"Zickery, dickery, lumby tum,Tip me the wink, and out I'll come,Leave my pagoda so glum, glum, glum,To drink green tea with my own Yum-Yum!"
"Zickery, dickery, lumby tum,Tip me the wink, and out I'll come,Leave my pagoda so glum, glum, glum,To drink green tea with my own Yum-Yum!"
"Zickery, dickery, lumby tum,Tip me the wink, and out I'll come,Leave my pagoda so glum, glum, glum,To drink green tea with my own Yum-Yum!"
Sochanted Evie Bennett on the following Monday, bursting intoVbroom with a face betokening news, and a manner suggestive of Bedlam.
"What's the matter, you lunatic? Look here, if you go on like a dancing dervish we shall have to provide you with a padded room! Mind the inkpot! Oh, I say, you'll have the black-board over! Hasn't anybody got a strait-waistcoat? Evie's gone sheer, stark, raving mad!"
"I've got news, my hearty! News! news! news!
'What will you take for my news?I know it will make you enthuse!There isn't a girl who'll refuse,Or offer to make an excuse.'
'What will you take for my news?I know it will make you enthuse!There isn't a girl who'll refuse,Or offer to make an excuse.'
'What will you take for my news?I know it will make you enthuse!There isn't a girl who'll refuse,Or offer to make an excuse.'
Ahem! A poor thing, but mine own. I'm waxing so poetical, I think I must be inspired."
"Or possessed! Sit down, you mad creature, and talk sense. What's your precious news?"
"Mrs. Trevellyan requests the pleasure of the companyof the young ladies of Miss Birks's seminary to drink tea with her on the occasion of the natal day of her nephew, Master Ronald Trevellyan," announced Evie, changing suddenly to a ceremonious eighteenth-century manner, and dropping a stiff curtsy.
"Ronnie's birthday!"
"Oh, what sport!"
"It's on Wednesday."
"Has she asked only us?"
"No, the whole school is to go, mistresses and all," returned Evie. "Mrs. Trevellyan wants to introduce Ronnie's new governess to us."
"There are sure to be games, and perhaps a competition with prizes," rejoiced Annie Pridwell; "and we always have delicious teas at the Castle. Gerda Thorwaldson, why don't you look pleased? You take it as quietly as if it were a parochial meeting. What a mum mouse you are!"
"Is it anything to get so excited over?" replied Gerda calmly.
"Of course it is! The Castle's the Castle, and Mrs. Trevellyan is—well, just Mrs. Trevellyan. There are the loveliest things there—foreign curiosities, and old pictures, and illuminated books, and we're allowed to look at them; and there's special preserved ginger from China, and boxes of real Eastern Turkish Delight. Oh, it's a fairy palace! You may thank your stars you're going!"
In spite of Annie's transports, Gerda did not look particularly delighted. She only smiled in a rather sickly fashion, and said nothing. The others, however,were much too occupied with their own pleasurable expectations to take any notice of her lack of enthusiasm. They had accepted her quiet ways as part of herself, and had set her down as a not very interesting addition to the Form, and thought her opinions—if indeed she possessed any—were of scant importance.
Gerda had made very little headway with her companions; her intense reserve seemed to set a barrier between them and herself, and after one or two efforts at being friendly the girls had given her up, and took no more trouble over her. "Gerda the Silent," "The Recluse," "The Oyster," were some of the names by which she was known, and she certainly justified every item of her reputation for reticence. If she did not talk much, she was, however, a good listener. Nothing in the merry chat of the schoolroom escaped her, and anybody who had been curious enough to watch her carefully might have noticed that often, when seemingly buried in a book, her eyes did not move over the page, and all her attention was given to the conversation that was going on in her vicinity.
Having received an invitation to Ronnie's birthday party, of course the burning subject of discussion was what to give him as a present. Miss Birks vetoed the idea of each girl making a separate offering, and suggested a general subscription list to buy one handsome article.
"It will be quite sufficient, and I am sure Mrs. Trevellyan would far rather have it so," she decreed.
"It's too bad, for I'd made up my mind to give him a box of soldiers," complained Annie, in private.
"And I'd a book in my eye," said Elyned.
"Perhaps Miss Birks is right," said Romola, "because, you see, some of us might give nicer presents than the others, and perhaps there'd be a little jealousy; and at any rate, comparisons are odious."
"Miss Birks has limited the subscriptions to a shilling each," commented Deirdre.
"Then let's take our list now. I'll write down our names, and you can tell me the amounts."
For such an object everyone was disposed to be liberal—everyone, that is to say, except Gerda Thorwaldson. When she was applied to, she flatly refused.
"Don't you want to join in the present to Ronnie?" gasped Romola, in utter amazement.
"Why should I?"
"Why, because we're going to tea at the Castle; and Ronnie is Ronnie, and Mrs. Trevellyan will be pleased too!"
"I don't know Mrs. Trevellyan."
"Well, you soon will. You'll be introduced to her on Wednesday. She always says something nice to new girls—asks them where their homes are, and if they've brothers and sisters, and how old they are—and if she finds out she knows their parents or their friends she's so interested. And she has such a good memory for faces! She actually recognized Irene Jordan, although she'd never seen her in her life before, because Irene is so like an aunt, a Miss Jordan who is a friend of Mrs. Trevellyan's."
Gerda had turned a dull crimson at these remarks. She kept her eyes fixed on the floor, and made no reply. What her inward thoughts might be, no one could fathom.
"Isn't your name to go down at all, then, on the list?" asked Romola, with considerable impatience.
"No, thanks!" replied Gerda briefly, turning awkwardly away.
Wednesday arrived, and perhaps even Ronnie hardly welcomed his birthday more than did his friends at the Dower House. His present—a toy circus—had arrived, and had been on exhibition in Miss Birks's study, and everybody had agreed that it was the very thing to please him. At three o'clock the girls went to change their school dresses for more festive attire, and were more than ordinarily particular in their choice of preparations.
