Secret Water

by Arthur Ransome

  “Of course it is,” said Titty almost crossly. “Tide’s coming in. Stand here a moment. Take Sinbad. I’m going to try again.”

  She looked far ahead at the line of withies marking the invisible road, and waded on. Good. The road was still hard beneath her feet. Just a few inches of mud but hard gravel underneath it. It must begin to get shallower quite soon. If she could only be sure herself, sure enough to tell the others to follow her and splash right through. She took another step. Water trickled cold down the inside of first one boot and then the other. And Bridget’s legs were much shorter than her own. She stopped, and almost before she knew it the water was tickling her knees. She made up her mind. They could not get through. The only thing to do was to turn round, get through the splash they had already passed and race back along the road to the mainland and safety.

  “Turn round, Bridget. And you, Roger. Don’t hurry. Get back. Get back to the dry place by the four posts. … All right, Roger. … I’ll take Sinbad again.”

  “But what are we going to do?” said Bridget.

  “Go back to the mainland,” said Titty. “It’ll be all right. We’ll make a fire and get our things dry.”

  “But what about the feast?”

  “John’ll come for us as soon as he can bring the boat.”

  Titty glanced back towards the island. There was nobody in sight. One of the buffaloes lumbered up to the top of the dyke, stood there looking at her without interest and settled down to graze. Not a human being was about.

  They waded carefully back to the bit of the road that was still dry between the shallow splash they had crossed and that other that was already too deep for them.

  “Now then, run,” said Titty, as soon as they were all three out of the water. “No time to lose. Tide’s rising all the time, and that other place’ll be deeper than it was.”

  “It jolly well is,” said Roger a moment later. “It’s over my knees already.”

  “You take Sinbad and the knapsack,” said Titty. “And I’ll carry Bridget.” She handed over knapsack and basket, and stooped, soaking the edge of her skirt, while Bridget, beginning to be worried, climbed out of the water on her back. She staggered on.

  “You’re a good weight,” she said, cheerfully.

  “That’s why they said I’d be better than Daisy,” said Bridget.

  “It’s too deep,” said Roger suddenly, and Titty lost her footing, and fell, with Bridget on her back.

  “Gosh!” said Roger.

  “I’m wet right up to my head,” said Bridget.

  “No good,” said Titty, struggling up. “We can’t get through. We’ve got to get back to the posts. Keep hold of my hand, Bridgie. You can’t get any wetter.”

  “But how’ll we get ashore?” said Roger, when the three of them had struggled back to the bit of dry road.

  “John and Susan’ll come back as soon as they find we aren’t in the camp. They’ll see us and bring a boat. We’ve only got to wait. Empty the water out of your boots.”

  The bit of road with the four posts on it, in the middle of the Wade, was shorter than it had been. At each end of it was a widening channel of water. On each side of it the water stretched as far as they could see, on one side to the Magellan Straits and the passage to Cape Horn, on the other side to Goblin Creek and the island of the Mastodon. And the water was rising, rising fast. Crossing the Wade in the morning Titty in imagination had been under water, looking up at the keels of boats passing overhead. And now they were not Israelites, crossing dryshod, but Egyptians. They were trapped there in the middle of the sea. They could go neither forward nor back and must wait there, watching the narrow island of the road shrink under their feet.

  What would John do if he were in command? Swim and fetch a boat? It would not be far to swim to the place where the road climbed once more out of the water. She was on the point of flinging off her clothes when she remembered that Roger and Bridget and Sinbad would be left there waiting in the middle of the sea. Then she thought of telling Roger to swim for it and bring help. But supposing there was a current. Supposing he were to be swept one way or other away from the road. Everywhere else was soft mud. And if he were to get stuck in it (and she had seen how easily that might happen) she would have to leave Bridget alone while she swam to help him. Bridget was all right now, but it would never do to leave her alone. …

  “Do you think they’ll see us soon?” said Bridget.

  “Sure to,” said Titty. “Give them time to get to the camp and to find we’re not there.” She spoke calmly, keeping the fear out of her voice as she looked along the island shore. Never had the island looked more utterly deserted. Even the buffalo had left the dyke.

