Cursed be the treasure
his into practice. But I was used to strangeness and mystery, and the
idea of hunting and being hunted was familiar to me from as far back as
I could remember; so I easily shook off the impression of alarm that
had crept over me, and skirting away from the point of danger I was
soon stripping for a dive in the pool.
The afternoon was beautiful, with a blazing sun, and I was in and out
of the water, practising all my strokes and tricks, for some hours,
for evening was drawing on before I dried myself for the last time by
jumping up and down in the sun, and pulled on my clothes. The tide had
been coming in, and was now almost full. With one last look at the
tempting depths, wondering whether I should strip again for a final
plunge, I turned and set off up the cliff. Some day, I vowed, I would
negotiate that huge frowning brow of rock that overhung the pool, for
at present if I wanted to reach the level platform above it--an ideal
spot for a boy to sprawl on and send his dreams out over the sea--I had
to scramble down from the top of the cliff; and in climbing up from
below I had to be content with a longer trail to the left.
I had taken only a few steps when I heard a gruff voice beneath me
chanting an old sea-song, and with instinctive caution I ducked behind
a boulder as I saw the nose of a boat pushing out from Ebb-Tide Cave.
I rubbed my eyes twice to clear my sight, when I saw that in the boat
was none other than Dirk himself. But there was no mistaking him.
And he knew his way too, for he steered straight for the outlet of
the pool, and I watched him pass easily through the choppy waves,
guiding himself with his oars, and out through the twisting channel,
where rounding a headland of rock he disappeared. I now knew that my
suspicion of those closed gates in the cave was justly founded, yet
until this moment I didn't realize how little I had credited my own
childish theories, for the revelation came to me not as a thing long
expected, but with a shock of surprise.
My thought now was to descend again and investigate, but I think I must
have been getting frightened and unnerved by the adventures of the day,
for somehow the idea of returning to the cave and finding the gates
closed against me, though knowing full well that Dirk had just passed
through them, jarred unpleasantly on my imagination. And suppose they
were not closed? Suppose they were open? I should be confronted by the
dead blackness of the unknown beyond. I shuddered, and turned away,
wondering at my ebbing courage, for it wasn't usual for me to turn
heart-sick at the prospect of adventure. But I was still a child, and I
was probably tired, and had certainly had my fill of surprises for one
day.
Not till I was nearly at the top of the cliff did I remember my father,
who must have been following Dirk. Perhaps if I had descended again
I should have met him, and learnt the secret from him. Again I hung
irresolute, but I reasoned that by now he would no longer be there.
Also I was feeling weary, and told myself that I must be fresh for
the combat in the evening if I were to bring off my little manœuvre
successfully and win the knife.
My father was already in, doctoring up his scarred hand, when I
arrived. As usual he greeted me with, "Found anything to-day, Tommy?"
I could have answered volumes to that question, but reserve was part
of my training, and I wanted to use my new knowledge before I divulged
it; so I only answered, "Had a lovely day," and reaching up put my arms
around his neck and kissed him. But in his eyes as I searched them I
saw no trace of excitement to show that he had been spending his time
otherwise than usual.
Supper was brought to us, and after supper we cleared the room for
battle. But I didn't win the knife. To tell the truth I felt rather
stupid and asleep, and for the life of me couldn't bring myself to try
Dirk's trick. I realized too that it might be easy enough in practice,
but in a real fight it would be another matter. A slip would put you at
the complete mercy of your antagonist. It was a reserve manœuvre to be
kept as a last resort when the choice lay between a desperate risk and
a certain defeat.
My father saw that I was tired, and soon cried enough; and then
settling down in the waning twilight he put the final touches to his
hand, and commencing to yarn bore me away with him on the magical
stream of his story over wonderful seas.
The hour of the evening story was always a golden time for me. For my
father didn't merely stuff me with thrill. Looking back I can realize
now how artistic in conception and narration were those extraordinary
yarns of his gleaned from every imaginable type of old sea-dog with
whom he had rubbed shoulders, and vivified with all the charm of his
abundant imagination. Sometimes he would set me to tell the story,
but in his presence I was tongue-tied and stumbling in my speech; but
I know that I learnt from him, and not from any pedagogue, whatever
understanding and appreciation I have of the splendour of language.
And so with the last of the light to bed; while my father drew a heavy
screen around his little reading-table, and lighting his lamp applied
himself to the mystery, whatever it might be, which engaged him night
by night. All I ever heard was the scratching of his quill, or more
usually the turning of pages.
He was still behind the screen when I awoke with the question on my
lips, "Are you a poet, daddy?"
I think he was surprised, for he exclaimed quickly, "A poet, Tommy?"
and I heard a faint sigh. Then he laughed and said, "You've been
dreaming, Tommy. Better go to sleep again."
