Читать книгу Five On Kirrin Island Again - Enid blyton - Страница 5

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Next day was fine and warm. ‘We can go across to the island this morning,’ said Aunt Fanny. ‘We’ll take our own food, because I’m sure Uncle Quentin will have forgotten we’re coming.’

‘Has he a boat there?’ asked George. ‘Mother—he hasn’t taken my boat, has he?’

‘No, dear,’ said her mother. ‘He’s got another boat. I was afraid he would never be able to get it in and out of all those dangerous rocks round the island, but he got one of the fishermen to take him, and had his own boat towed behind, with all its stuff in.’

‘Who built the tower?’ asked Julian.

‘Oh, he made out the plans himself and some men were sent down from the Ministry of Research to put the tower up for him,’ said Aunt Fanny. ‘It was all rather hush-hush really. The people here were most curious about it, but they don’t know any more than I do! No local man helped in the building, but one or two fishermen were hired to take the material to the island, and to land the men and so on.’

‘It’s all very mysterious,’ said Julian. ‘Uncle Quentin leads rather an exciting life, really, doesn’t he? I wouldn’t mind being a scientist myself. I want to be something really worthwhile when I grow up—I’m not just going into somebody’s office. I’m going to be on my own.’

‘I think I shall be a doctor,’ said Dick.

‘I’m off to get my boat,’ said George, rather bored with this talk. She knew what she was going to do when she was grown-up—live on Kirrin Island with Timmy!

Aunt Fanny had got ready plenty of food to take across to the island. She was quite looking forward to the trip. She had not seen her husband for some days, and was anxious to know that he was all right.

They all went down to the beach, Julian carrying the bag of food. George was already there with her boat. James, a fisher-boy friend of George’s, was there too, ready to push the boat out for them.

He grinned at the children. He knew them all well. In the old days he had looked after Timmy for George when her father had said the dog must be given away. George had never forgotten James’s kindness to Timmy, and always went to see him every holiday.

‘Going off to the island?’ said James. ‘That’s a queer thing in the middle of it, isn’t it? Kind of lighthouse, it looks. Take my hand, Miss, and let me help you in.’

Anne took his hand and jumped into the boat. George was already there with Timmy. Soon they were all in. Julian and George took the oars. James gave them a shove and off they went on the calm, clear water. Anne could see every stone on the bottom!

Julian and George rowed strongly. They sent the boat along swiftly. George began to sing a rowing song and they all took it up. It was lovely to be on the sea in a boat again. Oh holidays, go slowly, don’t rush away too fast!

‘George,’ said her mother nervously, as they came near to Kirrin Island, ‘you will be careful of these awful rocks, won’t you? The water’s so clear today that I can see them all—and some of them are only just below the water.’

‘Oh Mother! You know I’ve rowed hundreds of times to Kirrin Island!’ laughed George. ‘I simply couldn’t go on a rock! I know them all, really I do. I could almost row blindfold to the island now.’

There was only one place to land on the island in safety. This was a little cove, a natural little harbour running up to a stretch of sand. It was sheltered by high rocks all round. George and Julian worked their way to the east side of the island, rounded a low wall of very sharp rocks, and there lay the cove, a smooth inlet of water running into the shore!

Anne had been looking at the island as the others rowed. There was the old ruined Kirrin Castle in the centre, just the same as ever. Its tumbledown towers were full of jackdaws as usual. Its old walls were gripped by ivy.

‘It’s a lovely place!’ said Anne, with a sigh. Then she gazed at the curious tower that now rose from the centre of the castle yard. It was not built of brick but some smooth, shiny material, that was fitted together in sections. Evidently the tower had been made in that way so that it might be brought to the island easily, and set up there quickly.

‘Isn’t it queer?’ said Dick. ‘Look at that little glass room at the top—like a look-out room! I wonder what it’s for?’

‘Can anyone climb up inside the tower?’ asked Dick, turning to Aunt Fanny.

‘Oh yes. There is a narrow spiral staircase inside,’ said his aunt. ‘That’s about all there is inside the tower itself. It’s the little room at the top that is important. It has got some extraordinary wiring there, essential to your uncle’s experiments. I don’t think he does anything with the tower—it just has to be there, doing something on its own, which has a certain effect on the experiments he is making.’

Anne couldn’t follow this. It sounded too complicated. ‘I should like to go up the tower,’ she said.

‘Well, perhaps your uncle will let you,’ said her aunt.

‘If he’s in a good temper,’ said George.

‘Now George—you’re not to say things like that,’ said her mother.

The boat ran into the little harbour, and grounded softly. There was another boat there already—Uncle Quentin’s.

George leapt out with Julian and they pulled it up a little further, so that the others could get out without wetting their feet. Out they all got, and Timmy ran up the beach in delight.

‘Now, Timmy!’ said George, warningly, and Timmy turned a despairing eye on his mistress. Surely she wasn’t going to stop him looking to see if there were any rabbits? Only just looking! What harm was there in that?

