“We’re off at last!” said Nora, in a little happy voice that sounded almost as if she were going to cry.
Nobody said anything more. The boat floated on and on, as Mike and Jack rowed strongly. Peggy baled out the water that came in through the leaks. She wondered what it would be like not to sleep in a proper bed. She wondered what it would be like to wake up under the blue sky - to have no one to make her do this, that, and the other. How happy she felt!
It was a long way to the island. The sun rose higher and higher. The adventurers felt hotter and hotter. At last Nora pointed excitedly in front.
“The secret island!” she cried. “The secret island.”
Mike and Jack stopped rowing for a moment and the boat floated on slowly by itself whilst the four gazed at the lonely little island, hidden so well on the heart of the lake. Their own island! It had no name. It was just the Secret Island!
Mike and Jack rowed on again. They came to the little sandy cove beneath the willow trees. Jack jumped out and pulled the boat in. The others jumped out too and gazed round.
“We’re really here, we’re really here, we’re really here!” squealed Nora, jumping up and down and round and round in delight. “We’ve escaped. We’ve come to live on this dear little hidden island.”
“Come on, Nora, give a hand,” ordered Jack. “We’ve a lot to do before night, you know.”
Nora ran to help. The boat had to be unloaded, and that was quite a job. All the things were put on the beach under the willow trees for the time being. By the time that was finished the children were hotter than ever and very hungry and thirsty.
“Oh, for a drink!” groaned Mike.
“Peggy, do you remember the way to the spring?” asked Jack. “You do? Well, just go and fill this kettle with water, will you? We’ll all have a drink and something to eat!”
Peggy ran off up the hill and down the other side to the spring. She filled the kettle and went back. The others had put out enamel mugs ready to drink from. Mike was busy looking out something to eat, too. He had put out a loaf of bread, some young carrots, which they all loved to nibble, a piece of cheese each, and a cake.
What a meal that was! How they laughed and giggled and chattered! Then they lay back in the sun and shut their eyes. They were tired with all their hard work. One by one they fell asleep.
Jack awoke first. He sat up. “Hey!” he said. “This won’t do! We’ve got to get our beds for the night and arrange a good sleeping-place! We’ve dozens of things to do! Come on, everyone, to work, to work!”
But who minded work when it was in such a pleasant place? Peggy and Nora washed up the mugs and dishes in the lake water and set them in the sun to dry. The boys put all the stores in a good place and covered them with the old mackintosh in case it should rain. To-morrow they would start to build their house.
“Now to get a sleeping-place and bedding,” said Jack. “Won’t it be fun to sleep for the first time on the Secret Island!”
“Well,” said Jack, “I think it would be best to sleep under some thick trees somewhere, then, if it rains tonight, we shall not get too wet. But I don’t think it will rain; the weather is quite settled.”
“There are two nice, big, thick oak trees just beyond the cove,” said Mike, pointing. “Shall we find a place there?”
“Yes,” said Jack. “Find a bramble bush or gorse bush near them to keep any wind off. Let’s go and see what we think.”
They all went to the two big oak trees. Their branches swung almost down to the ground in places. Below grew clumps of soft heather, springy as a mattress. To the north was a great growth of gorse, thick and prickly.
“This looks a fine place to sleep,” said Jack. “Look. Do you see this little place here, almost surrounded by gorse, and carpeted with heather? The girls could sleep here, and we could sleep just outside their cosy spot, to protect them. The oak trees would shelter us nicely overhead.”
“Oh, I do think this is fine; I do, I do!” cried Nora, thinking that their green, heathery bedroom was the nicest in the world. She lay down on the heather. “It is as soft as can be!” she said; “and oh! there is something making a most delicious smell. What is it?”
“It is a patch of wild thyme," said Jack. “Look, there is a bit in the middle of the heather. You will smell it when you go to sleep, Nora!”
“All the same, Jack, the heather won’t feel quiet so soft when we have lain on it a few hours,” said Mike. “We’d better get some armfuls of bracken too, hadn’t we?”
“Yes,” said Jack. “Come on up the hill. There is plenty of bracken there, and heaps of heather too. We will pick the bracken and put it in the sun to dry. The heather doesn’t need drying. Pick plenty, for the softer we lie the better we’ll sleep! Heyho for a starry night and a heathery bed!”
The four children gathered armfuls of bracken and put it out in the sun to wither and dry. The heather they carried back to their green bedroom under the oak tree. They spread it thickly there. It looked most deliciously soft! The thick gorse bushes kept off the breeze, and the oaks above waved their branches and whispered. What fun it all was!
“Well, there are our bedrooms ready,” said Jack. “Now, we’d better find a place to put our stores in. We won’t be too far from the water, because it’s so useful for washing ourselves and our dishes in.”
