Famous Five 19 Five Go to Demons Rocks (12 page)

They came out into a cave. This too was lighted by lanterns, though very poorly. They had all heard the murmur of voices as they came to it, and wondered who was there.

Three other visitors were in the cave, sight-seeing, like the children. A big burly fellow was with them, with jet-black hair, deep-set dark eyes, and a surly mouth - so like Jacob that Julian guessed at once that he was the brother, Ebenezer.

As soon as Ebenezer set eyes on Jeremiah, he roared in fury.

‘You get out! This is my job - you get out. I’ll show the caves to those youngsters!’

And with that such a battle of words followed that the Five were almost deafened, especially as the echo repeated everything very loudly indeed! The three visitors fled away up the tunnel, fearing a fight. Anne was very frightened, and clung to Julian.

Ebenezer came shouting up to old Jeremiah, his hand raised. ‘Haven’t I told you more’n a hundred times to keep out of these caves? Haven’t I told you I’m the one to show folks around - and Jacob too?’

‘Don’t take no notice of him!’ said Jeremiah, turning his back on the angry man. ‘He’s nought but a Big Mouth, same as his brother Jacob!’

‘Look out!’ yelled Julian, as the angry Ebenezer rushed at Jeremiah, his fist raised to strike him. ‘LOOK OUT!’

“Famous Five 19 - Five Go To Demon's Rock” By Enid Blyton
50

Jeremiah saw the angry man coming at him, and very neatly side-stepped. Ebenezer couldn’t stop, stepped heavily on a strand of very slippery seaweed - and went sprawling into a corner!

‘Ho!’ said Jeremiah, delighted. ‘Very nice, Ebenezer! Get up, and run at me again!’

‘He’d better not,’ said Julian, in his most grown-up voice. ‘I shall report him to the police if he does - and that will make a pair of them in two days. Jacob got into trouble yesterday - and now it will be Ebenezer.’

Ebenezer got up, scowling, and glared at Jeremiah, who grinned back in delight.

‘Coming at me again, Ebby?’ he said. ‘It’s grand fun to hit an old man, isn’t it?’

But Ebenezer was very much afraid that Julian would do what he had threatened, and report him to the police. He rubbed his shoulder where it had struck a piece of rock, and debated what to do.

‘Come along,’ said Jeremiah, to the five watching children. ‘I’ll take you down to the Wreckers’ Cave. Ebby can come too, if so be he can behave hisself. But mebbe he’d like to run away home, and get his shoulder looked to!’

That was enough for Ebby! He determined to follow the little company, and made rude remarks all the time. So he tailed them, and shouted at them from a safe distance. How they wished they had Timmy with them! He would have made short work of the rude Ebenezer!

‘Don’t take any notice of him,’ said Julian, ‘Lead on Jeremiah. My word, isn’t it dark in this tunnel! Good thing we all brought good torches!’

The tunnel came to an end at last and opened out into an extraordinary cave. The roof was unexpectedly high, and the irregular sides were ridged with shelves of rocks. On the shelves were dirty old boxes, a crate or two and some sacks.

‘What in the world are those?’ asked Dick, shining his torch on them.

‘Well young sir, they’re just what they look like - ordinary boxes and sacks,’ said Jeremiah. ‘Put there by Ebenezer and Jacob to fool people! They tells everybody they’re what the old wreckers got out of ships they wrecked, years ago! Hoo-hoo-hoo! Anybody that believes those lies deserves to be fooled. They’re all from Ebby’s back-yard. Seen them lying there meself! Hoo-hoo-hoo!’

His hoo-hooing laugh echoed round the cave, and Ebenezer made an angry growling noise rather like a dog.

‘I’m not going to fool these kids,’ said Jeremiah. ‘You and your sacks and boxes! I know where the old things are, the real old things - oh yes I do!’

‘They’re no better than the sacks and boxes there, wherever they are!’ said Ebby, in a growling voice. ‘You’re lying, old Jeremiah - you don’t know nothing!’

‘Take us on farther,’ said Dick. ‘There must be more caves. I think this is exciting. Is this really where the old wreckers hid the things they salvaged from the wrecks they caused

- or just a tale?’

“Famous Five 19 - Five Go To Demon's Rock” By Enid Blyton
51

‘Oh, this is their cave, that’s true enough. Dressed up a bit by Ebby there!’ said Jeremiah. ‘But I know the caves farther on. Ebby doesn’t! He’s too skeered to go farther under the sea. Aint’ you, Ebby?’

Ebby said something that sounded rude. Julian turned to Jeremiah eagerly. ‘Oh do take us farther - if it isn’t dangerous!’

