Five on Finniston Farm (9 page)

What - have that old door hanging in some newfangled house out in that American country, wherever it is? NO. I say NO, and I"l say it til I"m blue in the face!"

„Al right, Grand-dad - don"t upset yourself," said Mrs Philpot. She spoke to Julian in a low voice. „Change the subject, quickly, or Grand-dad wil go on and on, poor old fel ow!"

Julian racked his brain for a change of subject, and fortunately remembered the henhouses. He at once began to tell Great-Grand-dad all they had done that afternoon, and the old fel ow calmed down at once, and listened with pleasure. Snippet, who had run in fright to the twins as soon as Great-Grand-dad had begun to shout, ran back to him, and settled on his feet. Timmy also decided to join them, and soon Great-Grand-dad was completely happy again, drawing on his old pipe, with one dog at his feet, the other resting a great head on his knee. Timmy certainly did love Great-Grand-dad!

Mr Henning did not come back that night, much to everyone"s relief, but arrived next day just before lunch, bringing with him a dried-up little fel ow wearing thick glasses, whom he introduced as Mr Richard Durleston.

„The great Mr Durleston!" he said proudly. „Knows more about old houses in England than anyone else in the country. I"d like him to see that old door after lunch, Mrs Philpot - and that queer opening in the wall of the bedroom upstairs, which was used to heat embers and bricks for warming beds years ago."

Fortunately Great-Grand-dad was not there to object, and after they had had dinner, Mrs Philpot took Mr Durleston to the old studded door. „Ah yes," he said. „Quite genuine. Very fine specimen. I should offer two hundred pounds, Mr Henning."

How Mrs Philpot longed to accept such an offer! What a difference it would make to her housekeeping! She shook her head. „You"d have to talk to old Great-Grand-dad," she said. „But I"m afraid he"l say no. Now I"l take you to see the queer old opening up in one of the bedrooms."

She took Mr Henning and Mr Durleston upstairs, and the four fol owed, with Timmy. It was indeed a strange opening in the wall! It had a wrought-iron door rather like an old oven door. Mrs Philpot opened it. Inside was a big cavity, which had obviously been used as a kind of oven to heat bricks for placing into cold beds; some of the old bricks were actual y stil there, blackened with long-ago heating! Mrs Philpot took out what looked like a heavy iron tray with an ornamented raised edge. On it were old, old embers!

„This tray was used for heating and holding the embers before they were put into warming-pans," she said. „We stil have one old warming-pan left - there on the wall, look."

The four, just as interested as the two men, looked at the copper warming-pan, glowing red-gold on the wall. „The red-hot embers were emptied into that," Mrs Phil-pot told the children, „and then the pan was carried by its long handle into all the bedrooms, and thrust into each bed for a few minutes to warm it. And that funny little opening in the wal is, as I said, where people years and years ago heated the embers - and the bricks too, which were wrapped in flannel and left in each bed."

„Hmmmmm. Very interesting. Quite rare to see one in such a well-preserved state," said Mr Durleston, peering into the opening through thick glasses. „You could make an offer for this too, Mr Henning. Interesting old place. We"ll have a look at the barns too, I think, and the outbuildings. Might be a few things there you could pick up with advantage."

George thought it was a good thing the twins were not with them to hear al this. They seemed to share with their Great-Grand-dad a hatred of parting with any of the treasures belonging to the old farm-house!

Mrs Philpot took the two men downstairs again, and the four fol owed.

„I"l just take Mr Durleston to the old chapel, mam," said Mr Henning, and Mrs Philpot nodded. She left them and hurried back into the kitchen, where she had a cake baking.

The four looked at one another, and Julian nodded his head towards the two men, now making their way out of doors. „Shall we go too?" he said. „We haven"t seen this chapel yet, either!"

So they followed the two men, and soon came to a tall, quaint old building with smal and beautiful arched windows set high up in the walls. They went in at the door, a few paces behind the two men, and stared in wonder.

„Yes - you can see it was once a chapel!" said Julian, speaking instinctively in a low voice.

„Those lovely old windows - that arch there..."

„And the feel of it!" said Anne. „I know now what old Mr Finniston down at that little shop meant, when he said that though it was now a store-house, it was stil ful of prayer! You can feel that people have been here to pray, can"t you? What a lovely little chapel. Oh, I do wish it wasn"t used as a store-house!"

