Peggy said nothing. She was listening, and they knew that Peggy, like Cook, was feeling in her bones that something had gone seriously wrong.
“They’re gone a gey long time,” said Cook.
It was growing dusk when at last they heard the tinny hooting of Rattletrap’s horn and then the noise of the old car turning in at the Beckfoot gate.
“You bide still,” said Cook, as Dick and Dorothea jumped to their feet, looking round for a hiding-place. “They’ll stop at the front door if they’ve found her. … Nay, I knew they hadn’t.” With a rattle and a squawk of the brakes the old car had pulled up in the yard. Billy Lewthwaite, Timothy and Nancy were getting out. All three were looking grave.
“She’s not been to Swainson’s,” said Nancy.
“You don’t think she’s found out about us and gone off in a rage?” said Dorothea.
“We’ve been right down to the foot of the lake and asked,” said Timothy.
“We thought of that,” said Nancy, “but I knew she’d never go from that station anyway, because of all the changes. She never does. We saw old Carrotty, the porter, and he said he hadn’t seen her for three or four years.”
“He knows her,” Peggy explained to Dorothea. “He used to work here years ago.”
“If only I’d ha’ looked in yon tank,” said Billy. “Everybody’ll be on to me about it.”
“She was all right when you left her,” said Timothy. “You’re not to blame.”
“Supper’s waiting when all’s said and done,” said Cook. “You slip along to your mother’s, Billy. She’ll be wondering what’s gone with you.”
“Shall I say owt to Sammy if he’s at home?”
Police again. Nancy, Peggy, the Picts and Timothy looked at each other.
“If she doesn’t turn up soon, I shall have to ring up the sergeant myself,” said Timothy.
*
Supper at the table in the kitchen was a grim meal. Having it there at all showed how wrong things were. Dick and Dorothea were feeling they had no right to be in the house. Timothy, of course, had even less, but he had told Cook that he did not mean to leave until Miss Turner had been found. Nancy and Peggy were feeling that a Great Aunt spending all her time in trying to improve them was better than a Great Aunt who had disappeared.
“If she wanted to vanish,” said Nancy, “she might have waited another two days. If she disappeared at Harrogate or somewhere people would simply say ‘Three Cheers’ or ‘R.I.P.’ and have a celebration. But disappearing here, when we’ve kept her happy all the time, and only one day to go before she clears out properly. … Oh, Giminy, Giminy! What will Mother say?”
“She’ll turn up all right,” said Timothy.
“She may be doing it on purpose,” said Dorothea.
“Better tell the police,” said Cook, putting a treacle tart on the table in front of Timothy. “They’ll drag for her.”
Timothy frowned. “Nothing like that,” he said.
“Of course, she might have tumbled in the lake,” said Dick.
“But it’s quite shallow at the edges,” said Nancy.
“Much more likely she went for a stroll while waiting for the petrol,” said Timothy. “She may have sat down and fallen asleep. …”
“She always did sleep in the afternoons,” said Nancy hopefully. “Or nearly always.”
“The doctor told her to,” said Peggy.
“We’ll ring up that doctor if she doesn’t turn up soon,” said Timothy.
“She isn’t one subject to fits,” said Cook.
*
“No good your waiting,” said Timothy when supper was over. “You two had better clear off to your house in the wood.”
“What are you going to do?” asked Nancy.
“Stay here,” said Timothy. “With Jim and your mother away, I’d better be on hand in case something needs doing. There wasn’t a sign of her all along the road. If she doesn’t walk in soon, I’ll have to telephone to the police.”
“But you’ll be getting arrested for burglary,” said Dorothea.
“Who cares?” said Timothy. “We’ll have to have a regular search and the more men they can send the better. The police are the only people for a job like that with thick woods all over the place.”
Nancy’s face suddenly lit up.
“Colonel Jolys,” she exclaimed. “I’ll go and ring him up at once. He’ll be lots better than the police. There hasn’t been a fell fire for ages and there won’t be after all that rain. They’ll be delighted at the chance of really doing something, and there are hundreds of them.”