"How slow you are, Gerda Thorwaldson!" said Deirdre, whose own immaculate toilet was complete. "You haven't put on your dress yet. Why don't you hurry?"
"You needn't think we'll wait for you," added Dulcie.
Instead of replying, Gerda calmly donned her dressing-gown, and, volunteering no explanation, went out of the room and shut the door behind her.
She walked downstairs to Miss Birks's study, and, tapping at the door, reported herself.
"May I, please, stay at home this afternoon?" she begged. "I'm afraid I don't feel up to going out to tea to-day."
"Not go to the Castle? My dear child, I hope you're not ill? Certainly stay at home, and lie down on your bed if your head aches. Nettie shall bring your tea upstairs. I'm sorry you'll miss so great a treat as a visit to Mrs. Trevellyan's."
Gerda made no comment; but as she was habitually sparing of speech, her silence did not strike Miss Birks as anything unusual. It was time to start, and the Principal had her nineteen other pupils to think about, so she dismissed the pseudo-invalid with a final injunction to rest.
Gerda did not return to her bedroom till she was perfectly sure that Deirdre and Dulcie had left it. She had no wish to run the gauntlet of their inevitable criticisms, or to be questioned too closely on the nature of her sudden indisposition. She loitered about the upper landing until from the end window she saw the whole school—girls, mistresses, and Principal—file down the drive and out through the gate in the direction of the Castle. Then, going to her dormitory, she rang the bell, and lay down on her bed.
"Would you mind bringing my cup of tea now, Nettie, please?" she asked, when the housemaid appeared. "And then I should like to be left perfectly quiet until the others come back."
"Of course I'll bring it, miss," said the sympathetic Nettie. "Nothing like a cup of tea for a headache. The kettle's on the boil, so you can have it at once. I won't be more than a minute or two fetching it"
Nettie was as prompt as her word. She returnedalmost directly with the tea, and arranged it temptingly on a little table by the bedside.
"Shut your eyes and try and go to sleep when you've drunk it," she recommended. "You'll perhaps wake up quite fresh. It is a pity you couldn't go with the other young ladies to the Castle. They were all so full of it—and Master Ronnie's birthday, too! I know how disappointed you must feel."
Gerda finished her tea far more rapidly than is usual for invalids with sick-headaches; then, instead of taking Nettie's advice and closing her eyes, she rose and put on her school dress, her coat, and her cap. She opened the door and listened—not a sound was to be heard. The servants must surely be having their own tea in the kitchen, and no one else was in the house. With extreme caution she crept along the passage and down the stairs. The side door was open, and as quietly as a shadow she passed out and dodged round the corner of the house. A few minutes later she was running, running at the very top of her speed across the warren in the direction of a certain rocky creek not far from St. Perran's well.
When the girls returned at half-past six, full of their afternoon's experiences, they found Gerda lying on her bed, with the blind drawn down. There was an almost feverish colour in her cheeks.
"We'd a ripping time!" Dulcie assured her. "A splendid 'Natural Objects' competition. I nearly got a prize, but I put 'snake-skin' down for one, and it was really a piece of the skin of a finnan-haddock.Emily Northwood won the first, with sixteen objects right out of twenty, and Hilda Marriott was second with fourteen. I might have known that specimen was fish scales.
"Ronnie was delighted with his circus," added Dulcie. "He gave us each a kiss all round. And Mrs. Trevellyan was so nice! She was sorry you couldn't come, and hoped she'd see you some other time. By the by, how's your headache?"
"Rather better. I think I'll get up now," murmured Gerda. "I haven't touched my Latin to-day."
"Plucky of you to come and do prep. If I had a headache, wouldn't I just make it an excuse to knock off Virgil!"
It was getting near to the end of February. The days were lengthening visibly, and the sun, which only a month ago had appeared every morning like a red ball over the hill behind the Castle, now rose, bright and shining, a long way to eastward. In spite of occasional spring storms, the weather was on the whole mild, and every day fresh flowers were pushing up in the school garden. The warren, attractive even in winter, was doubly delightful now primrose tufts were venturing to show among the last year's bracken, and the gorse was beginning to gleam golden in sheltered stretches. The girls were out every available moment of their spare time, rambling over the headland or haunting the sea-shore. For most of them the latter provided the greater entertainment.
They had discovered a new occupation, that of salvagingthe driftwood, and found it so enthralling that for the present it overtopped all other amusements. The high spring-tides and occasional storms washed up quantities of pieces of timber, and to rescue these from the edge of the waves, and carry them into a place of safety, became as keen a sport as fishing. Quite a little wood-stack was accumulating under the cliff, and the girls had designs of carrying it piece by piece to a point on the top of the headland, and there building a beacon of noble proportions to be fired on Empire Day amid suitable rejoicings.
It was exciting work to skip about at the water's edge, grasping at bits of old spars or shattered boards. The sea seemed to enjoy the fun, and would bob them near and snatch them away in tantalizing fashion, sometimes adding a wetting as a point to the joke. To secure a fine piece of wood without getting into the water was the triumph of skill, attended with considerable risk, not to life or limb, but to length of recreation, for Miss Birks had laid down an inviolable rule that anybody who got her feet wet at this occupation must immediately return to school, change shoes and stockings, and desist from further attempts on that day. One or two of the girls were lucky enough to possess india-rubber wading boots, with which they could venture to defy Father Ocean and rob him of some of the choicest of his spoils, but they were the highly-favoured few; the rank and file had to content themselves with the ordinary method of swift snatching with the aid of a hockey stick.