„I was told by an old fel ow down in the vil age antique shop that a Lady Phil ippa, who was once the Lady of the castle, brought each of her fifteen children here to learn their prayers," said Mr Durleston, surprisingly. „Hmm, hmm - nice old story. Probably true.

Chapels were often built near to castles. Wonder which path they took from the castle to the chapel. Al gone now, no castle, nothing! Hmm, hmm."

„I"d like to buy this chapel, knock it down, and take it stone by stone to my place in the States," said the American enthusiastical y. „Fine specimen, isn"t it? It would look wunnerful in my place."

„Can"t advise that," said Mr Durleston, shaking his head. „Not in good taste. Let"s go to those out-buildings yonder. Might see something in the old junk there."

They went off, and the children stayed behind, entranced with the little chapel. Sacks upon sacks of grain and what looked like fertilizer were arranged in rows all over the floor.

A cat had three kittens cuddled together on one sack, and a dove cooed somewhere high up in the arched roof. It was a very peaceful sound, somehow just right for the silent little place. The children trooped out quietly, not feeling inclined to follow the brash Mr Henning round any more.

„At least the other man stopped him from his mad idea of removing the chapel stone by stone," said Anne. „I couldn"t bear that beautiful old place to be torn up by its roots and replanted somewhere else."

„You sound quite angry, Anne - almost as fierce as old Great-Grand-dad!" said Julian, slipping his arm through his sister"s. „I don"t somehow think the old chapel wil be sold to Mr Henning - even if he offered a mil ion dol ars for it!"

„Well, I like most Americans very much," said Anne. „But not Mr Henning. He - he wants to buy history just as if it were chocolate or toffee!"

That made the others laugh. „I say!" said Julian, „what about having a snoop round, now we"re out, and just see if we can decide where to hunt for the site of the castle? I presume we al agree that it can"t be very far away from the chapel?"

„Yes - that"s agreed," said Dick. „And it"s also agreed that the site is probably on a hil . The snag is that there are rather a lot of hil s on this undulating farmland!"

„Let"s make our way over there - up the nearest slope," said George. „Hal o, here are the twins. We"ll cal them. They might like to come."

The twins soon joined them, and said yes, they would certainly like to hunt for the castle-site. „But it might take years!" said Harry. „It might be anywhere on the farm!"

„Well, we plan to examine this first slope," said Julian. „Heel, Tim, heel, Snippet. Oh gosh, here"s Nosey the jackdaw too. NOT on my shoulder, if you don"t mind, Nosey. I rather value my ears!"

„Chack!" said the jackdaw, and flew to the twins.

They made their way up the slope. There was, however, absolutely nothing to be seen except grass, grass, grass! They came to a big mound and stood looking at it.

„A very large mole must have made that!" said Dick, which made them all laugh, for the mound was as high as their shoulders. Rabbit-holes could be seen at the bottom, though it was probable that very few burrowed there now - the great rabbit-disease, myxomatosis had wiped them practically out of existence on Finniston Farm.

Timmy couldn"t see a rabbit-hole without scraping at it, and soon he and Snippet were scattering earth over everyone. Snippet was small enough to disappear into one hole, and came out carrying - of all things - an oyster shel ! Julian took it out of his mouth in amazement.

„Look here - an oyster shell - and we"re miles from the sea. How did it get there? Go in again, Snippet. Scrape hard, Timmy. Buck up! An idea is glimmering in my brain!"

Before long, what with Timmy"s excited scraping and Snippet"s explorations deep into the burrow, quite a collection of oyster shells, and small and large bones, lay on the grass!

„Bones!" said Anne. „Not bones of people surely! Don"t tell me this is a mound covering an old grave or something, Ju."

„No. But it is something rather exciting!" said Julian, „I"m pretty sure it"s an old kitchenmidden."

„A kitchen-midden? What on earth"s that?" said George. „Oh look - Timmy"s got another mouthful of oyster shel s!"

„A kitchen-midden is what you might cal the rubbish-heap of the old days," explained Julian, picking up some oyster shells, „It was often very big, when it comprised the rubbish thrown out from large houses - or castles! Things like bones and shel s wouldn"t rot away like other rubbish - and I do believe we"ve found the kitchen-midden of the old castle. My word - what a find! Now we know something very important!"

„What? asked everyone, in excitement.