“Hundreds of what?” asked Timothy.
“Firefighters,” said Nancy. “You saw them last year. Colonel Jolys has them all trained. They sound horns and everybody who’s got a motor car loads up as many as he can carry and they go wherever they’re wanted. They’ll search the whole of the woods in no time while the police are just mooning about taking notes.”
“It’s not a bad idea,” said Timothy. “But we’ll talk to the police first. Here. Clear out, all four of you. You take these two home and come back.”
*
Picts and Martyrs groped their way up the wood together. Dick lit the hurricane lantern in the hut. Dorothea set about lighting the fire.
“Aren’t you going to bed?” said Peggy.
“Not just yet,” said Dorothea. “We simply can’t. I know why Timothy wanted to get rid of us.”
“Why?” asked Nancy.
“He thinks something really awful’s happened and he didn’t want us to hear what he was going to say to the police.”
“I wish we’d never gone out today,” said Peggy.
“So do I,” said Nancy. “I ought to have guessed something awful was going to happen when she was so jolly ready to let us go. It wasn’t natural. It was almost as if she wanted to be alone.”
“You don’t think she’d found out about us?” said Dorothea.
“Of course not,” said Nancy. “If she had, she’d have been up here first thing, instead of doing her packing. She’s never guessed a thing about you or she wouldn’t have been keeping on so about the Swallows. No. It’s something else altogether.”
“We’d better go back,” said Peggy. “In case she’s come.”
“If she has,” said Dorothea, “do you think you could…?”
“If there’s any news, we’ll come up and tell you at once,” said Nancy, “even if it means breaking out by force.” And with that she and Peggy hurried off in the dark, and left Dick and Dorothea to themselves.
*
Dick and Dorothea sat by their fire. There was nothing they could do to help but going to bed seemed impossible. Dick looked at his caterpillars, put his box in a cool place, came back to the fire and tried to read about Fox Moths in Common Objects of the Country. There was a good picture of them but it was blurred for him by pictures of the Great Aunt talking on the lawn, of the Great Aunt lying with a broken ankle, waiting to be found, of the Great Aunt hearing Timothy, Nancy and Billy pass close by in the motor car and being somehow unable to call out to them, pictures that he could not help seeing.
“They ought to be able to find her,” he said suddenly.
“They could,” said Dorothea, “if only they could get into her mind. But nobody knows why she went out at all. It was after her lunch. It was when she’s supposed to lie down. Why did she go out instead? And with the motor car? If we only knew that there would be somewhere to start.”
“I don’t believe they properly looked for tracks,” said Dick.
“There wouldn’t be any in the road.”
“But she must have gone off the road and there’d be tracks in the grass. They’ll have to look for them tomorrow.”
“It may be too late,” said Dorothea.
“I know,” said Dick.
It was long after midnight when they heard footsteps outside. Nancy and Peggy had come up again from Beckfoot.
“I knew you’d still be up,” said Nancy. �
��Timothy said you’d be asleep.”
“Has she come back?” asked Dorothea.
“No,” said Nancy. “Cook’s sitting in the kitchen with the door open. Timothy’s just gone for another walk along the lake road. Cook wanted us to go to bed but I thought we’d just come up and tell you. The police’ll be here first thing in the morning. And I did telephone to Colonel Jolys. He was as pleased as Punch. I knew he would be. Not about her being lost, of course, though Mother says he hated her when he was young, but because of being able to have a go at finding her. He’s coming with all his men. He says they’ll comb the whole place. He’s coming with everyone he can get unless she turns up during the night. Timothy says the police think she probably will.”
“If she’s lost her memory she may be anywhere,” said Dorothea, “and probably thinking she’s somebody else.”
“She isn’t like that,” said Nancy.
“She may be awfully ill,” said Peggy, “or even dead.”
“No,” said Nancy.