Two days after Ronnie's birthday party a strongwind and squall during the night had furnished material for more than usually good sport, and the whole school betook itself to the beach to try to reap a harvest. Laughing, joking, squealing, the girls pursued their quarry, enjoying the fun all the more for the accidents of the moment. Evie Bennett dropped her hockey stick, and nearly lost it altogether. Romola Harvey slipped and fell flat into a pool of water; and many other minor mishaps occurred to keep up the excitement until the catch of the year was secured, a large piece of timber which it took the united efforts of all arms to drag successfully up the beach. Deirdre and Dulcie at last, grown reckless ventured a risky experiment on their own account, with the result that a wave caught them neatly, and gave them the full benefit of sea-water treatment.
"Oh, you're done for. Go back at once!" commanded Jessie Macpherson, the head girl, whose office it was to see that the rule about changing shoes was duly observed.
"Sea-water doesn't hurt," protested the chums.
"Your feet are wet through, so back you trot this instant. Do you want me to report you?"
Very loath to leave the shore, Deirdre and Dulcie were nevertheless bound to obey, so they toiled regretfully up the steep path from the cove, casting a lingering eye on their companions, who were still hard at work.
"Where's Gerda?" asked Dulcie. "She's not down there, and now I think of it, I haven't seen her for the last half-hour or more. Did she get wet?"
"I really didn't notice. I suppose she must have, and been sent back. We shall probably find her in the garden."
The two stepped briskly over the warren, their shoes drying on their feet with a rapidity which made them disparage Miss Birks's excellent rule about changing.
"It's just her fuss—we should have taken no harm," said Deirdre. "I say, surely that's Ronnie's laugh. I'd know it anywhere. Where is the child?"
The girls were passing close to the high wall which separated the Castle grounds from the warren, and as it seemed more than probable that Ronnie was inside, playing in the garden, they managed with considerable effort, and the aid of some strong ivy, to climb to the top and peep over. Here a most unexpected sight met their gaze.
On the grass, under a tamarisk bush, sat Gerda with Ronnie on her knee. She had evidently made friends with the little fellow to a great extent, for he seemed very much at home with her, and the two were laughing and joking together in the most intimate fashion. It was such an absolutely new aspect of Gerda that Deirdre and Dulcie were dumb with amazement. When, at the Dower House, had she laughed so gaily, or talked in so animated and sprightly a fashion? No shy, reserved, taciturn recluse this; her eyes were shining, and her whole face was full of a bright expression, such as the others had never seen there before.
"Hallo, Gerda! What are you doing here?" called Deirdre, finding speech at last.
Gerda dropped Ronnie, and sprang to her feet with a sharp exclamation. No one could have looked more utterly and egregiously caught. She stood staring at the two faces on the top of the wall, and offered no explanation whatever. Ronnie, however, waved his hand merrily.
"We've been playing Zoo," he volunteered. "Gerda's been a lion, and gobbled me up, and she's been an elephant and given me rides, and we were both polar bears, and growled at each other. Listen how I can growl now—Ur-ur-ugh! Oh, and look what she's given me for my birthday! It comes from Germany," producing from his pocket a little compass. "Now if ever I get lost, I can always find my way home. See, I can show you which is north, and south, and east, and west."
"You'd better be going back, Gerda," remarked Dulcie grimly. "You know we're not allowed in the Castle grounds without a special invitation."
"I'll come through the side gate," replied Gerda, turning from Ronnie without even a good-bye. Deirdre and Dulcie dropped from the wall, and met their room-mate at the identical moment when she passed through the turnstile.
"Well, of all mean people you're the meanest!" observed Deirdre. "I call it sneaky to take such an advantage, and go to play with Ronnie by yourself. We'd do it if it were allowed, but it isn't."
"I wonder his governess wasn't with him," said Dulcie. "He's generally so very much looked after."
"And as for going inside the Castle garden, it wasmost fearful cheek," continued Deirdre. "We, who know Mrs. Trevellyan quite well, never think of doing such a thing."
"What I call meanest," put in Dulcie, "was to try and curry favour with Ronnie by giving him a birthday present on your own account. Miss Birks said there were to be no separate presents: we were all to join, so that there'd be no jealousy—and you wouldn't subscribe. Oh, you are a nasty, hole-and-corner, underhand sneak! Have you anything to say for yourself?"
But Gerda stumped resolutely along with her hands in her coat pockets, and answered never a word.
"D'youknow, Dulcie," remarked Deirdre, when the chums were alone, "the more I think about it, the more convinced I am there's something queer about Gerda Thorwaldson."
"So am I," returned Dulcie emphatically. "Something very queer indeed. I never liked her from the first: she always gives me the impression that she's listening and taking mental notes."
"For what?"
"Ah, that's the question! What?"
"I certainly think we ought to be on our guard, and to watch her carefully, only we mustn't on any account let her know what we're doing."
"Rather not!"
"She's no business to sneak away by herself when we're all salvaging on the beach. She knows perfectly well it's against rules."
"She doesn't seem to mind rules."
"Well, look here, we must keep an eye on her, and next time we see her decamping we'll just follow her, and watch where she goes. I don't like people with underhand ways."
"It doesn't suit us at the Dower House," agreed Dulcie.
Though the chums kept Gerda's movements under strict surveillance for several days, they could discover nothing at which to take exception. She did not attempt to absent herself, or in any way break rules; she asked no questions, and exhibited no curiosity on any subject. If possible, she was even more silent and self-contained than before. Rather baffled, the girls nevertheless did not relax their vigilance.
"She's foxing. We must wait and see what happens. Don't on any account let her humbug us," said Deirdre.
