They sat and ate, though none of them felt hungry. Daisy lay down behind them, perfectly good. The hens clucked quietly, puzzled at finding themselves in such a strange dark place, but quite happy with the children there.
When the meal was over Jack went back to his post again. He sat just inside the cave-entrance and listened.
The men were getting puzzled and disheartened. They were sitting at the foot of the hill, eating sandwiches and drinking beer. Jack could hear their voices quite plainly.
“Well, those children may have been on this island, and I think they were - but they’re not here now,” said one man. “I’m certain of that.”
“We’ve hunted every inch,” said another man. “I think you’re right, Tom; those kids have been here all right - who else could have planted those runner beans we found? - but they’ve gone. I expect that boy the policeman saw last Wednesday gave the alarm, and they’ve all gone off in the boat.”
“Ah yes, the boat!” said a third man. “Now, if the children were here we’d find a boat, wouldn’t we? Well, we haven’t found one - so they can’t be here!”
“Quite right,” said the first man. “I didn’t think of that. If there’s no boat here, there are no children! What about going back now? I’m sure it’s no good hunting any more.”
“There’s just one place we haven’t looked,” said the quiet voice of the fourth man. “There are some caves in this hillside - it’s possible those children may have hidden there.”
“Caves!” said another man. “Yes - just the place. We’ll certainly look there. Where are they?”
“I’ll show you in a minute,” said the fourth man. “Got a torch?”
“No, but I’ve got plenty of matches,” said the other man. “But look here - they can’t be there if there’s no boat anywhere to be seen. If they are here, there must be a boat somewhere!”
“It’s possible for a boat to be sunk so that no searcher could find it,” said the fourth man.
“Children would never think of that!” said another.
“No, I don’t think they would,” was the answer.
Jack, who could hear everything, thought gratefully of Mike. It had been Mike’s idea to sink the boat. If he hadn’t sunk it, it would certainly have been found, for the search had been much more thorough than Jack had guessed. Fancy the men noticing the runner beans!
“Come on,” said a man. “We’ll go to those caves now. But it’s a waste of time. I don’t think the children are within miles! They’ve gone off up the lakeside somewhere in their boat!"
Jack crawled silently back to the inner cave, his heart thumping loudly.
“They don’t think we’re on the island,” he whispered, “because they haven’t found the boat. But they’re coming to explore the caves. Put out the lantern, Mike. Now everyone must keep as quiet as a mouse. Is Daisy lying down? Good! The hens are quiet enough, too. They seem to think it’s night, and are roosting in a row! Now nobody must sneeze or cough - everything depends on the next hour or two!”
Not a sound was to be heard in the big inner cave. Daisy lay like a log, breathing quietly. The hens roosted peacefully. The children sat like mice.
And then they heard the men coming into the cave outside. Matches were struck - and the passage that led to their cave was found!
“Look here, Tom,” said a voice. “Here’s what looks like a passage - shall we see where it goes?”
“We’d better, I suppose,” said a voice. And then there came the sound of footsteps down the blocked-up passage!
The children could hear the sound of someone fumbling his way along the narrow passage. He found it a tight squeeze, by his groanings and grumblings. He came right up to the place where the children had piled rocks, stones, and earth to block up the passage.
“I say!” the man called back to the others, “the passage ends here in what looks like loose rocks. Shall I try to force my way through - pull the rocks to see if they are just a fall from the roof?”
“No!” cried another man. “If you can’t get through, the children couldn’t! This is a wild-goose chase - we’ll never find the children in these caves. Come back, Tom.”
The man turned himself round with difficulty and began to squeeze back - and at that very moment a dreadful thing happened!
Daisy the cow let out a terrific moo!
The children were not expecting it, and they almost jumped out of their skins with fright. Then they clutched at one another, expecting the men to come chasing along at once, having heard Daisy.
There was an astonished silence. Then one of the men said, “Did you hear that?”
“Of course!” said another. “What in the wide world was it?”
“Well, it wasn’t the children, that’s certain!” said the first, with a laugh. “I never in my life heard a child make a noise like that!”
“It sounded like a cow,” said another voice.
“A cow!” cried the first man, “what next? Do you mean to say you think there’s a cow in the middle of this hill, Tom?”
“Of course there can’t be,” said Tom, laughing. “But it sounded mighty like one! Let’s listen and see if we hear anything again.”