“You don’t think she’s run away on purpose?” said Dick.
“What from?” said Nancy. “She’s been having the time of her life. One long orgy of bossiness. We’ve made her jolly happy.”
“It can’t be that,” said Peggy. “She’d done all her packing ready for going away, and Cook heard her telephoning to arrange with somebody to come at one o’clock to take her to the train, and she told Cook she’d be wanting sandwiches to take with her.”
“Something simply must have happened to her,” said Dorothea.
“And the very last day,” said Nancy. “And we’d managed so jolly well. We’d almost got accustomed to her ourselves. And … And she really was pretty sporting when she thought that Dick was a full-sized burglar.”
The Great Aunt lost was beginning to seem a very different character from the Great Aunt invading Beckfoot in holiday time and having her own way about everything.
“Well,” said Nancy at last, “you’d better go to bed now. We all will, or we’ll be no use in hunting for her tomorrow. Come on, Peggy. Good night. Jibbooms and bobstays! It’ll be daylight in a few more hours. Good night. …”
“She’s quite right,” said Dick, when they could no longer hear the footsteps going down the moonlit wood. “I’m going to bed. I’m going to sleep thinking about the Great Aunt. It often works with mathematics. I’ve often done it. You go to sleep thinking about a sum and wake up to find you know what you’ve done wrong.”
Dorothea, before climbing into her hammock, looked out at the ghostly trees.
“It’s a warm night,” she said. “That’s one good thing.”
CHAPTER XXVI
THE HUNT IS UP
THE sound of a coach-horn waked them in the morning. Another horn sounded and then another, making the cheerful noise that used in coaching days to echo through these hills. The sounds came from far away, towards the head of the lake.
“It’s the firefighters. They’re coming,” said Dorothea, rolling out of her hammock and going to the door of the hut. Already the sun was high in the sky and the clearing was dappled with shadows from the trees.
Dick reached up for his spectacles from the beam above his head, slid down and joined Dorothea. He was remembering the day last summer when High Topps was ablaze and the fire was sweeping across heather and bracken towards the woods and the farms below. The sound of the horns had meant help then, and help just before it was too late. This time …
“She hasn’t come back or Nancy’d have telephoned to stop them,” he said.
“She’s been out all night,” said Dorothea. “Lying with a broken leg, too weak to shout or even move. It’s a good thing they make such a noise. She’ll hear them, too, and know that help is coming.”
Again the horns sounded.
“They’re near now,” said Dick. “They must be close to the bridge. They’ll be coming along the road in a minute. Let’s go down.”
“We’d better not,” said Dorothea. “Not till Nancy or Peggy comes up from Beckfoot.”
“If there are hundreds of people looking for her, it’ll be safe for us to look, too. We ought to have a try for footprints along the edge of the road where they found the empty car.”
“It would be lovely if you did find them,” said Dorothea. “And then the rescuer would have to slip away without giving his name. … I could make a story like that, where the one who does the rescue simply can’t give his name because he’s wanted by the police.”
“There go the firefighters,” said Dick, as the horns sounded from the road below them. “Four motor cars at least. And listen. There are lots more coming. …”
More and more coach-horns were sounding far away.
“We’d better get dressed at once and have breakfast. You go and get the mugs. They’ve been rinsing in the beck since breakfast yesterday. And get washed at the same time. And fill the kettle. What’s that?” A deep, booming bark from the direction of Beckfoot had startled them both.
“It’s not an ordinary sheep-dog,” said Dick. “And it’s not …”
“It’s the police,” said Dorothea. “They’ve brought a bloodhound. I suppose they always do when anybody gets lost.”
*
They were washed, dressed and ready for anything, but there was still no sign of Peggy or Nancy. The kettle was boiling, the cornflakes had been waiting for some time, and Dorothea had filled the saucepan and pushed it in at the side of the fire to be ready for the eggs, when, at last, Jacky came up with the milk.