One afternoon a strong west wind blowing straight from the sea seemed to promise such a good haul at their engrossing occupation that the girls, who for a day or two had forsaken salvaging in favour of hockey practice, turned their steps one and all towards the beach. As they walked along across the warren they had a tolerably clear and uninterrupted view of the whole of the little peninsula, and were themselves very conspicuous objects to anyone who chanced to be walking on the shore. Deirdre's eyes were wandering from sea to sky, from distant rock to near primrose clumps, when, happening to glance in the direction of the cliff that overtopped St. Perran's well, she was perfectly sure that she saw a white handkerchief waved in the breeze. It was gone in an instant, and there was no sign of a human figure to account for the circumstance, but Deirdre was certain it was no illusion. She called Dulcie's attention to it, butDulcie had been looking the other way, and had seen nothing.
"Probably it was only a piece of paper blowing down the cliff," she objected. "How could it be anyone waving? Nobody's allowed on the warren."
"It might be Ronnie and Miss Herbert."
"Oh no! We could see them quite plainly if it were."
"Gerda, did you notice something white?"
"I don't see anything there," replied Gerda, surveying the distance with her usual inscrutable expression. "I think you must have been mistaken."
It seemed quite a small and trivial matter, and though Deirdre, for the mere sake of argument, stuck to her point all the way down to the beach, the others only laughed at her.
"You'll be saying it's a ghost next," declared Betty. "I think you're blessed with a very powerful imagination, Deirdre."
Arrived on the shore, the girls found their expectations fully justified. Several most interesting-looking pieces of driftwood were bobbing about just at the edge of the waves, and with a little clever management could probably be secured, and would make a valuable addition to the stack which was to furnish their beacon fire. Jessie Macpherson, who possessed a pair of wading boots, was soon in command, directing the others how to act so that none of the flotsam should be lost, and marshalling her band of eager volunteers with the skill of a coastguardsman.
"Wait for the next big wave! Have your hockeysticks ready! Doris and Francie and I will wade in and try to catch it, then, when the wave's going back, you must all make a rush and try to hold it. Not this wave! Wait for that huge one that's coming. Are you ready? Now! Now!"
The owners of the wading boots did their duty nobly. They caught at the floating piece of timber and held on to it grimly, while a line of girls followed the retreating wave, and, making a dash, seized the trophy, and rolled it into safety.
"Oh, it's a gorgeous big one—the largest we have!"
"That was neatly done!"
"We've robbed old Father Neptune this time!"
"It's a piece of luck!"
"Of flotsam, you mean!"
"Three cheers for the beacon!"
"Hip, hip, hip, hooray!"
"Hooray! Hooray!" echoed Dulcie, then she looked round, and suddenly touched Deirdre on the arm.
In the midst of the general excitement Gerda had vanished. Where had she gone? That was the question which the chums at once asked each other. It was impossible that in so short a space of time she could have scaled the steep path from the cove on to the top of the cliff. She must surely have run along the shore instead. To the east the great mass of crags formed an impassable barrier, but it was just practicable to round the headland to the west. Without a moment's delay they dashed off in that direction. They tore in hot haste over the wet sand, scrambled anyhow amongst the seaweed-covered rocks at thepoint, regardless of injury to clothing, and, valiantly leaping a narrow channel, turned the corner, and found themselves in a second cove, similar to the former, but larger and more inaccessible from the cliffs. They were rewarded for their promptitude, as the first sight that caught their eyes was Gerda, speeding along several hundred yards in front of them, as if she had some definite object in view.
"Shall I shout after her?" gasped Dulcie.
"Not for the world," returned Deirdre. "We mustn't let her know she's being followed."
"If she looks back, she'll see us."
"We'll hide behind this rock."
"She'll be round the next corner in a minute."
"So she will. Then, look here, we must wait till she's gone, and then climb up the cliff, and run along and peep over from the top."
"Whew! It'll be a climb."
"Never mind, we'll manage it. Let us take off our coats and carry them. I'm so hot."
Deirdre's precautions proved to be most necessary. Gerda turned at the far headland, and took a survey of the bay before she scrambled round the point. She did not see the two heads peeping at her from behind the big rock, and, apparently, was satisfied that she had eluded pursuit. No sooner had she disappeared than Deirdre and Dulcie hurried forth, and, choosing what looked like a sheep track as the best substitute for a path, began their steep and toilsome climb. Excitement and determination spurred them on, and they persevered in spite of grazed knees andscratched fingers. Over jagged pieces of rock, between brambles that seemed set with more than their due share of thorns, catching on to tufts of grass or projecting roots for support, up they scrambled somehow, till they gained the level of the warren above.
The course that followed was a neat little bit of scouting. Making a bee-line for the next cove, they then dropped on their hands and knees, and, crawling under cover of the gorse bushes to the verge of the cliff, peeped cautiously over. Gerda was just below them, standing at the edge of the waves and looking out to sea. This creek was a much smaller and narrower one than the others, and the rocks were too precipitous to offer foothold even to the most venturesome climber.
Well concealed beneath a thick bush that overhung the brow of the crag, Deirdre and Dulcie had an excellent view of their schoolmate's movements without fear of betraying their presence. Gerda stood for a moment or two gazing at the water, then she gave a long and peculiar whistle, not unlike the cry of the curlew. It was at once answered by a similar one from a distance, and in the course of a few minutes a small white dinghy shot round the point from the west. It was rowed by a big, fine-looking, fair-haired man, who wore a brown knitted jersey and no hat.
With powerful strokes he pulled himself along, till, reaching the shallows, he shipped his oars, jumped overboard, and ran his little craft upon the beach. He had scarcely stepped out of the water before Gerda was at his side, and the two walked togetheralong the beach, he apparently asking eager questions, to which she gave swift replies. Up and down, up and down for fully ten minutes they paced, too absorbed in their conversation to look up at the cliff above, though had they done so they would scarcely have spied the two spectators who cowered close under the shelter of the overhanging hazel bush, squeezing each others' hands in the excitement of the scene they were witnessing.
