31

over the sea of adventure

‘it’s no good,’ said bill, in a low voice. ‘i must stand up. i don’t want them to machine-gun theboat.’

he stood up and waved, then put both hands up to show that he surrendered. a boat put off fromthe seaplane and came rapidly towards bill’s boat. in it were three men, one of them holding arevolver in his hand.

the children waited, panic-stricken, fearing to hear a shot at bill. they had none of them raisedtheir heads, but they could picture all too plainly what was happening.

the boat came near – and then there came a loud cry of amazement from it.

‘bill! by all that’s wonderful, it’s bill! why on earth didn’t you welcome us, instead ofmaking us think you were part of the gang!’

‘good heavens! it’s you, joe!’ yelled bill, and the relief in his voice brought all the children totheir feet at once. ‘look here, kids – it’s joe – my colleague. hey, joe, you got my message then,all right?’

the boat came alongside with a gentle bump. joe put away his revolver, grinning. ‘yes, i gotyour radio message all right – but i guess you didn’t get ours. we kept asking you questions, andall you did was to go on repeating the same old thing. so this seaplane was sent out and we werejust cruising along looking for the lagoon you told us about, when we spotted your boat here. sodown we came to investigate.’

‘thank goodness,’ said bill. ‘we’d run out of petrol. we were expecting the enemy to send aplane or a boat out after us at any moment!’

‘come along to the seaplane,’ said joe, who had bright blue eyes and a very wide grin. ‘will thekids mind flying?’

‘oh no. we’re used to it,’ said jack, and helped the girls into the boat where joe stood.

‘are we rescued?’ said lucy-ann, hardly believing it could be true, after all their alarms andfears.

‘you are,’ said joe, and grinned at her. ‘sent one of our biggest seaplanes after you, to take youhome! have to do that for bill here, you know. he’s a v.i.p.’

‘what’s that?’ asked lucy-ann, as they sped towards the seaplane.

‘very important person, of course,’ said joe. ‘didn’t you know he was?’

‘yes,’ said lucy-ann, beaming. ‘oh yes. i always knew he was.’

‘we’ve left huffin and puffin behind,’ suddenly wailed dinah.

‘good heavens! was there somebody else in your boat then?’ said joe in alarm. ‘never sawthem!’

‘oh, they’re only puffins,’ said jack. ‘but awfully nice ones, quite tame. oh, there they are,flying after the boat.’

‘can we take them with us?’ begged lucy-ann. but bill shook his head.

‘no, lucy-ann. they’d be miserable away from their home here in the islands. soon they willnest again and lay an egg. then they will forget all about us.’

‘i shall never, never forget them,’ said lucy-ann. ‘they kept with us all the time!’

‘here we are,’ said joe, as they came to the enormous seaplane. they were helped into it, andthen the plane took off smoothly and sweetly, circling into the air like a broad-winged gull.

horace’s boat was left bobbing alone, waiting for one of the police boats to collect it.

‘what about that lagoon?’ said joe suddenly. ‘i’d like to spot it, and plot it on our maps. i thinkwe can find it. will these kids know it if they see it?’

‘oh yes,’ said jack. ‘you can’t mistake it. it’s a most extraordinary sea-lake, and much bluerthan the sea. i shouldn’t be surprised if you can see some of the packages under the water, if yougo down low. the water’s so clear there.’

the seaplane roared through the sky. the children were thrilled. down below was the blue sea,looking smooth and still. then, as they looked, they saw little islands coming into view. whathosts of them there were!

then jack caught sight of the lagoon. ‘there it is, there it is!’ he shouted. ‘look down there!

you can’t mistake it, lying between those two islands, shut in by a reef of rocks all the wayround.’

the seaplane circled round the surprising lagoon. it dropped lower. the children watched to seeif they could make out any of the underwater packages – and sure enough, through the clear waterglimmered the silvery-grey wrapping that covered the hidden guns.

‘that’s where the guns are,’ said philip. ‘look, bill – you can see the waterproof wrappings!

they had already begun to lift the packages from the water and load them on to seaplanes. wewatched them loading one.’

bill and joe exchanged glances. ‘we’ve got some pretty good witnesses then,’ said joe. ‘goodbunch of kids, this, bill. are they the ones you’ve gone adventuring with before?’

‘they are,’ said bill. ‘you can’t keep them out of adventures, you know. and they will drag meinto them too!’

they left the lagoon with its sinister secret behind them and flew over the island where bill hadbeen a prisoner. ‘there’s the little jetty,’ said jack, as they flew low. ‘and look, there are twomotor-boats there now! i say, bill – what about horace?’

