‘I say!’ said Julian, in horror. ‘I say! What do you think’s happened?’
‘What?’ asked everyone, in panic.
‘The hole is closed!’ said Julian. ‘We can’t get out! Somebody’s been along and put those planks across and I bet they’ve put the caravan over them, too. We can’t get out!’
Everyone stared up at the closed entrance in dismay. They were prisoners.
‘Whatever are we to do?’ said George. ‘Julian what are we going to do?’
CHAPTER NINETEEN
PRISONERS UNDERGROUND
Julian didn’t answer. He was angry with himself for not thinking that this might happen! Although Lou and Dan had been seen getting on the bus with bags, they might easily not have been spending the night away the bags might contain things they wanted to sell stolen goods of some kind.
‘They came back quickly and came up the hill, I suppose, to have another try at getting Nobby and Pongo back,’ said Julian, out loud. ‘What an idiot I am to leave things to chance like that. Well I’ll have a try at shifting these planks. I should be able to, with luck.’
He did his best, and did shift them to a certain extent but, as he feared, the caravan had been run back over the hole, and even if he managed to shift some of the planks it was impossible to make a way out.
‘Perhaps Pongo can help,’ he said suddenly. He shouted loudly: ‘Pongo! Pongo! Come and help!’
Everyone stood still, hoping that they would hear Pongo chattering somewhere near, or scraping at the planks above. But there was no sign or sound of Pongo.
Everyone called, but it was no use. Pongo didn’t come. What had happened to him? Poor Nobby felt very worried.
‘I wish I knew what has happened,’ he kept saying. ‘I feel as if something horrid has happened to poor old Pongo. Where can he be?’
Pongo was not very far away. He was lying on his side, his head bleeding. He was quite unconscious, and could not hear the frantic calls of the children at all. Poor Pongo!
What Julian had feared had actually happened. Lou and Dan had come back up the hill, bringing money with them to tempt Nobby and Pongo back. When they had got near to the hollow, they had stood still and called loudly.
‘Nobby! Nobby! We’ve come to make friends, not to hurt you! We’ve got money for you. Be a sensible boy and come back to the camp. Mr Gorgio is asking for you.’
When there had been no reply at all, the men had gone nearer. Then they had seen Pongo and had stopped. The chimpanzee could not get at them because he was tied up. He sat there snarling.
‘Where have those kids gone?’ asked Lou. Then he saw that the caravan had been moved back a little, and he at once guessed.
‘They’ve found the way underground! The interfering little brutes! See, they’ve moved one of the caravans off the hole. What do we do now!’
‘This first,’ said Tiger Dan, in a brutal voice, and he picked up an enormous stone. He threw it with all his force at poor Pongo, who tried to leap out of the way. But the rope prevented him, and the stone hit him full on the head.
He gave a loud scream and fell down at once, lying quite still.
‘You’ve gone and killed him,’ said Lou.
‘So much the better!’ said Tiger Dan. ‘Now let’s go and see if the entrance-hole is open. Those kids want their necks wringing!’
They went to the hollow and saw at once that the hole had been discovered, opened, and that the children must have gone down it.
‘They’re down there now,’ said Tiger Dan, almost choking with rage. ‘Shall we go down and deal with them and get our stuff and clear off? We meant to clear off tomorrow, anyway. We might as well get the stuff out now.’
‘What in the daylight with any of the farm men about to see us!’ said Lou with a sneer. ‘Clever, aren’t you?’
‘Well, have you got a better idea?’ asked Tiger Dan.
‘Why not follow our plan?’ said Lou. ‘Go down when it’s dark and collect the stuff. We can bring our wagon up as we planned to do tonight. We don’t need to bother about forcing the children to go now they’re underground and we can make them prisoners till we’re ready to clear off!’
‘I see,’ said Dan, and he grinned suddenly, showing his ugly teeth. ‘Yes we’ll close up the hole and run the caravan back over it and come up tonight in the dark with the wagon go down collect everything and shut up the hole again with the children in it. We’ll send a card to Gorgio when we’re safe and tell him to go up and set the kids free.’
‘Why bother to do that?’ said Lou, in a cruel voice. ‘Let ‘em starve underground, the interfering little beasts. Serve ‘em right.’
‘Can’t do that,’ said Dan. ‘Have the police after us worse than ever. We’ll have to chuck some food down the hole, to keep them going till they’re set free. No good starving them, Lou. There’d be an awful outcry if we do anything like that.’
The two men carefully put back the boards over the top of the hole and replaced the heather tufts. Then they ran the caravan back over the place. They looked at Pongo. The chimpanzee was still lying on his side, and the men could see what a nasty wound he had on his head.
‘He ain’t dead,’ said Lou, and gave him a kick. ‘He’ll come round all right. Better leave him here. He might come to himself if we carried him back to camp, and fight us. He can’t do us any harm tonight, tied up like that.’
They went away down the track. Not ten minutes afterwards the children came to the hole and found it blocked up! If only they hadn’t stopped to explore that tunnel a bit further, they would have been able to get out and set Timmy on the two men.
But it was too late now. The hole was well and truly closed. No one could get out. No one could find poor Pongo and bathe his head. They were real prisoners.
They didn’t like it at all. Anne began to cry, though she tried not to let the others see her. Nobby saw that she was upset, and put his arm round her.
‘Don’t cry, little Anne,’ he said. ‘We’ll be all right.’
‘It’s no good staying here,’ said Julian, at last. ‘We might as well go somewhere more comfortable, and sit down and talk and eat. I’m hungry.’
They all went back down the passage, up through the hole in the roof, and into the enormous cavern. They found a sandy corner and sat down. Julian handed Anne the kitbag and she undid it to get the food inside.
‘Better only have one torch going,’ said Julian. ‘We don’t know how long we’ll be here. We don’t want to be left in the dark!’
Everybody immediately switched off their torches. The idea of being lost in the dark inside the hill wasn’t at all nice! Anne handed out slices of bread and butter, and the children put thin slices of Mrs Mackie’s delicious ham on them.
They felt distinctly better when they had all eaten a good meal. That was jolly good,’ said Dick. ‘No, we won’t eat that chocolate, Anne. We may want it later on. Golly, I’m thirsty!’
‘So am I,’ said Nobby. ‘My tongue’s hanging out like old Timmy’s. Let’s go and get a drink.’
‘Well, there was a stream in that other cave beyond the tunnel, wasn’t there?’ said Dick. ‘We can drink from that. It’ll be all right.’
‘Well, I hope it will,’ said Julian. ‘We were told not to drink water that wasn’t boiled while we were caravanning but we didn’t know this sort of thing was going to happen! We’ll go through the tunnel and get some water to drink from the stream.’
They made their way through the long, winding tunnel, and passed the shelf of stolen goods. Then on they went and came out into the cave through which the stream rushed so quickly. They dipped in their hands and drank thirstily. The water tasted lovely so clear and cold.
Timmy drank too. He was puzzled at this adventure, but so long as he was with George he was happy. If his mistress suddenly took it into her head to live underground like a worm, that was all right so long as Timmy was with her!
‘I wonder if this stream does go to that hole in the hillside, and pours out there,’ said Julian, suddenly. ‘If it does, and we could follow it, we might be able to squeeze out.’