The manappeared to have many directions to give, for he talked long and earnestly, and Gerda nodded her head frequently, as if to show her thorough comprehension of what he was saying. At last she glanced at her watch, and they both hurried back to where they had left the boat. He launched his little dinghy, sprang in, seized the oars, and rowed away as rapidly as he had arrived. Gerda stood on the beach looking after him till he had rounded the point and disappeared from her view, then, crying bitterly, she began to walk back in the direction from which she had come. Deirdre and Dulcie waited until she was safely past the corner and out of sight, then they sprang up and stretched their cramped limbs, for the discomfort of their position had grown wellnigh intolerable.
"Ugh! I don't believe I could have kept still one second longer," exploded Dulcie.
"My feet are full of pins and needles," said Deirdre, stamping her hardest, "and my elbow is so sore where I have been leaning on it, I can't tell you how it hurts."
"It can't be worse than mine."
"I say, though, we've seen something queer!"
"Rather!"
"Who can that man be?"
"That's just what I want to know."
"It looks very suspicious."
"Suspicious isn't the name for it. Do you think we ought to tell Miss Birks?"
"No, no, no! That would never do. We must say nothing at all, but go on keeping our eyes open, and see if we can find out anything more. Don't let Gerda get the least hint that we're on her track."
"Suppose Jessie asks us why we left the cove? What are we to say?"
"Why, that we missed Gerda, and as she's our room-mate, we went over the warren to see if we could find her and make a threesome. It was our plain duty."
Dulcie chuckled.
"Oh, our duty, of course! And naturally, of course, we didn't find her on the warren. She wasn't there."
"She'll have to make her own explanations if Jessie asks her where she was."
"Trust her for that!"
"I wonder what excuse she'll give?"
THE MAN APPEARED TO HAVE MANY DIRECTIONS TO GIVEPage 95
As it happened, everything turned out most simply. Deirdre and Dulcie overtook Gerda farther on along the warren, and concluded that she had probably climbed up from the second cove by the same path as themselves. They discreetly ignored her red eyes and made some casual remarks upon the weather. The three were walking together when the rest of the school came up from salvaging. The head girl looked at them, but seeing that they formed an orthodox "threesome" made no comment, and passed on. She probably thought they had been taking a stroll on the warren. Gerda looked almost gratefully at her companions. She had evidently felt afraid lest they should mention the fact that she had not been with them the whole time. She made quite an effort to speak on indifferent subjects as they walked back, and was more conversational than they ever remembered her. At tea-time, however, she relapsed into silence, and during the evening nobody could draw a word from her. Dulcie woke once during the night, and heard her crying quietly.
The two chums puzzled their heads continually over the meaning of the strange scene they had witnessed. Many were the theories they advanced and cast aside. One only appeared to Deirdre to be a really possible explanation.
"I'll tell you what I believe," she said, "I think that man in the brown jersey is a German spy. You know, although Gerda sticks to it that she is English, we've always had our doubts. She looks German, and she speaks better German than Mademoiselle, though Mademoiselle's Swiss, and has talked two languages from babyhood. Gerda isn't an English name. She says it was taken from Gerda in 'The Snow Queen', but can one believe her? I'm called 'Deirdre' because my family's Irish, and it's an old Celtic name, but 'Gerda' is distinctly Teutonic. Then she spellsThorwaldson 'son' but in one of her books I found it written Thorwaldsen, which is most suggestive. No, mark my words, she's a German, and she's come here as a spy."
"What has she to spy on?" asked Dulcie, deeply impressed.
"Why, don't you see? A knowledge of this part of the coast would be simply invaluable to the Germans, if they wanted to invade us. All these narrow creeks and coves would be places to bring vessels to and land troops, and the Castle could be taken and held as a fort, and perhaps the Dower House too."
"Is that why she was measuring the passage?"
"It might very easily be! She'd give them a plan of the school."
"Oh! Would they come and turn us out and kill us?"
"One never knows what an enemy might do. This bit of shore is not at all well protected; we're a long way from a coastguard station on either side. It's just the sort of spot where a whole army could be quietly landed in a few hours, before anyone had an inkling of what was going on. There's no doubt that we ought to watch Gerda most carefully. It may mean saving our country from a terrible catastrophe."
Nowthat they had decided on an explanation of their schoolfellow's mysterious conduct, the chums felt that every circumstance seemed to point in its favour. They wondered they had never thought of it before. The importance of keeping a strict watch was realized by both. There was a certain satisfaction in doing so. They felt as if they were rendering their country a service, almost indeed as if they were members of a secret diplomatic corps, and had been told off for special duty. Who knew what England might have to thank them for some day? Possibly at no very far-off date the whole country might be ringing with their names, and the newspapers publishing portraits of the two schoolgirls who had averted a national disaster. Just to be prepared for emergencies, they took snapshots of each other with Dulcie's Brownie camera, and added a series of photographs of the school, all of which they thought would be very suitable to give to the enthusiastic reporter who would demand an illustrated interview. They were rather disappointed with the results of the portraits, which in their estimation scarcely did them justice.
"I look more like forty than fourteen!" said Deirdre, regarding ruefully the dark shadows on her cheeks and the lines under her eyes. "It doesn't show my hair properly, either. No one could tell it was curly."
"And I look as fat as a prize pig, with no eyes to speak of, and an imbecile grin."
"I wonder how real photographers manage to touch things up, and make them look so nice?"
In spite of their best efforts it had proved impossible to do their developing and printing without their handiwork being seen by their companions. The photographs of the school were so good that the girls begged them shamelessly to send home. Gerda was particularly importunate, and even offered to buy copies when they were refused as a gift.
"We don't sell our things," said Dulcie bluntly. "You may go on asking till Doomsday, and you won't get a single print, so there!"
To the chums, Gerda's request was full of significance.