‘horace will be rescued when we clean up these scoundrels,’ said bill. ‘they’re the men whomake fortunes when one country goes to war with another, or when civil war is fought – becausethey get the guns and sell them to each side. we try to stop it by all kinds of international treaties –but these men are against the law, and scorn it. that’s where i come in – to stop them!’

‘how will you stop them now?’ asked jack. ‘will you raid the island – and capture the men?

and destroy all the hidden guns? suppose they escape by motor-boat or plane?’

‘don’t you worry about that,’ said joe, with his wide grin stretching across his brown face.

‘we’ve got messages through already. there’ll be a fleet of our seaplanes up here in a few hours –and armed boats patrolling all round. there’s no hope for any of the gang now.’

except for the little jetty, which would hardly have been noticed if the children and bill hadn’tknown it was there, there was nothing to see on the enemy’s island at all.

‘everything well camouflaged,’ said bill. a clever lot, and i’ve been after them for a long time.

they sent me off on all kinds of false trails and i’d almost given up hope of finding their lair. butthere it is.’

‘they must have been surprised to see you up here, bill!’ said lucy-ann, as the seaplane leftthe enemy’s island behind.

‘oh, look – there’s the island where we landed with bill!’ cried dinah. ‘puffin island! do look!

there’s the bird-cliff – and you can just see the little narrow channel going into the cliff – only youhave to look hard to see it. and there’s where we had our signal fire.’

‘and there’s where we had our tents that blew away in the storm – by those few trees,’ saidjack. and look, there’s the puffin colony!’

the seaplane flew down as low as it dared. it flew low enough for the children to see a movingmass of birds, scared of the enormous noise made by the seaplane’s powerful engines.

‘i can see huffin and puffin!’ cried lucy-ann. the others roared with laughter.

‘you can’t, you fibber!’ said dinah.

‘no, i can’t really. i’m pretending to,’ said lucy-ann. ‘i want them to be there always. i wantthem to have their own burrow, and a nest – and an egg! i want them to have a lovely baby puffinthat would be tame too. goodbye, dear huffin and puffin! we did so love having you for pets.’

‘arrrrrrrr!’ suddenly said kiki, for all the world as if she understood what lucy-ann wassaying.

‘kiki’s saying “goodbye” in puffin language,’ said lucy-ann. ‘arrrrr, huffin and puffin! i’msaying goodbye too.’

and from the scared puffin colony rose a medley of deep guttural arrrrrrrs as the birds settleddown once more. those that had run down burrows popped up again and added their arrrrr to thechorus.

‘what a lot we shall have to tell mother,’ said philip. ‘i wonder how she is?’

joe smiled at him. ‘getting on fine, except for worrying about you four,’ he said. ‘she’ll feelbetter still when she gets our radio message.’

‘oh, have you sent one already?’ asked dinah. ‘oh, good! now she’ll know we’re all right.

goodness – won’t it be strange to go back to school after all this?’

school! sitting at a desk, learning french grammar, getting into rows for leaving tennis racquetsabout, playing silly tricks, having music lessons, going to bed at the proper time – how very, verystrange it would all seem!

only lucy-ann thought of it with real pleasure. ‘it’ll be so nice to wake up in the mornings andknow there’s only lessons and tennis and things to worry about,’ she said to bill. ‘instead ofwondering if the enemy is coming, and seeing planes parachuting guns down into lagoons, andrushing about in motor-boats, and . . .’

‘conking poor horace on the head,’ said bill, grinning.

‘well, we didn’t do that, whatever he said to you,’ said lucy-ann. and if ever i see him againi’m going to tell him i’m sorry we made such an awful mistake – but that honestly he deserves agood old – a good old . . .’

‘conk,’ said philip, chuckling.

‘well, conk if you like,’ said lucy-ann. ‘a good old conk for telling such awful stories.’

the seaplane was flying south now. it had left behind all the exciting little islands, and all themillions of noisy sea-birds. the sun was now almost gone and the sea was shadowed a deep blue.

in a few minutes the first stars would prick through the evening sky, as bright as diamonds.

‘we’ll be over the mainland soon,’ said bill. ‘thank goodness it’s all ended up well! i thoughtit was the finish of everything when this seaplane landed beside us and hailed us. anotheradventure to talk over when we see each other in the holidays. what a lot we’ve had together!’

‘i think i’ve liked this one the best,’ said jack thoughtfully, and he scratched what was left ofkiki’s crest. all those islands – and this lonely sea, with its blues and greens and greys.’

‘the sea of adventure,’ said lucy-ann, looking down at its vast expanse of dark blue, touchedhere and there with the golden reflection of the sky. ‘goodbye, sea of adventure! you’re a lovelyplace – but much too exciting for me!’