Nobody said anything. “Oh dear,” thought Lucy-Ann, “just as we think things are all right, they turn out wrong again.”
After a while the engine stopped with a series of coughs and splutters. “No more petrol,” said Jack gloomily.
“Send for the doctor,” said Kiki.
“Wish we could,” said Philip.
“Arrrrrr!” said Huffin from the deck-rail. Both Huffin and Puffin were still with the little company. Lucy-Ann had begun to hope that they would travel right home with them. What excitement they would cause!
“This is really disgusting,” said Bill. “So near and yet so far!”
There was a dead silence, and only the plish-plash of the sea against the sides of the boat could be heard. Philip’s rats, surprised at the quiet, ran out of their various hiding-places in his clothes, and sniffed the air. Bill hadn’t seen them since he had been captured from Puffin Island, and he stared in surprise.
“My word — how they’ve grown! Well, well, who knows, we may have to eat them in the end!”
He meant this as a joke, but both Lucy-Ann and Dinah took it seriously, and squealed in horror.
“Ugh! Bill! How could you say such a horrible thing! Eat a rat! I’d rather die!” said Dinah.
“Shall we row, just for something to do?” said Jack. “Or have a meal? Or what?”
“Oh, have a meal,” said Philip. Then a thought struck him. “I say, Bill — I suppose we oughtn’t to start rationing ourselves, ought we? I mean — do you think we may be marooned out here on this lonely sea for days on end?”
“No,” said Bill, who privately thought that before the day was up they would all be back on the island in the hands of the enemy, now that their plane had spotted them. “No. We really don’t need to think of things like that at moment. All the same — I wouldn’t have headed out for the open sea as we have done, if I’d thought the petrol was going to give out — I’d have kept near the islands.”
It was a boring and anxious day. The four children were still very tired, but refused to try and sleep. No motor-boat appeared in chase of them. The sun began to sink in the west, and it looked as if the little company was going to spend a night out on the open sea.
“Well, thank goodness it isn’t cold, anyway,” said Dinah. “Even the wind is warm tonight. Don’t we seem a long long way from home — and from school — and from all the ordinary things we know?”
Lucy-Ann gazed round her at the vast open sea, green near the boat, but a deep blue beyond. “Yes,” she said, “we’re far away from everywhere — lost on the Sea of Adventure.”
The sun slid down further still. Then, on the evening air, came a familiar sound — the throb-throb-throb of a powerful engine.
Everyone sat up straight at once. Motor-boat? Aeroplane? Seaplane? What was it?
“There it is!” cried Jack, making everyone jump. “Look, over there! Golly, what a big one! It’s a seaplane.”
“It must be the one we saw on the lagoon the other day,” said Dinah. “They’ve sent it after us. Oh, Bill — what can we do?”
“All lie down flat,” said Bill at once. “You’ve got to remember that if it’s the enemy they don’t know I’ve got children with me — they probably think there are three or four men in the boat — and they may shoot, as they did before. So lie down flat and don’t move. Don’t show your heads at all.”
Lucy-Ann’s knees began their familiar wobbly feeling. She lay down flat at once, glad that Bill had not suggested that the boys should squash on top of them again. Bill put his arm over her.
“Don’t you worry, Lucy-Ann,” he said. “You’ll be all right. They won’t hurt children.”
But Lucy-Ann didn’t want “them” to hurt Bill either, and she was very much afraid they would. With her pale face pressed into the rugs, she lay as still as a mouse.
The roar of the sea-plane came much nearer. It circled just overhead. Then its engine cut out and it landed not far off. Waves from it rippled under the boat and sent it up and down.
Nobody dared to look overboard and see the great seaplane. Bill was afraid of a bullet if he did.
Then a colossal voice came booming over the sea, the voice of a giant: “AHOY THERE! SHOW YOURSELVES!”
“Don’t move,” said Bill urgently. “Don’t move. Don’t be frightened, Lucy-Ann. They’re using a megaphone, that’s why the voice sounds so loud.”
The giant voice came again: “WE’VE GOT OUR GUNS ON YOU. ANY FUNNY BUSINESS AND YOU’LL BE BLOWN TO SMITHEREENS. SHOW YOURSELVES!”
Chapter 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 the boat.”
He stood up and waved, then put both hands up to show that he surrendered, A boat put off from the seaplane and come rapidly towards Bill’s boat. In it were three men, one of them holding a revolver in his hand.
The children waited, panic-stricken, fearing to hear a shot at Bill. They had none of them raised their 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 of making 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 to their 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 got your wireless message all right — but I guess you didn’t get ours. We kept asking you questions, and all you did was to go on repeating the same old thing. So this seaplane was sent out and we were just cruising along looking for the lagoon you told us about, when we spotted your boat here. So down we came to investigate.”
“Thank goodness,” said Bill. “We’d run out of petrol. We were expecting the enemy to send a plane 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 the kids 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 and fears.
“You are,” said Joe, and grinned at her. “Sent one of our biggest seaplanes after you, to take you home! 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 saw them!”
“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 will nest 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, and then 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 think we 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 bluer than the sea. I shouldn’t be surprised if you can see some of the packages under the water, if you go 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. What hosts 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 way round.”