There was a silence, as if the men were listening - and at that moment Daisy most obligingly gave a dreadful hollow cough, that echoed mournfully round and round the cave.
“I don’t like it,” said a man’s voice. “It sounds too queer for anything. Let’s get out of these dark caves into the sunshine. I’m perfectly certain, since we heard those noises, that no children would be inside those caves! Why, they’d be frightened out of their lives!”
Jack squeezed Nora’s hand in delight. So old Daisy had frightened the men! What a glorious joke! The children sat as still as could be, glad now that Daisy had given such a loud moo and such a dreadful cough.
There was the sound of scrambling about in the outer cave and then it seemed as if the men were all outside again. “We’d better just hunt about and see if there are any more caves,” said one man. "Look, that seems like one!”
“That’s the cave where we put the hens when the trippers came!” whispered Jack. “It’s got no passage leading to our inner cave here. They can explore that all they like.”
The men did explore it, but as it was just a cave and nothing else, and had no passage leading out of it, they soon left it. Then they found the cave with the low-down, tiny entrance - the one the children used to squeeze into when they wanted to go to their inner cave - but, as Jack had said, the entrance was too small for any grown up to use, and, after trying once or twice, the men gave it up.
“No one could get in there except a rabbit,” said a man’s voice.
“Children could,” said another.
“Now look here, Tom, if we find children on this island now, I’ll eat my hat!” said the first man. “There’s no boat, to begin with - and we really haven’t found anything except runner beans, which might have been dropped by birds, and a funny sort of sandy yard - and you can’t tell me children are clever enough to live here day after day, and yet vanish completely, leaving no trace behind, as soon as we come! No, no - no children are as clever as that!”
“I think you’re right,” said Tom. “Come on, let’s go. I’m tired of this island with its strange noises. The sooner we get back home, the better I’ll be pleased. Where those children have gone just beats me. I wish we could find them. There’s such a surprise waiting for them!”
The voices grew distant as the men went down the hill to the beach, where they had put their boat. Jack crept quietly through the low passage into the small cave with the tiny entrance. He put his ear down to the entrance and listened. The sound of voices floated up to him. He heard the sound of oars being put ready. He heard the sound of the boat being pushed on to the water. Then came the sound of splashing.
“They’re going!” he called. "They really are!”
The others crowded round Jack. Then, when he thought it was safe, they all squeezed out of the tiny cave entrance and crept out on the hillside. Well hidden in the tall bracken, they watched the boatful of men being rowed away - away - away! The splashing of the oars, and the men’s voices, came clearly to the four children as they stood there.
Nora suddenly began to cry. The excitement had been so great, and she had been so brave, that now she felt as if she must cry and cry and cry. And then Peggy began - and even Mike and Jack felt their eyes getting wet! This was dreadful - but oh, it was such a glorious feeling to know they had not been discovered, and that their dear little island, their secret island, was their very own again.
A low and mournful noise came from the inside of the hill - it was poor old Daisy the cow, sad at being left alone in the cave.
The children couldn’t help laughing now! “Do you remember how Daisy frightened those men!” chucked Jack.
“She frightened me too,” said Peggy. “Honestly, I nearly jumped out of my skin - if my dress hadn’t been well buttoned up I believe I would have jumped right out of myself!”
That made the others laugh still more - and half-laughing, half-crying, they sat down on the hillside to wait till the boat was out of sight.
“I really thought they’d found us when that man got up to the part we had blocked up,” said Jack.
“Yes - it was a jolly good thing we did block it up!” said Peggy. “We would most certainly have been found if we hadn’t!”
“And it was a good thing Mike sank the boat,” said Nora. “If they had found a boat here they would have gone on looking for us till they’d found us.”
“I wonder what they meant when they said that such a surprise was waiting for us,” said Mike. “It couldn’t have been a nice surprise, I suppose?”
“Of course not!” said Peggy.
“They’re almost out of sight,” said Nora. “Do you think it’s safe to get up and do a dance or something, Jack? I’m just longing to shout and sing and dance after being shut up in the cave for so long!”
“Yes, we’re safe enough now,” said Jack. “They won’t come back. We can settle into the caves for the winter quite happily.”
“Shall we light a fire on the beach and have a good hot meal?” said Peggy. “I think we could all do with one!”