‘Well, I’m going farther on, anyway,’ said Tinker, suddenly. ‘Mischief hasn’t come back -

so he must be lost - and I’m going to find him!’

Julian saw that Tinker was quite determined. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘We’ll come with you.

Jeremiah, lead the way! But it’s not really dangerous, is it? I mean - we don’t want to find the sea sweeping through these caves, right up to where we are!’

‘Tide’s not on the turn yet,’ said Jeremiah. ‘We’re all right for a while. When it comes in, it swirls up this passage here - but it stops at the Wreckers’ Cave - that’s just too high for it, see? The tunnel runs downwards fast now. It goes right under your light-house, have you seen it down at the bottom of the shaft?’

‘Good gracious, yes!’ said Julian, remembering. ‘I went down it - and the sea was swirling in and out at openings in the bottom of the shaft. Do you mean to say that the sea that rises in the shaft at high tide, comes racing up into these tunnels too?’

‘Aye, that it does,’ said Jeremiah. ‘You can get from here to the lighthouse under the rocky sea-bed right to that foundation shaft. But nobody dares! Tide comes in so quickly, you might get caught and drownded!’

Ebby at once shouted something rude again - it sounded as if he was telling Jeremiah to go and ‘get drownded too’!

‘Do let’s go on farther,’ said Dick. ‘Come on, Jeremiah.’

So Jeremiah led them farther on under the rocky bed of the sea. It was strange and rather frightening to hear the constant noise of the water racing over the roof of the winding tunnel. Their torches lighted up slimy walls, and rocky shelves and hollows.

‘You know - this would have been a very good place to hide treasure,’ said Julian, glancing up at a dark hollow in the roof of the tunnel. ‘Though I don’t know how anyone would set about looking for it - there are hundreds of nooks and crannies - and isn’t it cold in this tunnel!’

‘Well, the sun’s rays never penetrate down here,’ said Dick. ‘My word, the sea sounds pretty loud now!’

‘I wish we could find Mischief,’ said Anne to George. ‘Look at poor Tinker. He’s crying.

He’s pretending not to, but I could see the tears rolling down his cheeks last time I flashed my torch on him.’

They stopped to look at something - a strange jellylike thing, like an enormous sea anemone. Ebby caught them up, and bumped into Dick. He rounded on Ebby at once.

‘Keep off! Follow us if you like, but don’t come so near. We don’t like you!’

Ebby took no notice but kept as close behind everyone as he possibly could, and Dick realized that he was probably feeling very scared! Then, as they rounded another corner of' the tunnel, and saw yet another cave, Tinker gave a yell that echoed everywhere.

‘MISCHIEF! LOOK! THERE HE IS! MISCHIEF!’

And sure enough, there was the little monkey, crouched under a small shelf of rock, shivering in fright. He wouldn’t even go running to Tinker. Tinker had to pick him up and hug him.

‘Mischief! Poor Mischief - were you very frightened?’ he said. ‘You’re trembling all over!

You shouldn’t have run away! You might have been lost for ever!’

“Famous Five 19 - Five Go To Demon's Rock” By Enid Blyton
52

Mischief had something clutched in his tiny paw. He chattered to Tinker, and put his little furry arms round his neck. As he did so, he opened one paw - and something fell out and rolled over the rocky floor.

‘What have you dropped, Mischief?’ said Dick, and shone his torch down on to the floor of the cave. Something was glittering there - something round and yellow! Everyone stared, and a shock of excitement went through Julian, who was nearest. ‘A gold coin!’

he cried, and picked it up. ‘As bright as when it was minted. Mischief, where did you get it from? Look, Dick, look, George - it’s gold all right!’

Immediately everyone was full of the greatest excitement, one thought only in their heads.

The treasure! Mischief must have found the treasure! It was an old coin - very old.

Where could Mischief have found it?

‘Oh let’s go farther on and see!’ cried Dick.

‘Jeremiah, it must bc the treasure! Mischief will lead us to it!’

But Mischief would do nothing of the sort. He was NOT going to lose himself again. He was going to sit on Tinker’s shoulders, with an arm safely round the boy’s neck! He hadn’t liked being lost, all by himself in the dark.

Jeremiah would not go any farther, either. He shook his head. ‘No - not today, young sirs. Tide will soon be sweeping up these tunnels - faster than we can walk. Better turn back now, in case we’re caught. Many’s the visitor that’s had to run for his life, when the tide came up all of a sudden!’

