal to a watcher up there on the hil s," said Julian, pointing behind him. „A watcher who was standing on the only spot from which the flash could be seen!

Maybe the light gleamed steadily to entice a ship in, but was flashed in code to the watcher on the hil s, and the flashing said, “Ship on rocks. Tell the others, and come to the feast!” "

„How simply horrible!" said Anne. „I can"t believe it!"

„It is difficult to think anyone could be so heartless," said Julian. „But I think that"s what happened. And then, I think, the people who lived in this house went down from here to the near-by coves and waited for their friends to come along the other way, the Wreckers" Way, wherever that is."

„It must be a secret way," said Dick. „It must have been a way known only to those vil agers who were wreckers. After all, wrecking was against the law, and so this whole business of showing lights and wrecking ships must have been kept a dead secret. We heard what old Grandad said, that every wrecker who knew the way had to vow he would tel no one else."

„Old Grandad"s father probably lived in this very house, and climbed the stone stairway on a wild night, and lighted the lamp that shone out over the stormy sea," said Julian.

„That"s why Yan said he was “frit” of this tower," said George. „He thinks his Grandad"s dad stil lights it! Well, we know better. Somebody else lights it, somebody who can"t be up to any good either!"

„And, don"t let"s forget, somebody who may stil be about somewhere!" said Julian, lowering his voice suddenly.

„Gosh! yes," said Dick, looking round the little tower as if he expected to see a stranger there, listening. „I wonder where he keeps his lamp. It"s not here."

„The oil splashes are on almost every one of the stone steps," said Anne. „I noticed as I came up. I bet it"s a big lamp. It has to give a light far out to sea!"

„Look, it must have been stood on this bit of the wall," said Dick. „There are some oily patches here."

They all looked at the dark patches. Dick bent down and smelt them. „Yes, paraffin oil," he said.

George was looking at the wall on the other side of the tower. She called to the other three.

„And here"s a patch on this side!" she said. „I know what happened! Once a ship had been caught by the light and was on its way in, the men with the lamp put it on the other side of the tower to signal to the watcher on the hil s, to tell him the ship was caught!"

„Yes. That"s it," said Anne. „But who could it be? I"m sure nobody lives here, the place is an absolute ruin, open to the wind and the rain. It must be somebody who knows the way here, sees to the light, and does the signalling."

There was a pause. Dick looked at Julian. The same thought came into their minds. They had seen somebody wandering out in the stormy night, twice!

„Could it be Mr Penruthlan, do you suppose?" said Dick. „We couldn"t imagine why he was out here in the storm the first night we came out to watch for the light."

„No, he"s not the man with the light, he"s the watcher on the hil s!" said Julian. „That"s it!

That"s why he goes out on wild nights, to see if there"s a signal from the tower, flashing to say that a ship is coming in!"

There was an even longer pause. Nobody liked that idea at all.

„We know he tells lies, we know he goes through people"s pockets, because we saw him,"

went on Julian after a few moments. „He fits in well, He"s the man who goes and stands in that special spot on the hil s and watches for a light!"

„What does he do after that?" said Anne. „Didn"t we hear that there were no wrecks here now, because of the lighthouse higher up the coast? What"s the point of it all, if there isn"t a wreck?"

„Smuggling," said Julian shortly. „That"s the point. Probably by motor-boat. They choose a wild night of storm and wind, when they wil be neither seen nor heard, wait out at sea for the signal ing light to show them all"s clear, and then come in to one of these coves."

„Yes, and I bet the Wreckers" secret way is used by someone who steals down to the cove and takes the smuggled goods!" said Dick, excited. „Three or four people, perhaps, if the goods are heavy. Gosh! I"m sure we"re right."

„And it"s the watcher on the hil who tells his friends, and down they go to the coves together. It"s most ingenious," Julian said. „Nobody sees the light on the tower except the boat waiting, and nobody sees the signal inland except the one watcher on the hil s.

Absolutely fool-proof."

„We are lucky to stumble on it," said Dick. „But what puzzles me is this. I"m pretty certain that the man who lights the lamp didn"t come the way we came - we"d have seen trodden-down weeds or something. We should certainly have found some sort of a path his feet had made."

„Yes. And there wasn"t anything, not even a broken thistle," said Anne. „There must be some other way into this old house."

„Of course there is! We"ve already said there must be a way for the man who lights the lamp to get down to the coves from here!" said George. „Well, that"s the way he gets here, of course. He comes up the passage from the cove. How stupid we are!"

This idea excited them all. Where was the passage? Nobody could imagine! It certainly wasn"t in the tower, there was no room for anything in that small tower except for the spiral staircase leading to the top.

„Let"s go down," said Anne, and began to descend the steps. A slight noise below made her stop. „Go on," said George, who was just behind her. Anne turned a scared face to her.

„I heard a noise down there," she whispered.

George turned to Julian immediately. „Anne thinks there"s somebody down there," she said, in a low voice.

„Come back, Anne," ordered Julian at once. Anne climbed back, stil looking scared.

„Would it be the man who does the lamp?" she whispered. „Do be careful, Julian. He can"t be a nice man!"

„Nice! He must be a beast!" said George, scornful y. „Are you going down, Ju? Look out, then."

Julian peered down the stone steps. There was really nothing for it but to go down and see who was there. They couldn"t possibly stay up in the tower al day long, hoping that whoever it was would go away!

„What sort of noise did you hear?" Julian asked Anne.

„Well, a sort of scuffling noise," said Anne. „It might have been a rat, of course, or a rabbit.

It was just a noise, that"s all. Something"s down there, or somebody!"

„Let"s sit down for a moment or two and wait," said Dick. „We"ll listen hard and see if we can hear anyone."

So they sat down cautiously, George with her hand on Timmy"s col ar. They waited and they listened. They heard the wind blowing round the old tower. They heard the distant gulls cal ing, „ee-oo, ee-oo, ee-oo". They heard the thistles rustling their prickles together down below.

But.they heard nothing from the kitchen at the foot of the tower. Julian looked at Anne.

„No sound to be heard now," he said. „It must have been a rabbit!"

„Perhaps it was," said Anne, feeling rather foolish. „What shall we do then? Go down?"

„Yes. I"l go first though, with Timmy," said Julian. „If anyone is lying in wait he"ll be annoyed to see our Timmy. And Timmy wil be even more annoyed to see him!"

Just as Julian was getting up, a noise was quite distinctly heard from below. It was, as Anne had described, a kind of scuffle, then silence.

„Well, here goes!" said Julian, and began to descend the steps. The others watched breathlessly. Timmy went with Julian, trying to press past him. He hadn"t seemed worried about the noise at al ! So perhaps it was only a rat or rabbit!

Julian went down slowly. Who was he going to find - an enemy, or a friend? Careful now, Julian, there may be somebody lying in wait!