  THE ROAD ACROSS THE RED

  “It’s covered that pebble already,” said Roger. “I’ll put another one further back.”

  He scrabbled in the mud for pebbles, and laid a row of them, each one about a foot further than the last from the edge of the water. Before he had laid the last the first had disappeared.

  “What are we going to do?” said Roger.

  “Wait,” said Titty. “We’ve only got to wait. And I’ll serve out a ration of chocolate.”

  “Why not?” said Roger.

  They went to the four posts, at the highest point of the road. That would be the last part to be covered. Roger hung Sinbad’s basket from the top of one of the posts. Titty hung the knapsack from another, after burrowing into it for a slab of chocolate, which she broke into three equal pieces. Bridget and Roger nibbled chocolate. Titty took a bite of hers but found to her surprise she did not want it. Just for a moment she thought she was going to be sick. Why didn’t somebody come up on the dyke and see them?

  “It’s like the Flood,” said Roger. “It’s a pity we haven’t got an ark. I say, is it any good our yelling?”

  HIGH AND LOW TIDE

  “Too far,” said Titty. “They’d never hear. But we might as well try. We’ll all yell ‘Ahoy’ together.”

  Roger wasted a bit of chocolate by swallowing it.

  “Now then,” said Titty. “One … two … three…”

  “AHOY,” they shouted.

  “Again,” said Titty. “One … two … three, AHOY … OY … OY!”

  In spite of all three voices, well timed and doing their best, “Ahoy” sounded very thin when shouted from the middle of that great space of water and mud.

  “Ahoy,” shouted Roger.

  “Shut up,” said Titty. “Keep a look out and yell when you see anybody. No good just shouting at nothing.” A little more shouting into emptiness and she knew the others would begin to be as worried as she was herself.

  Roger went along the little bit of dry road. He came back looking grave.

  “All my stones are under water,” he said.

  “Well, naturally,” said Titty. She caught his eye, scowled at him and glanced over her shoulder at Bridget who was talking to Sinbad through his basket. If Roger knew things were pretty bad, it was no use pretending to him, but, whatever happened, they must keep Bridget cheerful.

  Roger understood. There was no need to do any explaining.

  “Gosh!” he said suddenly. “I wish I had my penny whistle. What about singing? Come on, Bridget. Let’s have ‘Hanging Johnny’. See if you’ve forgotten the words. …”

  Titty wished he had chosen a livelier tune, but “Hanging Johnny” was better than nothing.

  “And then I hanged my granny,” sang Bridget.

  “That’s not the first verse,” said Roger.

  “Haul away, boys, haul away,” sang Titty, her eyes on the distant dyke.

  “I hanged her up so canny,” sang Bridget.

  “So Hang, boys, Hang,” sang all three.

  Hanging Johnny worked through his relations in the wrong order and did not explain that people said he hanged for money till the last verse. But Roger made no more complaints and the choruses went with a will, though both Roger and Titty were thinking of something else. Surely someone would appear
somewhere, and the sooner the better, before Bridget realized that their tiny island of road would shrink to nothing and that they would be left in the middle of the Red Sea, the waters of which would stretch from shore to shore.

  “You sing one now,” said Bridget.

  “What shall we do with a drunken sailor?” sang Titty. Was that John’s head moving above the dyke? “What shall we do with a drunken sailor?” No, whatever it was it was gone. “What shall we do with a drunken sailor?” And no one on the mainland either? “Early in the MORNING.” Well, Bridget was all right so far. Keep going. “Way, hay, up she rises. Way, hay, up she rises.” Has Roger spotted someone? “Way, hay, up she rises.” No. He’s only looking at the shore. Gosh, I wonder if we ought to have swum for it right away. “EARLY in the MORNING.” … Too late now.

  “Go on, Titty,” said Bridget. “Brasswork comes next. …”

  “You sing it,” said Titty. “We’ll chorus.”