“Have you heard what’s oop?” he panted. “You should be down at Beckfoot. They’ve firefighters out and the police and all. Sergeant’s brought his bloodhound. And my dad’s coming with our Bess. She’s a right clever dog. Hasn’t nobody telled you? There’s owd Miss Turner made away wi’ herself, that’s what my mother says. They’re going to hunt the woods for her, and if they don’t find her they’ll be dragging t’lake. Eh, but I hope they’ll let me go in t’boat.”
“I’m sure she hasn’t killed herself,” said Dorothea.
“That’s what my dad says. He says she’ll have got herself cragfast or brambled like, so’s she can’t move, same’s a sheep.”
“Just lying and waiting to be found,” said Dorothea.
“Happen they’ll find her, happen they won’t,” said Jacky. “I’se off to see.” And with that Jacky, forgetting in his hurry even to take the empty milk bottle, dashed off to join the hunt.
They ate their breakfast and then could wait no longer, but slipped cautiously down the path towards the road. They were nearing the bottom of the wood when they heard footsteps coming up. It was the postman, with a letter addressed to Dorothea. “I didn’t leave it in the wall,” he said. “I wanted a word with you. You haven’t seen owt of Miss Turner?”
“No,” said Dorothea.
“She’s not up with you in yon hut?” said the postman. “I thought I’d make sure. I wouldn’t put it past them two lasses of Mrs Blackett’s to be hiding her away. With their skulls and crossbones and all. Kidnapping. Prisoner or summat. With them two limbs you never know.”
“They didn’t have anything to do with it,” said Dorothea.
“So you think,” said the postman. “And what about that man breaking into Beckfoot? Sammy tells me there wasn’t a man about the place at all, just them two limbs at their games. And a nice trouble they’ll have made for me if it comes out about my bringing your letters and keeping all dark about Miss Turner saying you wasn’t known.”
“But they were our letters,” said Dorothea. “And nobody’ll ever find out about them.”
“Poor look-out for me if they do,” said the postman. “I’ve telled myself a dozen times I should have out right away and telled Miss Turner that you two and them two were up to a game. But Miss Nancy’s too quick. She has you in trouble with one foot, and before you can lift out you’re opp to t’neck. And then for this to happen. The sergeant’s over on this side, and the firefighters and all. They’ll be asking one
question after another and if one thing don’t come out another will.”
“It’ll be all right if they find her,” said Dorothea. “She’s going today.”
“Ay, but will they? And there’s Mrs Blackett coming back tomorrow. I saw the postcard. And what’ll she say? It’s a sad trouble for her to come back to and all. Well, I’ve kept my mouth shut so far. …”
“You mustn’t let out about the letters now,” said Dorothea urgently.
“I can’t do nowt else but keep quiet. It’s other folk’s tongues I’m fearing. There’s too many folk know too much. There’s the folk at Watersmeet for one. There’s young Jacky with a tongue that’d talk the hind leg off a Herdwich sheep. And Mrs Lewthwaite’s been cracking away with Mrs Braithwaite. She knows, and her Billy, and Sammy by now like enough. They’re all in it, but there’s only got to be one word said and they’ll all be talking to save theirselves and let other folk take the blame. And there was I thinking all was right, with Miss Turner going away today and Mrs Blackett coming back.”
And the postman gloomily shaking his head, stumped off again down the path to his bicycle in the road.
“We’ve just not got to be seen,” said Dorothea.
“But if we can’t be seen, how can I look for those tracks?” said Dick.
“It can’t be helped,” said Dorothea.
She opened her letter. It was just an ordinary pleasant, happy letter from their mother, telling them that their father was nearly through with his examination papers and looking forward to coming north and being given sailing lessons by the captain and mate of the Scarab. It hoped that Mrs Blackett would come back all the better for her holiday, and that everything had gone perfectly so that she would feel glad she had invited them. It said there were more underclothes coming for both of them.
AT THE BECKFOOT GATE
The Picts and the Martyrs Page 25