George’s sharp ears caught the sound of swoosh-swoosh! Somewhere the tide had crept in! ‘Come on!’ she said. ‘We’d better do what Jeremiah says. The sea’s coming up the tunnel now as well as over it - and soon it will be sweeping up the beach too, and in at the cliff-passages. We’ll be caught in the middle, and have to stay here for ages!’

‘No need for alarm, missy,’ said old Jeremiah. ‘There’s a bit of time yet. Hallo - where’s Ebenezer gone?’

‘Blow - he must have heard us talking about Mischief’s gold piece,’ said George. ‘I forgot all about him! Now he knows that Mischief has found a gold coin, he’ll feel sure that the treasure may be somewhere down here - and he’ll look for it as soon as ever he can!

WHY didn’t we keep quiet about it?’

‘I forgot he was standing near us,’ groaned Dick. ‘Well I suppose the whole of Demon’s Rocks Village will know by now that a monkey has found the treasure - and hordes of sight-seers will swarm down here, hoping to find it. It must have been put in a pretty dry place, surely, for that coin to be so bright and untarnished.’

‘Buck up - we’d better go back as quickly as possible,’ said Julian. ‘Look at old Jeremiah

- he’s too thrilled for words! He’s planning to find the treasure himself at the earliest possible moment!’

‘Well, I vote we have a shot at it ourselves tomorrow,’ said Dick, excitement welling up in him at the thought. ‘Good old Mischief! You’re better than any detective!’

Then away up the tunnels they went, making all kinds of plans. WHAT an excitement!

“Famous Five 19 - Five Go To Demon's Rock” By Enid Blyton
53

Old Jeremiah was as excited as the others, but he said very little. He was angry to think that Ebenezer should have been there to see the find. He didn’t trust that Ebby - nor that Jacob either! They’d be ferreting after that treasure as sure as nuts were nuts, and monkeys were monkeys! Ha - wouldn’t they like to know where it was! He stumped on, up the old tunnels, thinking hard, and at last they came out into the welcome daylight again!

‘Here, Jeremiah - buy yourself some more baccy,’ said Julian, putting twenty pence into the old man’s hand. ‘And don’t count too much on that treasure! I expect it’s just an odd coin that Mischief found in a dry corner somewhere!’

‘Thank you, young sir,’ said the old man. ‘I’m not wanting the treasure myself - I’m just hoping that Ebby and Jacob don’t find it. They’ll be hunting all the time for it now!’

They were glad to be out in the open again. The sun had gone now, and the wind had whipped up. It was raining hard.

‘I say - we’d better buck up, else we shan’t be able to walk back to the light-house over the rocks!’ said Julian, worried. But fortunately the wind was against the tide and they just had time to wade over to the light-house steps.

‘There’s our little boat bobbing-about,’ said Tinker. ‘And hark - I can hear old Timmy barking! He’s heard us coming!’

So he had. He had been lying on the door-mat, his ears glued to the crack under the door, listening, listening. Nobody had come near the light-house and not a sound did old Timmy hear but the wind and the sea, and a few gulls gliding by.

‘We’re back, Timmy!’ yelled George, and she pushed at the door. It opened, and Timmy leapt out, almost knocking her over. Mischief sprang on to the dog’s back, and chattered at him without stopping.

‘He’s telling him about the gold coin he found,’ said Tinker, with a laugh. ‘Oh, I wish you’d been with us, Timmy. It was grand!’

‘It feels as if we’ve been away for ages,’ said George. ‘But it isn’t very late after all -

unless my watch is slow! I'm hungry. Let’s have something to eat and talk about everything - and what we’re going to do!’

So, over biscuits and sandwiches and coffee, they talked and talked. ‘We must get down to the caves again as soon as possible!’ said George. ‘I’m absolutely certain that Jacob and Ebby will be down there, hunting for coins, as soon as the tide’s out again.’

‘Well, we can’t do anything today, that’s certain,’ said Dick. ‘For one thing the tide’s in now - and for another thing it’s blowing up for a storm. Just hark at the wind!’

Timmy was sitting as close to George as he possibly could. He hadn’t liked her going out without him. She sat with her arm round him, eating her biscuits, occasionally giving him half of one. Tinker was doing the same with Mischief!

The children talked and talked. Where could Mischief have found that coin? Was it one on it’s own, that the sea had swept into the tunnel? Or was it part of a whole lot of coins? Had it come from an ironbound box, whose wooden sides had rotted away? They talked endlessly, their eyes bright, the round gold coin on the table in front of them.

‘I suppose it would be treasure-trove if we found it?’ said Dick. ‘I mean - it would be so old that it would belong to the Crown, and not to anyone in particular.’