  “Set him polishing up the brasswork,

  Set him polishing up the brasswork,

  Set him polishing up the brasswork,

  EARLY IN THE MORNING”

  “What about a fire?” said Roger. “A good column of smoke so that nobody could help seeing.”

  “No firewood,” said Titty. “You can’t burn mud. … I’ll tell you what though. We can unwrap the parcels and burn all the paper. …”

  “Lucky he wrapped everything up,” said Roger. “He never guessed it’d be so useful. ‘What I always say is they ought to make the clerk of the weather. …’ Good old grocer. …” Roger laughed again. “I bet he didn’t know why I had to bolt.”

  “Let me light it,” said Bridget.

  “All right,” said Titty.

  “You must do it with one match,” said Roger.

  “If it doesn’t blow out,” said Bridget. “And it won’t, unless you go and blow it. There’s no wind really.”

  “There isn’t much paper,” said Titty, digging parcels out of the knapsack. “Look here, Bridgie. You and Roger eat the last of those cream buns. We can use their bag.”

  “The lump sugar’s in a cardboard box,” said Roger. “The sugar’ll be all right without it till we get to the camp.”

  “The ginger biscuits are in a paper bag,” said Bridget.

  “Let’s have it,” said Titty. “And the cornflakes have got a good burnable box. And he’s put paper round the tins of milk and cocoa.”

  “I say,” whispered Roger to Titty. “Ought we to burn Sinbad’s basket? There’s nothing else in the way of sticks.”

  “Can’t,” said Titty. “We can’t have Sinbad loose if we have to swim.”

  Roger looked at the widening water between them and the shore.

  “We’ll manage, if we have to,” said Titty quietly. “You and me with Bridget between us. Or I’ll take Bridgie and you keep the basket as dry as you can.”

  “The ground’s not very dry,” said Bridget, who was busy arranging the fuel. “The paper gets wet as soon as it touches it.”

  “All the more smoke,” said Titty.

  Roger pulled out his knife and attacked one of the four posts on the high bit of the Wade. He got a shaving or two. “Jolly damp,” he said. “I suppose they would be, going under water every time the tide comes in. …” His face changed as he spoke. Titty knew that he too was thinking how deep the waters would flow over the spot where they were standing. She scowled at him furiously. “Good for you, Bridget. Here’s your match. Get the paper well lit and then the cardboard. …”

  “There’s some seaweed round that other post,” said Roger. “That ought to make some smoke.”

  “Done it with one match,” said Bridget. “I knew I could. I wish Susan had seen me.”

  “So do I,” said Titty, and glanced again at the distant dyke.

  The paper flamed up, burning much too fast, but the cardboard box, torn to narrow bits, caught fire, and a column of smoke drifted up and away. Roger put the seaweed on the top. The fire nearly went out, but heartened again, with a smell of burning kelp. Roger frantically cut a few more shavings, but nobody can make a big fire with nothing to burn, and presently the paper had burnt out, and they were simply wasting matches lighting and relighting small bits of charred cardboard and trying to light wet shavings that needed drying before they would kindle. The fire was over. The smoke signal had been made. There was not a sign that anybody had seen it.

  “What’ll Susan say when she finds sugar and ginger-breads and cornflakes all mixed up in the knapsack?” said Bridget.

  “Tell us to separate them,” said Roger.

  The water was lapping over into the ruts on each side of the bit of road that was still uncovered in the middle of the Red Sea. The road was getting shorter and shorter. All was covered except that bit between the two pairs of wooden posts.

  “Are we going to get wet?” asked Bridget suddenly.

  “You can’t get wetter than you are,” said Titty. “You’ve been in once when I fell down. Look here. Don’t let the ship’s kitten get frightened. You tell him they’ll be coming for us in a minute.”

  “All right,” said Bridget and went to the post on which Sinbad’s basket was hanging, to give the kitten words of comfort.

  Titty and Roger went to the water’s edge.

  “Hadn’t we better swim now?” said Roger.