Ah—there was a rabbit! And another and another! They sat all about, looking at the little company coming up from the shore. They flicked their ears and twitched their noses, keeping quite still.

‘Oh, they’re as tame as ever!’ said Anne in delight. ‘Aunty Fanny, aren’t they lovely? Do look at the baby one over there. He’s washing his face!’

They stopped to look at the rabbits. They really were astonishingly tame. But then very few people came to Kirrin Island, and the rabbits multiplied in peace, running about where they liked, quite unafraid.

‘Oh, that one is ...’ began Dick, but then the picture was spoilt. Timmy, quite unable to do nothing but look, had suddenly lost his self-control and was bounding on the surprised rabbits. In a trice nothing could be seen but white bobtails flashing up and down as rabbit after rabbit rushed to its burrow.

‘Timmy!’ called George, crossly, and poor Timmy put his tail down, looking round at George miserably. ‘What!’ he seemed to say. ‘Not even a scamper after the rabbits? What a hard-hearted mistress!’

‘Where’s Uncle Quentin?’ asked Anne, as they walked to the great broken archway that was the entrance to the old castle. Behind it were the stone steps that led towards the centre. They were broken and irregular now. Aunt Fanny went across them carefully, afraid of stumbling, but the children, who were wearing rubber shoes, ran over them quickly.

They passed through an old ruined doorway into what looked like a great yard. Once there had been a stone-paved floor, but now most of it was covered by sand, and by close-growing weeds or grass.

The castle had had two towers. One was almost a complete ruin. The other was in better shape. Jackdaws circled round it, and flew above the children’s heads, crying ‘chack, chack, chack’.

‘I suppose your father lives in the little old room with the two slit-like windows,’ said Dick to George. ‘That’s the only place in the castle that would give him any shelter. Everywhere else is in ruins except that one room. Do you remember we once spent a night there?’

‘Yes,’ said George. ‘It was fun. I suppose that’s where Father lives. There’s nowhere else—unless he’s down in the dungeons!’

‘Oh, no one would live in the dungeons surely, unless they simply had to!’ said Julian. ‘They’re so dark and cold. Where is your father, George? I can’t see him anywhere.’

‘Mother, where would Father be?’ asked George. ‘Where’s his workshop—in that old room there?’ She pointed to the dark, stone-walled, stone-roofed room, which was really all that was left of the part in which people had long ago lived. It jutted out from what had once been the wall of the castle.

‘Well, really, I don’t exactly know,’ said her mother. ‘I suppose he works over there. He’s always met me down at the cove, and we’ve just sat on the sand and had a picnic and talked. He didn’t seem to want me to poke round much.’

‘Let’s call him,’ said Dick. So they shouted loudly.

‘Uncle QUEN-tin! Uncle QUEN-tin! Where are you?’

The jackdaws flew up in fright, and a few gulls, who had been sitting on part of the ruined wall, joined in the noise, crying ‘ee-oo, ee-oo, ee-oo’ over and over again. Every rabbit disappeared in a trice.

No Uncle Quentin appeared. They shouted again.

‘UNCLE QUENTIN! WHERE ARE YOU?’

‘What a noise!’ said Aunt Fanny, covering her ears. ‘I should think that Joanna must have heard that at home. Oh dear—where is your uncle? This is most annoying of him. I told him I’d bring you across today.’

‘Oh well—he must be somewhere about,’ said Julian, cheerfully. ‘If Mahomet won’t come to the mountain, then the mountain must go to Mahomet. I expect he’s deep in some book or other. We’ll hunt for him.’

‘We’ll look in that little dark room,’ said Anne. So they all went through the stone doorway, and found themselves in a little dark room, lit only by two slits of windows. At one end was a space, or recess, where a fireplace had once been, going back into the thick stone wall.

‘He’s not here,’ said Julian in surprise. ‘And what’s more—there’s nothing here at all! No food, no clothes, no books, no stores of any sort. This is not his workroom, nor even his store!’

‘Then he must be down in the dungeons,’ said Dick. ‘Perhaps it’s necessary to his work to be underground—and with water all round! Let’s go and find the entrance. We know where it is—not far from the old well in the middle of the yard.’

‘Yes. He must be down in the dungeons. Mustn’t he, Aunt Fanny?’ said Anne. ‘Are you coming down?’

‘Oh no,’ said her aunt. ‘I can’t bear those dungeons. I’ll sit out here in the sun, in this sheltered corner, and unpack the sandwiches. It’s almost lunch-time.’

‘Oh good,’ said everyone. They went towards the dungeon entrance. They expected to see the big flat stone that covered the entrance, standing upright, so that they might go down the steps underground.

But the stone was lying flat. Julian was just about to pull on the iron ring to lift it up when he noticed something peculiar.

‘Look,’ he said. ‘There are weeds growing round the edges of the stone. Nobody has lifted it for a long time. Uncle Quentin isn’t down in the dungeons!’

‘Then where is he?’ said Dick. ‘Wherever can he be?’