CHAPTER V
THE CLOSED GATE
My father always tried to meet a surprise with calm acceptance as
though it was a thing which he had been anticipating. This was part
of his "technique of philosophy", as he termed it, though the phrase
was sufficiently incomprehensible to me as a boy. So when, the next
morning, I tracked him right into his hiding-place, pushing under the
bushes and finding the hole which led down into the secret passage,
he didn't exclaim his astonishment, but hearing me stumbling my way
through the unexplored blackness he opened the shutter of the dark
lantern he was carrying, and said in a matter-of-fact voice, "Come
along, Tommy; I'll show you."
It was I who was taken aback, for he had been hidden from me and the
sudden light surprised me. I uttered a feeble "Oh!" and took his hand.
The passage was wide enough for two, and high enough for a short man
like my father to walk upright in. The lantern lit up at intervals the
stays and beams which supported the tunnel, showing it to be a man-made
affair. Presently we came to a flight of roughly levelled steps built
up with stakes into the earth, and at the end there was a steep drop
into darkness, with a rope ladder disappearing into the gulf. My father
began to descend, and I followed. It was a longish shaft, and I was
glad to reach the bottom. I knew at once that we were in a different
sort of place now, for the sound of our feet echoed resonantly, and the
walls were running with moisture, and there were no supports along the
sides.
As we proceeded, the tunnel gradually widened, twisting its way
downward at a gentle slope, and after a while the floor became slippery
with sea-weed, showing that the tide flowed in at full. In fact, before
we had reached the end of the journey we were wading in water up to our
knees, for it was still fairly early, about nine or ten, and the tide
was only at half ebb. And then my father set his lantern in a niche
high up in the wall, and said, "Well, what do you make of it, Tommy?"
I looked about me in the dim light, and before me stood a flat wall
of rock, split in two, which I recognized at once as the back of the
gateway that opened into Ebb-Tide Cave, though whether I should have
recognized it so quickly if it hadn't been for my observations of
the day before I don't know. I said with something of my father's
nonchalance, "This opens into Ebb-Tide Pool."
Even my father couldn't quite screen his surprise, for he wasn't to
know how I had arrived at my knowledge.
"Ha!" he exclaimed, "you're very cute, Tommy."
"But look!" I said, and pointed to the twin doors of rock.
"But how do you know it opens?" he asked.
"I know," I said.
"But how?"
"It must do," I said doggedly; for I couldn't tell him how I knew.
"Yes, it does," he said at length, "but I haven't found out how it's
done."
We didn't find out that morning either, though we probed every nook and
cranny, questing for the secret bolt or spring or whatever it might be
which would set that great gate swinging. My father had been over the
whole ground before, and I found nothing new to solve the mystery. I
thought I had made a discovery when, scrambling up to the niche where
my father had set the lantern, I found I could thrust my arm deep into
a cranny full of rotting refuse. I cleared it away, but couldn't reach
to the end of the little crevice. I pointed it out to my father; but
he had explored it before without result. We came away at last, and
emerging into the bracken blinked at the blinding daylight.
"That's that," said my father, and warned me not to prowl there too
often. But I knew what I meant to do.
For the rest of the day I reserved my strength, knowing I had been
too tired the evening before to do myself justice with the knife; so
I lay out on the cliff and bathed in the glorious sun that still beat
splendidly from the blue, and before returning I tumbled into the sea
for a single plunge, and reached the inn with a magnificent appetite
and feeling fit for the evening's encounter.
To describe the combat in all its details would take too much space,
for it was long and eventful. I tried every artifice my father had
taught me, hoping to make my drive without betraying my secret, but he
held me in play too surely, and though I managed to parry his attacks I
scored no hits myself. As we drew apart for a rest, both panting from
the exertion, he asked, "Had enough, Tommy?" And I answered carelessly,
"No, I'm fit for another turn," and we closed again.
I ran in quickly this time, intending to put the trick into immediate
play. As I expected, he shot out his left hand and caught my wrist, and
I saw the word "Rash!" forming on his lips, but before it was uttered
I slipped the knife into my left hand, and with a sideways jab crushed
the paper weapon against his breast, feeling my hand go thump against
his ribs as though I had struck him.
"Well!" he exclaimed, and dropped his own weapon to the floor. "Well!"
He sat down. "I _have_ seen it done, Tommy; but where did you learn it?"
I evaded the answer by dancing about him and exclaiming, "The knife,
the knife, I've won the knife!"
"And you shall have it," he said.
And so at last the shining prize lay in my hand, and with fond fingers
I felt along its delicious edge. When should I need to use it in
earnest, I wondered.
I turned a radiant face to my father, and throwing an arm round him
I kissed him vigorously, and drawing away said, "If I ever meet
Shadow-of-Fear, or the old witch, Bite-in-the Dark...." I didn't need
to finish the sentence, but slipping the knife from my upraised right
hand into my left I practised the feint in mid air. My father smiled
and said, "Don't be satisfied yet, Tommy. You're not a man till you can
use a pistol too."
In honour of the occasion he told me a wonderful tale that night; and
I sat at his feet long after the sun had gone down, and the window had
become a black square, and the strange voices of the night were ominous
of dark and secret things, listening to my father as he told a story of