  Titty looked towards the island. “No,” she said. “Not till we can’t help it. Remember what that mud’s like by the shore. We’ve got to wait till we can land on hard ground.”

  “It’ll be jolly deep here by then.”

  “I know,” said Titty. “And it’s all my fault. We ought to have gone right on and not stopped till we were on the island.”

  “It was Sinbad’s fault really,” said Roger. “And mine a bit.”

  “No it wasn’t,” said Titty. “Why can’t one of them look this way?” she added almost angrily. “Look here. We’d better take our clothes off for swimming, and make a bundle of them with Sinbad’s basket on the top.”

  “Bridget knows how to float,” said Roger. “And she’ll keep still if you tell her to.”

  “Gosh!” said Titty. “It’s the worst mess we’ve ever been in.”

  The water lapped about their feet, and they went back to the posts. The water crept over the road. The ruts were filled. The middle of the road was a thin line that disappeared. They were standing in water that stretched almost from the mainland to the island.

  Roger suddenly began to struggle out of his wet shirt.

  “Not yet, Roger. Not yet,” said Titty.

  “Signal of distress,” said Roger, wringing out the water.

  “There’s nothing to hoist it on.”

  “Give me a leg up,” said Roger.

  “It’s worth trying,” said Titty.

  “Whistle for a wind,” said Roger. “It’s too wet to wave.”

  Bridget obediently tried but failed. The ship’s baby was beginning to lose faith in the able-seamen.

  “Go on, Bridgie,” said Roger. “‘Spanish Ladies’ is an easy one. Lick your lips first.”

  Some noise did come from Bridget’s lips, and sure enough the light wind that had just rippled the water strengthened a little, as Titty took one of Roger’s feet in both hands and hoisted him up, while Roger scrambled up the post, and sat on the top of it, taking a grip of it with both legs. Over his head one hand above the other, he held his shirt. A gust, that sent little waves lapping round the tops of Bridget’s boots as she stood at the foot of the post, blew out the signal of distress and kept it flapping.

  “Jolly good flag,” said Roger. “It’d be better if it wasn’t so beastly wet.”

  “Can you see anybody?” said Titty.

  “The water’s over my boots,” said Bridget.

  “Look here, Bridgie,” said Titty. “You know how to float. Well, you’re going to. You’ll just have to lie on your back and keep still, and I’m going to swim you ashore. It’s going to be as easy as easy.”

 
SIGNAL OF DISTRESS

  “But I can’t,” said Bridget. “Not for as long as all that. Isn’t anybody coming? You said they were coming. And what about Sinbad?”

  “Roger’ll take Sinbad. It’ll be all right. And then we’ll run and get dry, and everybody’ll be awfully proud of you.”

  “Would Susan let me?” said Bridget

  “Of course she would. And so would John. It isn’t as if you were too young.”

  Bridget gulped.

  “There’s no other way,” said Titty. “I’ll keep tight hold of you all the time.”

  “When are we going to start?” said Bridget.

  “Now,” said Titty.

  “And Sinbad’ll get wet too.”

  “Roger’ll keep him as dry as he can.”

  “And what about the things in the knapsack. The sugar and the biscuits for the feast?”

  “Can’t be helped,” said Titty. “And I don’t see how we can save our seaboots. Oh yes we can. We’ll tie them to one of the posts and come and get them when the tide goes down again. There’s some string in the knapsack. You stay here, and I’ll go and get it from the post. We won’t take Sinbad’s basket off his post till we’re ready to start. Better get out of your clothes. …”

  “Will we lose them too? …”

  “AHOY!” There was a sudden yell from the human flagstaff above their heads, and a frantic flapping of the signal of distress.

  “What is it?” cried Titty, and at the same moment she saw.

  “Saved,” said Roger.

  Far away, in the mouth of the channel leading to Goblin Creek a black speck of a boat was moving over the water.

  Titty suddenly felt like laughing and crying at the same time.

  “There you are, Bridgie,” she said. “No swimming after all. He’ll be here before the water’s up to our middles.”

  CHAPTER XXVII

  RESCUE AND AFTER