They were. They could see rocky beaches. The waves pounded on them. They looked for the town, and saw buildings coming down to the water’s edge. It seemed queer that there was no proper harbour. City ports always had a harbour.
The boat ran in gently, Andros looking out for rocks, and taking a course he seemed to know. He was making for a little channel that led inland.
The children fell silent as they neared the island. Their eyes were fixed on the city. It didn’t look right somehow. Something was the matter with it. It looked — well — dead, Lucy-Ann thought.
Jack remembered his binoculars and put them to his eyes. He gave an exclamation. “Gosh! Would you believe it!”
“What?” said everyone at once impatiently.
“It’s all ruins,” said Jack, and he lowered the glasses and looked at the others. “It’s a ruined city! I never thought of that!”
“I, Andros, told that,” said the sailor. “I tell you poor island, dead island. One farm, two farms, perhaps. City gone. Nobody there. All gone to other islands now.”
They nosed into the little channel. It was deep and calm. “You get out, and I wait?” enquired Andros. “Not see much. All dead and poor this island. Yes, Mister, sir. I take you better places.”
“We’ll get out, Andros,” said Bill. “Bring the rest of the food, Jack. We may as well explore now we’re here, and we’ll picnic in the old ruins. They will be quite interesting, I expect.”
Not knowing quite what to think, the children leapt off the boat on to a ledge. They climbed up some old worn steps, and came into what must have been the main street of the old city. It was overgrown now and difficult to walk in. There were ruins everywhere. Bill looked at a few of them closely.
“These are hundreds of years old,” he said. “I wonder what made the people leave Thamis and go elsewhere. I suppose the island couldn’t keep them in food. What a place!”
“It’s got such an old deserted feeling about it that I feel I’m living hundreds of years ago,” said Lucy-Ann. “I wish the city would come alive — be full of the long-ago people, walking and running here along the street, looking out of the old broken window-openings, going down to whatever harbour there was to see the ships!”
“Well, I hope the city doesn’t come alive,” said Dinah. “I’d be scared stiff. I don’t like it much as it is, either.”
It was built on a steep hill, and the old ruined buildings rose one above another, some just a wall or two, others a hollow shell and still others looking fairly habitable until the children peeped inside and saw the holes in the roof and the walls.
Almost at the top was an old ruined temple, one or two graceful arches still remaining. Its massive columns stood in a broken row, with one or two gulls perched on the jagged tops. Bill scraped aside some of the grass that grew on the floor of the temple, and pointed out old mosaic stones to the children.
“Bill, is there anything here at all that’s on the map?” asked Jack. Somehow it was all so different from what he had imagined that the idea of hidden treasure now seemed ridiculous. Bill got out the redrawn map.
“Look — this is where we came in with our boat, surely,” said Philip, pointing. “It says ‘CREEK’. Well, wouldn’t you call that channel a creek? And look — the entrance or beginning of the way to the treasure is somewhere near the creek.”
“Oh, Bill — let’s go back and explore along there!” said Dinah.
Bill laughed. “We’ve certainly got a bee in our bonnet about this! All right. Come on. It’ll be on the way to the boat, anyway.”
“Just let’s get to the top of the hill,” said Jack. “We could see over the rest of the island then. It’s not very large.”
“Right,” said Bill, and they climbed to the very top. They could see away over to the other side of the island, where the dark-blue sea was tipped with white horses. It was a bare rocky place, but here and there were green patches, and small buildings could be seen.
“The farms Andros spoke of, I suppose,” said Bill. “My word — he was certainly right when he called it poor and dead! It’s not quite my idea of a treasure island!”
They turned to go down the hill on which the ruined city was built. They made their way carefully. Half-way down Lucy-Ann stopped and listened. “I can hear something,” she said.
“So can I,” said Dinah. “It’s a bell ringing! Whatever can it be?”
Chapter 18
A FEW SURPRISES
IT seemed so very queer to hear a bell ringing in that dead and silent city that the little company felt really startled. The sound came nearer.
“Dong-dong-dong.” Kiki didn’t like it either and crouched against Jack’s cheek. Micky chattered quietly.
“Dong-dong-dong!”
“Something’s coming round that corner,” said Jack suddenly. And something did.
It was a donkey, a little grey donkey with a big bell hanging from his neck! With him was a small boy, an imp of a boy, riding astride, with panniers each side of the donkey, great baskets that were full of something covered in white cloths.
“Good gracious!” said Dinah, and she sat down on a big stone, most relieved to see that it was just a donkey-bell that had startled them all. “I don’t know what I thought was coming!”
“I suppose the boy’s from one of the farms,” said Bill, looking puzzled. “But why has he come here? There is nobody living here.”
Then an even more surprising thing happened. The boy caught sight of the five people watching him, and grinned a welcome. He leapt off the donkey, pointed to the pannier baskets and screamed out something that sounded like sheer gibberish, but which the children imagined must be the speech of Thamis. Then he brought the donkey right up to them, and began to throw back the cloths that covered whatever was in the panniers.
“It’s food,” said Bill, in amazement. “Bread — cheeses — meat. Gosh, he’s unpacking the lot.”
The boy unpacked everything, chattering all the time. He evidently couldn’t understand why nobody helped him, and addressed quite a few cutting remarks to the two boys, who, of course, couldn’t make head or tail of them.
“Here, boy,” said Bill. “What’s all this?”
He pointed to the pile of food. The boy sent out a stream of gibberish again, pointing to Bill, and then pointing to the food.
“Anyone would think he had brought all this for us,” said Bill, exasperated. “I can’t understand it at all.”
The boy mounted his donkey again. He held out his hand to Bill, palm upwards. That was plain enough. He wanted money!
“Well, well — it beats me,” said Bill, astounded. “A very fine welcome to Thamis, I must say — but most unexpected. We don’t want the food, sonny. WE DON’T WANT IT. TAKE IT BACK!”
No amount of shouting could make the boy understand. He got very angry, and tapped his palm smartly to make Bill understand he wanted money. In the end Bill tipped a handful of coins into his hand. He counted them carefully, nodded his head, grinned brilliantly, and then very rudely spat at Micky. Micky spat back, and Kiki growled like a dog.
The donkey backed away from Kiki and began to bray. “Eee-yore! Eee-eee-yore!”
Kiki was extremely startled, but she soon recovered, and produced a very good bray herself. The boy gave a yelp of surprise, kicked his donkey hard with both his bare heels, and galloped away round the corner, the donkey’s bell ringing hard. “Dong-dong-dong-dong-dong!”
Bill sat down and scratched his head. “Well, what do you make of that!” he said. “A present of some very fine country food, sent by somebody we don’t know, who can’t possibly have known we were here.”
“It’s a bit queer,” said Jack. “I wouldn’t mind one of those rolls.”
They all had one. They were very good. They sat and munched them, wondering about the boy. They couldn’t make head or tail of his appearance.
“What are we going to do with this food?” said Philip. “It won’t keep if it’s left out in the sun. It seems an awful waste of good food to leave it mouldering here.”
“It does,” said Bill. “Well — the only thing we can do is to carry it into a cool place somewhere — and hope that boy will come back!”
They picked up the food and went into a near-by building. There was a hole in the floor, shaded by a half-ruined wall. They packed all the food there, wondering what would happen to it.
“Now we’d better go down to the creek and see if we can find the entrance, or whatever it is, shown on the map,” said Bill. He pulled it out of his pocket and looked at it. The children looked too. “We shan’t find it, so don’t think it!” said Bill, who was now secretly of the opinion that there was nothing to be discovered in this poor, “dead” island.