„Well - we know now that the site of the castle must be somewhere on this slope!" said Julian. „The kitchen-midden was probably not far from its wal s. We"re on the scent, scouts, we"re on the scent! Come on - let"s go further on. Spread out. Examine every inch of the ground!"

JUNIOR SPRINGS A SURPRISE!

The six children felt a sudden upsurge of excitement, and Timmy felt it too and barked loudly. Snippet joined in, and the jackdaw danced up and down on Harry"s shoulder, chacking hoarsely. Junior, who had seen them start out and was tracking them, stared in surprise from behind a bush in a nearby hedge. NOW what was all the excitement about?

What had Timmy and Snippet found?

He saw the six children spread out and begin to go slowly up the great slope of the hil .

Timmy followed them, rather puzzled. He wished he knew what they were looking for -

then he could hunt too! Junior kept safely behind the bush. He knew that if he followed too closely after the children, Timmy would hear him, and bark.

Suddenly the Harries gave a shout. „Hey!" The others looked up from their search, and saw them beckoning in excitement. „What about THIS? Come and look!"

Everyone hurried over to the twins, who were standing on a little ridge about two hundred yards below the top of the gently sloping hil . „Look!" said Harry, sweeping his arm in a circle. „Would this be a likely place for the castle-site?"

The four looked at the great shal ow depression that the twins pointed to. In shape it was like a very shallow soup-plate, certainly big enough for a castle to have been built there!

It was covered with thick, closely-growing grass, which was a little darker in colour than the grass around.

Julian clapped Harry on the shoulder. „Yes! I bet this is where the castle once stood! Why should the ground here suddenly have this great depression in it, as if it had sunk down, for some reason? The only reason could be that some enormously heavy building once stood here - and it must have been the castle!"

„It"s not too far from the kitchen-midden, where they threw their rubbish, is it?" asked Anne, anxiously, looking back to see how far away that was.

„No - just about right," said Julian. „They would be sure to have it some distance away, because it would smel , especially in the hot weather. Yes, twins - I think you real y have hit on the castle-site - and I bet if we had the machinery to excavate here, we"d come across dungeons, cel ars, underground passages - and all they contain!"

The twins went red with excitement, and stared solemnly at the great basin-like circle, green with grass. „What wil our mother say?" they said, both together.

„Plenty!" said Dick. „This might be the saving of your farm! But look - let"s not say a word about it yet, in case it gets round to Mr Henning. Let"s get Bil and ask him if he"ll lend us spades and things. We"l tel him we"ve found some interesting old shells and bones on the hil and want to do a little digging. We"ll soon know if this real y is the site of the castle."

„Good idea," said Julian, excited at the thought of being one of the first to dig down into the old dungeons! „Let"s pace round this old site and see how big it is."

They walked round and round it and decided it was more than big enough for even a large castle. They thought it was strange that the grass should be a different colour there.

„But it does sometimes happen that grass marks out where old buildings once stood," said Julian. „I say - this is just about the most exciting thing that ever happened to us - and I"m so glad it was the twins who first recognized the site! After all, it"s on their farm!"

„Isn"t that Junior, running over there?" said George suddenly, as she saw Timmy prick up his ears, and turn his nose to the wind. „Yes, it is. He"s been spying on us, the little beast!

There he goes, look!"

„Well, he can"t know much," said Julian, gazing after the running figure. „I don"t expect he even knows that a castle was once built here, at the top of this hil - and he certainly wouldn"t know we were looking for the site. He"s just snooping, that"s all."

But Junior did know all about the old castle, for he had overheard the children talking in the hen-house! And he did know what they had been looking for! He had followed them as closely as he dared, listening to their shouts - and now he felt that he must get back to his father and tell him what he knew!

He found his father stil with Mr Durleston, examining an old fireplace. „Now that"s worth buying," Mr Durleston was saying. „You could rip that out, and use it in your own house - a beautiful thing! Very old! And..."

„Pop! I say, Pop! Listen!" cried Junior, bursting in. Mr Durleston looked annoyed. That boy again! But Junior took no notice of the old man"s annoyance, and pul ed urgently at his father"s arm. „Dad! I know where the place is that the castle once stood on! And there"s dungeons and cellars underneath, ful of treasure, I know there are. Pop, those kids found the place, but they don"t know I saw them!"