“Right,” said Jack, and they set to work. Nora sang and danced about as she helped to fetch things. She felt so happy to think that they were safe, and that their secret island was their very own once more.
Soon they were eating as if they had never had a meal in their lives before. Then a loud moo from the hillside reminded them that Daisy was still there. So, leaving the girls to clear up, Jack sped off with Mike to get out Daisy and the hens.
“You’re a good old cow, Daisy,” Jack said to her, rubbing her soft nose. “We hoped you wouldn’t moo when those men were hunting for us - but you knew better, and you mooed at them - and sent them off!”
The days were much shorter now, and night came early. It did not seem long before the sun went and the stars shone out in the sky. The children fetched the lantern from the cave and, taking their book, they went to Willow House. It was Nora’s turn to read, and they all lay and listened to her. It was pleasant in Willow House with the lantern shining down softly, and the smell of the heather and bracken rising up. It was nice to be together and to know that the great hunt was over and they were safe.
“I’m sleepy,” said Jack, at last. “Let’s have some chocolate and a last talk and go to bed. You know, we shall soon have to think seriously of going to live in the caves. It won’t be nice weather much longer!”
“We’ll decide everything to-morrow,” said Mike sleepily, munching his chocolate.
They were soon asleep, for the day’s excitement had quite tired them out. But how lovely it was to wake the next day and know that the hunt was over and that they were safe for the winter. How they sang and joked and teased one another as they went down to bathe!
"Oooh!” said Nora, as she slipped into the water. “It’s getting jolly cold to bathe in the lake, Jack. Have we got to do this all the winter?”
“Of course not,” said Jack. “We’ll have to give it up soon - but it’s nice whilst it’s warm enough.”
That week the weather became really horrid. Storms swept over the lake and the children thought it looked just like the sea, with its big waves curling over and breaking on the beach with a crash. The waves ran right up the beach and it was impossible to make a fire there. The children got soaked with rain, and had to dry their clothes as best they could by a fire they lighted outside the big cave. This was a good place for a fire, because the wind usually blew from the other direction and the fire was protected by the hill itself.
“I think we’ll have to give up Willow House now and go to live in the caves,” said Jack one morning, after a very wild night. The wind had slashed at the trees all night long, the rain had poured down, and, to the children’s dismay, a little rivulet of rain had actually come into Willow House from the back and had soaked the heather bed Peggy and Nora were lying on. The girls had had to get up in the middle of the night and go to the front room, where the boys slept. This was a squash, but the front room was dry.
The leaves were falling from the trees. Every tree and bush had flamed out into yellow, crimson, pink, brown, or orange. The island was a lovely sight to see when the sun came out for an hour or two, for then its rays lighted up all the brilliant leaves, and they shone like jewels. But now the leaves were falling.
Leaves were dropping down in Willow House from the branches that made the roof. It was funny to lie in bed at night and feel a leaf drop lightly on to your cheek. Willow House looked different now that there were so few green or yellow leaves growing on the roof and walls. It was bare and brown.
Nora caught a cold and began to sneeze. Jack said they must move to the caves at once, or they would all get cold - and if they were ill, what would happen? There was no doctor to make them well!
They dosed Nora with hot milk and wrapped her up in the two new blankets Jack had bought in the village one week when he had been marketing. They set her at the back of the outer cave, with a candle beside her, for it was dim in that corner. She soon got better, and was able to help the others when they made their plans for living in the cave.
“We’ll make this outer cave our living-room and bedroom!” Jack said, “and the inner one shall be our storeroom. We’ll always have a fire burning at the entrance, and that will warm us and cook our food. This is going to be rather fun! We shall be cave-people this winter!”
“You two boys must make a few shelves to put round the cave,” she said. “You can weave them out of stout twigs, and put them up somehow. We will keep our books and games there, and any odd things we want. You must somehow manage to hang the lantern from the middle of the roof. Then, in the corner over here we will have our beds of heather and bracken. You boys can bring that in, too. If it’s wet we’ll dry it by the fire. The bracken is getting old and dry now - it should make a fine bed.”
Peggy swept up the floor of the cave with a brush made of heather twigs, and then she and Nora threw fine sand on it which they had brought from the beach. It looked very nice. The boys brought in the heather and bracken for the beds. Peggy arranged them comfortably, and then threw a blanket over each bed but one. There were only three blankets - two new ones and one old one - so it looked as if someone must go without.