Читать книгу Five Fall into Adventure - Enid blyton - Страница 6

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The four children waited at the open front door, listening to Timmy’s angry, excited barking. Anne was trembling, and Julian put his arm round her comfortingly.

‘What was this dreadful face like?’ he asked her. Anne shivered in his arm.

‘I didn’t see very much,’ she said. ‘You see, I just switched on my torch, and the beam was directed on the window nearby—and it lighted up the face for a second. It had nasty gleaming eyes, and it looked very dark—perhaps it was a black man’s face! Oh, I was frightened!’

‘Then did it disappear?’ asked Julian.

‘I don’t know,’ said Anne. ‘I was so frightened that I dropped my torch and the light went out. Then George woke up and rushed to the window.’

‘Where on earth was Timmy?’ said Dick, feeling suddenly surprised that Timmy hadn’t awakened them all by barking. Surely he must have heard the owner of the face climbing up to the window?

‘I don’t know. He came rushing into the bedroom when I screamed,’ said Anne. ‘Perhaps he had heard a noise and had gone down to see what it was.’

‘That’s about it,’ said Julian. ‘Never mind, Anne. It was a tramp, I expect. He found all the doors and windows downstairs fastened—and shinned up the ivy to see if he could enter by way of a bedroom. Timmy will get him, that’s certain.’

But Timmy didn’t get him. He came back after a time, with his tail down, and a puzzled look in his eyes. ‘Couldn’t you find him, Timmy?’ asked George, anxiously.

‘Woof,’ said Timmy, mournfully, his tail still down. George felt him. He was wet through.

‘Goodness! Where have you been to get so wet?’ she said, in surprise. ‘Feel him, Dick.’

Dick felt him, and so did the others. ‘He’s been in the sea,’ said Julian. ‘That’s why he’s wet. I guess the burglar, or whatever he was, must have sprinted down to the beach, when he knew Timmy was after him—and jumped into a boat! It was his only chance of getting away.’

‘And Timmy must have swum after him till he couldn’t keep up any more,’ said George. ‘Poor old Tim. So you lost him, did you?’

Timmy wagged his tail a little. He looked very downhearted indeed. To think he had heard noises and thought it was a rat—and now, whoever it was had got away from him. Timmy felt ashamed.

Julian shut and bolted the front door. He put up the chain, too. ‘I don’t think the Face will come back again in a hurry,’ he said. ‘Now he knows there’s a big dog here he’ll keep away. I don’t think we need worry any more.’

They all went back to bed again. Julian didn’t go to sleep for some time. Although he had told the others not to worry, he felt worried himself. He was sorry that Anne had been frightened, and somehow the boldness of the burglar in climbing up to a bedroom worried him, too. He must have been determined to get in somehow.

Joan, the cook, slept through all the disturbance. Julian wouldn’t wake her. ‘No,’ he said, ‘don’t tell her anything about it. She’d want to send telegrams to Uncle Quentin or something.’

So Joan knew nothing about the night’s happenings, and they heard her cheerfully humming in the kitchen the next morning as she cooked bacon and eggs and tomatoes for their breakfast.

Anne was rather ashamed of herself when she woke up and remembered the fuss she had made. The Face was rather dim in her memory now. She half wondered if she had dreamed it all. She asked Julian if he thought she might have had a bad dream.

‘Quite likely,’ said Julian, cheerfully, very glad that Anne should think this. ‘More than likely! I wouldn’t worry about it any more, if I were you.’

He didn’t tell Anne that he had examined the thickly-growing ivy outside the window, and had found clear traces of the night-climber. Part of the sturdy clinging ivy-stem had come away from the wall, and beneath the window were strewn broken-off ivy leaves. Julian showed them to Dick.

‘There was somebody,’ he said. ‘What a nerve he had, climbing right up to the window like that. A real cat-burglar!’

There were no footprints to be seen anywhere in the garden. Julian didn’t expect to find any, for the ground was dry and hard.

The day was very fine and warm again. ‘I vote we do what we did yesterday—go off to the beach and bathe,’ said Dick. ‘We might take a picnic lunch if Joan will give us one.’

‘I’ll help her to make it up for us,’ said Anne, and she and George went off to beg for sandwiches and buns. Soon they were busy wrapping up a colossal lunch.