The children were hungry again. They got out the rest of the cakes, and finished up the bread, eating some peas with it, which they shelled as they ate.
“Are we going to have any supper?” asked Mike.
“We might have a cup of cocoa each and a piece of my cake,” said Jack. “We must be careful not to eat everything at once that we’ve brought, or we’ll go short! I’ll do some fishing to-morrow.”
“Shall we begin to build the house to-morrow?” asked Mike, who was longing to see how Jack meant to make their house.
“Yes,” said Jack. “Now you two girls wash up the mugs again, and Mike and I will find a good place for the stores.”
The girls went to the water and washed the things. The boys wandered up the beach - and, at the back of the sandy cove, they found just the very place they wanted!
There was a sandy bank there, with a few old willows growing on top of it, their branches drooping down. Rain had worn away the sandy soil from their roots, and underneath there was a sort of shallow cave, with roots running across it here and there.
“Look at that!” said Jack in delight. “Just the place we want for our stores! Nora, Peggy, come and look here!”
The girls came running. “Oh,” said Peggy, pleased, “we can use those big roots as shelves, and stand our tins and cups and dishes on them! Oh, it’s a proper little larder!”
“Well, you girls, get the stores from the cove and arrange them neatly here,” said Jack. “Mike and I will go and fill the kettle from the spring, and we’ll see if there isn’t a nearer spring, because it’s a long way up the hill and down the other side.”
“Can’t we come with you?” asked Peggy.
“No, you arrange everything,” said Jack. “It had better all be done as quickly as possible, because you never know when it’s going to turn wet. We don’t want our stores spoilt.”
Leaving Peggy and Nora to arrange the tins, baskets, and odds and ends neatly in the root-larder, the two boys went up the hill behind the cove. They separated to look for a spring, and Mike found one! It was a very tiny one, gushing out from under a small rock, and it ran down the hill like a little waterfall, getting lost in the heather and grass here and there. Its way could be seen by the rushes that sprang up beside its course.
“I expect it runs down into the lake,” said Mike. “It’s a very small spring, but we can use it to fill our kettle, and it won’t take us quite so long as going to the other spring. If we have to live in the caves during the winter, the other spring will be more useful then, for it will be quite near the cave.”
They filled the kettle. It was lovely up there on the hillside in the June sun. Bees hummed and butterflies flew all round. Birds sang, and two or three moorhens cried “Fulluck, fulluck!” from the water below.
“Let’s go to the top of the hill and see if we can spy anyone coming up or down the lake,” said Jack. So they went right up to the top, but not a sign of anyone could they see. The waters of the lake were calm and clear and blue. Not a boat was on it. The children might have been quite alone in the world.
They went down to the girls with the full kettle. Nora and Peggy proudly showed the boys how they had arranged the stores. They had used the big roots for shelves, and the bottom of the little cave they had used for odds and ends, such as Jack’s axe and knife, the hammer and nails, and so on.
“It’s a nice dry place,” said Peggy. “It’s just right for a larder, and it’s so nice and near the cove. Jack, where are we going to build our house?”
Jack took the girls and Mike to the west end of the cove, where there was a thicket of willows. He forced his way through them and showed the others a fine clear place right in the very middle of the trees.
“Here’s the very place,” he said. “No one would ever guess there was a house just here, if we built one! The willows grow so thickly that I don’t suppose anyone but ourselves would ever know they could be got through.”
They talked about their house until they were tired out. They made their way back to the little beach and Jack said they would each have a cup of cocoa, a piece of cake, and go to bed!
He and Mike soon made a fire. There were plenty of dry twigs about, and bigger bits of wood. It did look cheerful to see the flames dancing. Jack could not use his little magnifying glass to set light to the paper or twigs because the sun was not hot enough then. It was sinking down in the west. He used a match. He set the kettle on the fire to boil.
“It would be better to-morrow to swing the kettle over the flames on a tripod of sticks,” he said. “It will boil more quickly then.”
But nobody minded how slowly the kettle boiled.
They lay on their backs in the sand, looking up at the evening sky, listening to the crackle of the wood, and smelling a mixture of wood-smoke and honeysuckle. At last the kettle sent out a spurt of steam, and began to hiss. It was boiling.
Nora made the cocoa, and handed it round in mugs. “There’s no milk,” she said. “But there is some sugar.”
They munched their cake and drank their cocoa. Though it had no milk in it, it was the nicest they had ever tasted.
“I do like seeing the fire,” said Nora. “Oh, Jack, why are you stamping it out?”
“Well,” said Jack, “people may be looking for us to-night, you know, and a spire of smoke from this island would give our hiding-place away nicely! Come on, now, everyone to bed! We’ve hard work to do tomorrow!”