"It shows pretty plainly we're on the right track," said Deirdre. "Of course she wants them to send to her foreign government. They'd pay her handsomely."
"Don't she wish she may get them!" snorted Dulcie.
The affair made an added coolness in their dormitory. Gerda appeared to think them unkind, while they stood more than ever on the alert. They watched her unceasingly. For some days, however, they could find nothing of an incriminating naturein her conduct. Possibly she was aware of their vigilance, and was on her guard against them.
"I believe we're overdoing it," said Deirdre anxiously. "Best slack off a little, and seem as if we're taking no notice of her. Don't follow her about so continually. It's getting too marked altogether. We must be diplomatic."
Just at present Gerda's behaviour was perfectly orthodox. If she went on the warren, it was invariably as one of a "threesome", and the chums could detect her in no more solitary and clandestine excursions. She seemed to have assumed a sudden interest in salvaging, and particularly in the beacon which the girls were beginning to build upon the headland. No one was ready to work harder in carrying up the pieces of driftwood from the beach, and piling them on to the great stack which every day grew a little higher and higher, till it really began to be a conspicuous object, and could be seen from both the villages of Pontperran and Porthmorvan, and from the sea. It was at Gerda's suggestion that a Union Jack, fastened to a pole, was kept flying from the top—a little piece of patriotism which appealed to the school at large, though it roused suspicion in the minds of the chums.
"It's a signal, of course," said Dulcie.
"Some fine day she'll pull it down, and substitute the German flag," agreed Deirdre. "She's only waiting her opportunity."
"Unless we circumvent her. There are two Britishers here who mean to look after their country!"
It was curious how many little things, really quite trivial in themselves, seemed to point in the direction of the chums' fears. Miss Birks greatly encouraged a debating society among her girls, and on her list of subjects for discussion had placed that of "National Truth versus Diplomatic Evasions". Gerda had certainly been chosen to speak for the opposition, and was therefore pledged to the side of diplomacy; but Deirdre and Dulcie thought she made far too good a case of it, and pleaded much too warmly the cause of the ambassador who on behalf of his country's honour is obliged to meet guile with guile, and outwit the enemy by means of stratagems and deeply-laid schemes.
"Any expedient is allowable for the sake of your fatherland," she had contended, and Dulcie quoted the words with a grave shake of her head as she talked the matter over with Deirdre.
"Notice particularly that she said fatherland! Now the Vaterland is always Germany. She didn't mean Britain, you may depend upon it. No—she's planning and scheming for another war!"
"Then we'll plan and scheme for King George! We'll accept her principles, and 'make use of any stratagem to outwit the enemy'."
So they waited and watched, and watched and waited, in what they flattered themselves was true Machiavellian style, till they were almost growing tired of so fruitless an occupation.
Then one day, quite unexpectedly, something happened. It was a wild, windy March morning, and thegirls were taking a hasty run on the warren between morning school and dinner, to "blow away cobwebs" and give them an appetite. There was not time to go far, but they dispersed in all directions, trying which could make the biggest distance record available. Gerda had started with Annie Pridwell and Betty Scott, but under pretence of beating their speed she had got considerably ahead and left them panting in the rear.
"Where's Gerda?" asked Deirdre, who, with Dulcie and Evie Bennett, had followed the first "threesome".
"We simply can't keep up with her! She walked as if she had seven-leagued boots. She's gone over the hill there. I'm going to wait till she comes back."
"There's no sense in flying like the wandering Jew!" protested Betty. "I hope she won't be long, because I don't want to walk back as fast as I came."
"Dulcie and I'll go after her," said Deirdre promptly. "We don't mind running. You two can be toddling along with Evie as leisurely as you like."
It only meant a change of "threesomes", so the girls agreed readily and departed at once, leaving the chums to act escort to the truant.
"She's done it on purpose," gasped Dulcie as soon as they were alone.
"Of course. It's a perfectly transparent dodge. Now we must do Secret Service work again and not let her see she's being followed."
The chums really congratulated themselves that they were getting on in the matter of scouting, they availed themselves so cleverly of the cover of rocksand bushes and proceeded with such admirable caution and care. Their efforts were successful, for after a few minutes of skilful stalking they caught sight of their quarry.
Gerda was climbing down the cliff side, fully a hundred feet below them, and had nearly reached the level of the beach. She descended quickly, almost recklessly, scrambling anyhow over rocks and through brambles, and splashing through a boggy piece where a trickle of water had formed a pool. Arrived on the shingle, she went straight to a hole among the rocks, searched in the seaweed, and produced a bottle. Taking a piece of paper from her pocket, she folded it into a long narrow slip and put it inside, replacing the cork tightly. Then she ran towards the crag at the mouth of the cove, and climbing up higher than was compatible with safety she hurled the bottle as far as she could throw it into the sea. She stood looking for a moment or two as it bobbed about on the surface of the water, then, turning round, began to scramble back with more haste than care.
"We've seen enough! Come quick before she spies us!" whispered Deirdre, dragging Dulcie away. "We mustn't let her know we were anywhere near. Let us run and be a long way off before she gets to the top of the cliff and sees us."
The clanging of the first dinner bell, which could plainly be heard in the distance, certainly offered a reasonable excuse for hurry. The chums fled like hares, and even with their best efforts only took their places at table when grace was said and the beefcarved. Gerda was later still and scurried in, hot and breathless, after the potatoes had been handed. She drank her whole glassful of water at a gulp. Deirdre and Dulcie avoided looking at her, but they nudged each other secretly. It was a satisfaction to know what she had been doing, though they could not openly proclaim their rejoicing. The penalty for lateness at meals was a fine, but they put their pennies in the charity box with the feeling of philanthropists. They considered them as contributions to a most excellent cause.