‘Do for twelve, I should think!’ said Joan, with a laugh. ‘Here’s a bottle of home-made lemonade, too. You can take as many ripe plums as you like as well. I shan’t prepare any supper for you tonight—you’ll not need it after all this lunch.’

George and Anne looked at her in alarm. No supper! Then they caught the twinkle in her eye and laughed.

‘We’ll make all the beds and do our rooms before we go,’ said Anne. ‘And is there anything you want from the village?’

‘No, not today. You hurry up with your jobs and get along to the beach,’ said Joan. ‘I’ll be quite glad of a peaceful day to myself. I shall turn out the larder and the hall cupboards and the scullery, and enjoy myself in peace!’

Anne seemed quite to have forgotten her fright of the night before as they went down to the beach that day, chattering and laughing together. Even if she had thought about it, something soon happened that swept everything else from her mind.

The little ragamuffin girl was down on the beach again! She was alone. Her dreadful old father, or whatever he was, was not there.

George saw the girl first and scowled. Julian saw the scowl and then the girl, and made up his mind at once. He led the others firmly to where rocks jutted up from the beach, surrounded by limpid rock-pools.

‘We’ll be here today,’ he said. ‘It’s so hot we’ll be glad of the shade from the rocks. What about just here?’

‘It’s all right,’ said George, half sulky and half amused at Julian for being so firm about things. ‘Don’t worry. I’m not having anything more to do with that smelly girl.’

‘I’m glad to hear it,’ said Julian. They had now turned a corner, and were out of sight of the girl. Big rocks ran in an upwards direction behind them, and jutted up all around them. Julian sat down in a lovely little corner, with rocks protecting them from the sun and the wind.

‘Let’s have a read before we bathe,’ said Dick. ‘I’ve got a mystery story here. I simply MUST find out who the thief is.’

He settled himself comfortably. Anne went to look for sea anemones in the pool. She liked the petal-like creatures that looked so like plants and weren’t. She liked feeding them with bits of biscuit, seeing their ‘petals’ close over the fragment and draw them quickly inside.

George lay back and stroked Timmy. Julian began to sketch the rocks around, and the little pools. It was all very peaceful indeed.

Suddenly something landed on George’s middle and made her jump. She sat up, and so did Timmy.

‘What was that?’ said George indignantly. ‘Did you throw something at me, Dick?’

‘No,’ said Dick, his eyes glued to his book.

Something else hit George on the back of the neck, and she put her hand up with an exclamation. ‘What’s happening? Who’s throwing things?’

She looked to see what had hit her. Lying on the sand was a small roundish thing. George picked it up. ‘Why—it’s a damson stone,’ she said. And ‘Ping’! Another one hit her on the shoulder. She leapt up in a rage.

She could see nobody at all. She waited for another damson stone to appear, but none did.

‘I just wish I could draw your face, George,’ said Julian, with a grin. ‘I never saw such a frown in my life. Ooch!’

The ‘ooch!’ was nothing to do with George’s frown; it was caused by another damson stone that caught Julian neatly behind the ear. He leapt to his feet too. A helpless giggle came from behind a rock some way behind and above them. George was up on the ledge in a second.

Behind one of the rocks sat the ragamuffin girl. Her pockets were full of damsons, some of them spilling out as she rolled on the rocks, laughing. She sat up when she saw George, and grinned.

‘What do you mean, throwing those stones at us?’ demanded George.

‘I wasn’t throwing them,’ said the girl.

‘Don’t tell lies,’ said George scornfully. ‘You know you were.’

‘I wasn’t. I was just spitting them,’ said the awful girl. ‘Watch!’ She slipped a stone into her mouth, took a deep breath and then spat out the stone. It flew straight at George and hit her sharply and squarely on the nose. George looked so extremely surprised that Dick and Julian roared with laughter.

‘Bet I can spit stones farther than any of you,’ said the ragamuffin. ‘Have some of my damsons and see.’

‘Right!’ said Dick promptly. ‘If you win I’ll buy you an ice-cream. If I do, you can clear off from here and not bother us any more. See?’

‘Yes,’ said the girl, and her eyes gleamed and danced. ‘But I shall win!’