You’ll have to think of something, said Dinah. The boys walked up to the house, thinking hard.
We’d better slip down quietly and unlock the door when he’s having a rest, said Philip at last. He can’t keep banging at the door for ever. As soon as he stops for a bit of rest, I’ll quietly put the key in the lock and unlock the door. Then I’ll slip upstairs again. The next time he tries the door, it will open but he won’t know why.
Good! said the others, pleased. It seemed a very simple way of setting Jo-Jo free without his guessing that it had anything to do with them.
Philip took the key and went down into the cellar as quietly as he could. As soon as he got down there he heard Jo-Jo hammering on the door. The boy waited till he had stopped for breath, and then pushed the big key quietly into the lock. He heard Jo-Jo coughing, and turned the key at the same moment, and then withdrew it. The door was unlocked now Jo-Jo could come out when he wanted to. Philip shot across the cellar, ran up the steps, out into the kitchen, and joined the others.
He’ll be out in a minute, he panted. Let’s slip up on to the cliff, and as soon as we see Jo-Jo again, we’ll walk down to the house, pretending we are just back from a walk. That will puzzle him properly.
So they all ran up to the cliff, lay down on the top, and peeped over to see when Jo-Jo appeared. In low voices the boys told the girls all they had found on the Isle of Gloom.
The two girls listened in amazement. Deep holes in the earth a stream that was red a pile of food tins how very queer! No-one had expected anything like that. It was birds they had gone to see.
We simply must go back again and find out what those shafts lead down to, said Jack. We’ll find out, too, if there were once mines of some sort there. Perhaps your Uncle Jocelyn would know, Dinah.
Yes, he would, said Dinah. Golly, I wish we could get hold of that old map of the island he spoke about the one he couldn’t find. It might show us all kinds of interesting things, mightn’t it?
Kiki suddenly gave one of her express-train screeches, which meant she had sighted her enemy, Jo-Jo. The children saw him down below, looking all round, evidently for them. They scrambled to their feet and walked jauntily down the path to the house.
Jo-Jo saw them and came to meet them, fury in his black face. You locked me in, he said. I’ll tell Miss Polly of you. You ought to be whipped.
Locked you in! said Philip, putting a look of sheer amazement on his face. Where did we lock you in? Into your room?
Down in the cellar, said Jo-Jo, in a furious voice. Here’s Miss Polly. I’ll tell of you. Miss Polly, these children locked me into the cellar.
Don’t talk nonsense, said Aunt Polly. You know there is no lock on the cellar door. The children have been for a walk look at them just coming back to the house how can you say they locked you in? You must be mad.
They locked me in, said Jo-Jo sulkily, suddenly remembering that the inner cellar was his own secret place and that he had better not go into any details, or Aunt Polly would go down and discover the door he had so carefully hidden.
I didn’t lock him in, Aunt Polly, said Philip earnestly. I’ve been ever so far away all morning.
So have I, said Jack, quite truthfully. Aunt Polly believed them, and as she knew that the four children were always together, she imagined that the girls had been with them. So how could any of them have played a trick on Jo-Jo? And anyway, thought Aunt Polly, there was no lock on the door to the cellar, so what in the wide world did Jo-Jo mean? He really must be going off his head.
Go and do your work, Jo-Jo, she said sharply. You always seem to have your knife into the children, accusing them of this and that. Leave them alone. They’re good children.
Jo-Jo thought otherwise. He gave one of his famous scowls, made an angry noise, beautifully copied by Kiki, and returned to the kitchen.
Don’t take any notice of him, said Aunt Polly. He’s a bit crazy, I think, and very bad-tempered, but he’s quite harmless.
The children went back into the house, winking at one another. It was nice to have Aunt Polly on their side. All the same, Jo-Jo was piling up grievances against them. They must look out.
Funny, thought Jack. Aunt Polly says Jo-Jo is quite harmless and Bill Smugs says he’s a dangerous fellow. One of them is certainly wrong.
Chapter 18
OFF TO THE ISLAND AGAIN
What should be done next? Should they tell Bill Smugs of their adventure? Would he be angry because they had evaded their promise, without actually breaking it, and gone out to the island in someone else’s boat? The children decided that he might be very angry. He had great ideas of honour and promises and keeping one’s word.
Well, so have we, said Jack. I wouldn’t have broken my promise. I didn’t. I just found a way round it.
Well, you know what grown-ups are, said Dinah. They don’t think the same way as we do. I expect when we grow up, we shall think like them but let’s hope we remember what it was like to think in the way children do, and understand the boys and girls that are growing up when we’re men and women.
You’re talking like a grown-up already, said Philip in disgust. Stop it.
Don’t talk to me like that, flared Dinah. Just because I was talking a bit of sense.
Shut up, said Philip, and got a box on the ear from Dinah immediately. He gave her a slap that sounded like a pistol-shot and she yelled.
Beast! she said. You know boys shouldn’t hit girls.
I shouldn’t hit ordinary decent girls, like Lucy-Ann, said Philip. But you’re just too bad-tempered for words. You ought to know by now that if you box my ears you’ll get a jolly good slap. Serves you right.
Jack, tell him he’s a beast, said Dinah; but Jack, although he never did hit a girl, couldn’t help agreeing that Dinah deserved what she often got.
You should keep your hands to yourself, he said to her. You’re too quick at dishing out ear-boxes, and you ought to know by now that Philip won’t stand for it.
Clear out and get over your bad temper, said Philip, his ear stinging and going very red. Lucy-Ann looked distressed. She hated these quarrels between the brother and sister. Go on, clear out, said Philip. He put his hand into his pocket and pulled out a box in which he had kept an extraordinarily tame beetle for days. Dinah knew he meant to open the box and put the beetle close to her. She gave a scream and rushed out of the room.
Philip put the box back into his pocket, after letting the enormous beetle have a run on the table. Whenever he held out his finger the beetle ran to it in delight. It really was amazing the way all creatures liked Philip.
You oughtn’t to keep it in a box, said Lucy-Ann. I’m sure it hates it.
Well, watch then, said Philip, and put the box out on the table again. He opened it, took out the beetle, and put it at the other end of the big table. He put the box, with its lid a little way open, on to the middle of the table. The beetle, having explored the top of the table thoroughly, made its way to the box, examined it, and then climbed into it and settled down peacefully.
There you are! said Philip, shutting the box and putting it back into his pocket. It wouldn’t go deliberately back into its box if it hated it, would it?
Well it must be because it likes being with you, said Lucy-Ann. Most beetles would hate it.
Philip is a friend to everything, said Jack, with a grin. I believe he could train fleas and keep a circus of them.
I shouldn’t like that, said Lucy-Ann, looking disgusted. Oh dear, I wonder where Dinah has gone off to. I wish you wouldn’t quarrel like this. We were having such a nice talk about what to do next.
Dinah had left the room in a rage, her arm stinging from Philip’s slap. She wandered down the passage that led to her uncle’s room, thinking up horrid things to do to her brother. Suddenly her uncle’s study door opened and he peered out.