It was Wednesday, and a half-holiday. At three o'clock the whole school was to start for a walk to Avonporth, and in the meantime the girls were expected to busy themselves with minor occupations. A certain number were due at the pianos for practising or music lessons, and from the rest stocking-darning, mending, and the tidying of drawers would be required. Gerda marched off with a volume of Beethoven, and was soon hard at work on the Moonlight Sonata under Mademoiselle's tuition. She played well, for she had been carefully taught in Germany, and had a good execution and sympathetic touch.
Deirdre and Dulcie stood outside the door for a moment or two listening to her crisp chords.
"She's boxed up there safe for an hour," commented Deirdre.
"Yes, Mademoiselle won't let her off," agreed Dulcie.
"I could do my darning after tea, and my drawers are as tidy as tidy."
"So are mine!"
"Should we? Do you think we dare?"
"Yes, yes. I'm game if you are."
Then the pair did a scandalous deed, such as they had never even contemplated in all their schooldays before. They took French leave and went out on to the warren. They knew the consequences would be disastrous if they were caught, for they were breaking three rules all at once, absenting themselves without permission, going two together instead of in a "threesome", and being on the headland at a forbidden hour. Perhaps the very riskiness of the undertaking added to its enjoyment.
"We must try and get that bottle, and here's our opportunity," said Deirdre.
"We can't explain to Miss Birks now, but we can tell her some day that we went out of sheer necessity," argued Dulcie.
"Of course; it's only our duty. Even the best of rules have to be broken sometimes when it's a matter of expediency. Miss Birks will quite appreciate that."
"Yes—when she knows the whole."
Meantime Miss Birks did not know, and the sense that their disinterested motives might be liable to misinterpretation caused the chums to proceed warily and avoid exposing themselves to any observer from the upper windows. They tacked along bypaths and went rather a roundabout route to reach their destination. Their hope was that the rising water might have washed the bottle back on to the beach, for Gerda's arm had not been strong enough to throw it sufficientlyfar to carry it into the open sea, and when they last saw it it had been whirling round and round at the mouth of the creek. They climbed down the cliff side by the same track that she had followed, and ran eagerly to the edge of the waves.
The tide was much higher than it had been before dinner, and was rolling up its usual toll of sticks, seaweed, and miscellaneous debris. What was that dark-green object that kept appearing and disappearing, half-hidden by a mass of floating brown bladderwrack? One moment it had vanished, and the next it bobbed up persistently. Deirdre and Dulcie did not wait to ask. With one accord they whisked off shoes and stockings (a proceeding utterly and entirely forbidden except in the months of June and July) and plunged into the water. They were both adepts in the art of salvaging, but no piece of driftwood ever gave them more trouble than that elusive bottle, which dipped and dived and evaded them with the skill of an eel. The beach was shingly, not sandy, which made their fishing not only a slippery but a most agonizing performance. They were obliged to grip each other's hands to keep their foothold at all. At last a larger wave than usual proved helpful, and indeed did its office so thoroughly that it dashed the bottle against Dulcie's shins. With a squeal of pain she caught it, nearly upsetting herself and Deirdre in the process, and the pair hobbled back to where they had left their shoes and stockings.
"Ugh! I'm absolutely lame! I didn't know stones could cut so," complained Deirdre.
"Look at my leg! It will be black and blue, I know," groaned Dulcie.
The possession of the bottle, however, was ample compensation for any scars they might have won in the struggle for its acquisition. They tried with impatient fingers to pull out the cork, but as that proved obdurate they cut the Gordian knot by breaking the neck on a stone. The thin piece of foreign note-paper was quite untouched by wet. Together they unfolded it, knocking their heads in their eagerness to read it both at once. At last, surely, they were within reach of Gerda's secret. But the letter was written in German, and alas! the chums were still in the elementary stages of the language, so that except for a chance word here and there they could not decipher a line of it. Their disappointment was keen.
"What does she mean by writing in her wretched old Deutsch?" demanded Dulcie indignantly.
"Oh, bother her! I wish I could read it!" moaned Deirdre.
Never had the advantages of education appealed to the girls more strongly. They began to think quite seriously of the necessity for studying foreign languages.
"Why didn't I have a Fräulein in my babyhood instead of an ordinary English nursery governess?" lamented Deirdre.
"We may be able to do something with a dictionary," said Dulcie more hopefully.
The idea was consoling enough to prompt them to put on their shoes and stockings, pocket the document,and climb the cliff. After all, if they could make little out of it themselves, they had at least prevented the message from falling into the hands of the person for whom it was destined, and so had frustrated Gerda's intention. That was sufficient reward for their trouble, even without the chance of learning its contents.
"We can keep asking separate words or even sentences until we can piece it all together," said Dulcie sagely.
"Right you are! and now we'd best rush back as fast as we can."
Time waits for nobody, and during their excursion to the beach it had seemed to roll on above the speed limit. Unless they meant to be late for the walk, they must hurry. They were obliged to skirt the cliffs, for they did not dare to show themselves on the open tract of the warren. It was not particularly easy to make haste along a narrow path beset with briers and riddled with rabbit holes. Deirdre went first, because she always naturally took the lead, and Dulcie, whose physical endurance was less, panted after her a bad second. Suddenly Deirdre stopped, and, shading her eyes with her hand, looked intently over the sea at a small object in the far distance.
"What's that?" she asked sharply.
For a moment or two it had the semblance of a huge bird, then a strange whirring noise was heard, and as it drew rapidly nearer and nearer they could see it was an aeroplane flying at no great height over the water. Apparently it was aiming for the exact spot where they were standing, and, quite scared, thegirls crouched down beside a gorse bush. With a loud whirr it passed over their heads, and, steering as easily as a hawk, alighted gently on the moorland only about a hundred yards farther on.