Peggy hurriedly rinsed out the mugs. Then all of them went to their green, heathery bedroom. The sun was gone. Twilight was stealing over the secret island.
“Our first night here!” said Mike, standing up and looking down on the quiet waters of the lake. “We are all alone, the four of us, without a roof over our heads even, but I’m so happy!”
“So am I!” said everyone. The girls went to their hidden green room in the gorse and lay down in their clothes. It seemed silly to undress when they were sleeping out of doors. Mike threw them the old ragged rug.
“Throw that over yourselves,” he said. “It may be cold to-night, sleeping out for the first time. You won’t be frightened, will you?”
“No,” said Peggy. “You two boys will be near, and, anyway, what is there to be frightened of?”
They lay down on the soft heather, and pulled the old rug over them. The springy heather was softer than the old hard bed the two girls had been used to at home. The little girls put their arms round one another and shut their eyes. They were fast asleep almost at once.
But the boys did not sleep so quickly. They lay on their heathery beds and listened to all the sounds of the night. They heard the little grunt of a hedgehog going by. They saw the flicker of bats overhead. They smelt the drifting scent of honeysuckle, and the delicious smell of wild thyme crushed under their bodies. A reed-warbler sang a beautiful little song in the reeds below, and then another answered.
“Is that a blackbird?” asked Mike.
“No, a reed-warbler,” said Jack. “They sing as beautifully as any bird that sings in the daytime! Listen, do you hear that owl?”
“Oooo-ooo-ooo-oooo!” came a long, quivering sound; “ooo-ooo-ooo-ooo!”
“He’s hunting for rats and voles,” said Jack. “I say, look at the stars, Mike?”
“Don’t they seem far away?” said Mike, looking up into the purple night sky, which was set with thousands of bright stars. “I say, Jack, it’s awfully nice of you to come away with us like this and share your secret island.”
“It isn’t nice of me at all,” said Jack. “I wanted to. I’m doing just exactly what I most want to do. I only hope we shan’t be found and taken back, but I’ll take jolly good care no one finds us! I’m laying my plans already!”
But Mike was not listening. His eyes shut, he forgot the owls and the stars; he fell asleep and dreamt of building a house with Jack, a lovely house.
Jack fell asleep, too. And soon the rabbits that lived under their gorse-bush came slyly out and peeped at the sleeping children in surprise. Who were they?
But, as the children did not move, the rabbits grew bold and went out to play just as usual. Even when one ran over Mike by mistake, the little boy did not know it. He was much too fast asleep!
“Mind how you do it,” said the thrush, “mind how you do it!”
Jack grinned. “I’ll mind how I do it all right!” he said to the singing thrush. "Hi, Mike! Wake up! The sun is quite high!”
Mike woke and sat up. At first he didn’t remember where he was. Then a broad smile came over his face. Of course - they were all on the secret island! How perfectly glorious!
“Peggy, Nora! Get up!” he cried. The girls awoke and sat up in a hurry. Wherever were they? What was this green bedroom - oh, of course, it was their heathery bedroom on the secret island!
Soon all four children were up and about. Jack made them take off their things and have a dip in the lake. It was simply lovely, but the water felt cold at first. When they had dried themselves on an old sack - for they had no towels - the children felt terribly hungry. But Jack had been busy. He had set his fishing-line, and, even as they bathed, he had seen the float jerk up and down. It was not long before Jack proudly laid four fine trout on the sand of the cove, and set about to make a fire to cook them.
Mike went to fill the kettle to make some tea. Peggy got some big potatoes out of the sack and put them almost in the fire to cook in their skins. Jack found the frying-pan in their storeroom and put a piece of margarine in it to fry the fish, which he knew exactly how to clean.
“I don’t know what we should do without you,” said Mike, as he watched Jack. “Goodness! How I shall enjoy my breakfast!”
They all did. The tea did not taste very nice without milk. “It’s a pity we can’t get milk,” said Jack. “We shall miss that, I’m afraid. Now, Peggy, wash up, and Nora, too. Put everything away - and we’ll start on our house!”
In great excitement everything was washed up and put away. Then Jack led the way through the thick willow-trees, and they came to the little clear place in the centre of them.
“Now, this is how I mean to build the house,” he said. “Do you see these little willow-trees here - one there - one there - two there - and two there. Well, I think you will find that if we climb up and bend down the top branches, they will meet each other nicely in the centre, and we can weave them into one another. That will make the beginning of a roof. With my axe I shall chop down some other young willow-trees, and use the trunk and thicker branches for walls. We can drive the trunks and branches into the ground between the six willow-trees we are using, and fill up any cracks with smaller branches woven across. Then, if we stuff every corner and crevice with bracken and heather, we shall have a fine big house, with a splendid roof, wind-proof and rain-proof. What do you think of that?”