Here was a pretty state of things! Had the vanguard of the German army arrived already? And did the enemy mean to swoop down on the school? They peeped timorously from behind the bush and saw two airmen in full oilskins dismount hastily and make an examination of the machine. Whether they were Germans it was impossible to tell; they spoke in tones too low for their words to carry, and certainly their garments gave no hint of their nationality. They looked round searchingly, as if verifying their whereabouts, glanced in the direction of the girls who cowered under their gorse bush, devoutly hoping they were not visible, and consulted a map; then, after an earnest conference, entered their machine again and started off in a northerly direction, flying over the warren towards Avonporth. The chums, almost spellbound, watched the aeroplane till it waned into a mere speck in the sky; then fear lent them wings and they scuttled back to school at a pace they had never attained even at the annual sports. Fortune favoured them, and they managed to dodge unnoticed into the garden, run round to the front, and just in the nick of time take their places among the file of girls assembled on the drive.
Nobody mentioned the aeroplane, so evidently nobody but themselves could have seen it. Whence it came and where it was going remained a mystery,though Deirdre and Dulcie had a settled conviction that Gerda could have enlightened them on that point. She was quite unconscious of the trick they had played her, and as they walked just behind her they chuckled inwardly at the knowledge that her cherished letter lay in Deirdre's pocket. Outward and visible triumph they dared not venture on: it was too dangerous an indulgence for those who wished to keep a secret. As it was, they found it difficult to evade the enquiries of their friends.
"What became of you two just now?" asked Evie Bennett. "Miss Harding was inspecting drawers, and she sent me to fetch you. I'd such a hunt all over the place and couldn't find you anywhere."
"You're a notoriously bad looker, you know, Evie," returned Deirdre, laughing the matter off.
"So Miss Harding said; but it isn't fair to expect one to find people who aren't there."
"Perhaps Betty had mesmerized us into the hypnotic state and rendered us invisible to mortal eyes such as yours!"
"Now, don't rag me! Oh, wasn't that joke spiffing! I shall never forgetVawith their faces all streaked with black! I laughed till I nearly died. They haven't forgiven us, and I believe they're plotting something to pay us back in our own coin."
"Let them try, if they like. We're not easily taken in."
"By the by, I was hunting for you two just now," Annie Pridwell broke in. "I wanted to borrow some darning wool, and as I couldn't find you I helpedmyself off your dressing-table. I don't know whose basket it was I rifled. I took the last skein."
"Mine, but you're welcome," said Dulcie. "My stockings are darned for this week, and shown to Miss Harding and put away. I'll get some more wool on Saturday, if we go to the village."
"But I couldn't find you when I looked for you," persisted Annie.
"Yes, where were you?" asked Evie again.
But to such an inconvenient question the chums prudently turned deaf ears.
Deirdre and Dulcie were determined to leave no stone unturned until they had obtained a translation of the letter which they had purloined from the bottle. They did not care to show the manuscript itself to any of the elder girls, as to do so might be to betray their secret, but by dint of asking odd sentences and words they made it out to run thus: "Very little to report. No progress at all just at present. Extreme caution necessary. Better keep clear of headland for a while, and let all plans stand over." There was neither beginning nor signature, and no date or address.
To the chums the communication had only one meaning. It must refer to a German attack upon the coast. The aeroplane had probably been prospecting for a suitable place to land troops. It was Gerda who was to supply the information needed by the foreign government as to a favourable time for executing a master-stroke.
Evidently she did not consider the hour was yetripe. For the present England was safe, but who knew for how long?
"It's that man in the brown jersey who's engineering the mischief," said Deirdre. "When we see him sneaking about in his boat we may know there's something on foot."
"What ought we to do?" asked Dulcie doubtfully.
"Nothing can be done just now, if they're on their guard and lying low. We must be vigilant and keep a general eye over things. If anything unexpected crops up we can warn the police. But, of course, we should have to have very good grounds to go upon in that case, a perfectly circumstantial story to tell."
"We've nothing but suspicions at present."
"That's the worst of it. We want more direct evidence. They might only laugh at us for our pains, and we should get into trouble with Miss Birks for interfering in concerns that aren't ours. No; we'll keep the police as the very last resource, and only tell them what we know in the face of a great emergency."
Miss Birks'sbirthday fell on the 1st April, and so did Betty Scott's. It was not a particularly happy date for an anniversary, but they both declared they liked it. To Betty it was certainly a chequered event, for the girls treated her to the jokes they dared not play on the head-mistress, and she had to endure a double dose of chaffing. But, on the other hand, a birthday shared with Miss Birks was luck above the common. There was invariably a whole holiday, and some special treat to celebrate the occasion. The nature of the festival depended so entirely upon the day that it was not generally decided till the last minute, which added an element of surprise, and on the whole enhanced the enjoyment. Whether this year's jollification would be outdoors or indoors was naturally a subject of much speculation, but the morning itself settled the question. Such a clear blue sky, such brilliant sunshine, and so calm a sea pointed emphatically to an excursion by water, and Miss Birks at once decided to hire boats, and take the school for a picnic to a little group of islets due west of the headland.
The girls loved being on the sea, and did not often get an opportunity of gratifying their nautical tendencies, for they were, of course, never allowed to hire boats on their own account. Miss Birks was too afraid of accidents to permit lessons in rowing, though many of her pupils thirsted to try their skill with the oars, and had often vainly begged leave to learn in the harbour. To-day three small yachts, with steady and experienced boatmen, were waiting by the quay at Pontperran, and even Mademoiselle—the champion of timorous fears—stepped inside without any nervous dread of going to the bottom of the ocean. It was delightful skimming out over the dancing, shining water, so smooth that the worst sailor could not experience a qualm, yet lapping gently against the bows as if it were trying to leap up and investigate the cargo of fair maidens carried on its bosom. With one accord the girls struck up some boat songs, and the strains of "Row, brothers, row!" or