The Hunniwell boys and the platinum mystery
all fixed for light housekeeping.”
CHAPTER V
SEARCHING
“Now I think we’d better go into a committee of the whole and take a
look at that map again,” Rogers told them when they were finished.
“We’re a committee in a hole all right,” Gordon laughed.
“But it isn’t a very deep one just at present,” Bill added.
By this time Rogers had the old map spread out on a flat rock and the
two boys looked over his shoulders as he proceeded to explain it more
thoroughly to them.
“Now, as near as I can estimate it, we’re right here,” he began placing
the point of his pencil on the map. “And right off here it looks to me
as though he had tried to represent a cliff or a hill only a short
distance from the shore. Unfortunately there’s no scale to the map so we
can’t tell how far from here it is, but right here’s where he hid the
stuff and it’s evidently in a cave in the side of the cliff.”
“And it’s up to us to find the cliff,” Gordon suggested.
“Exactly, and it ought not to be a very difficult task,” Rogers told
them. “The island isn’t large and it’s somewhere on this end of it,
that’s certain.”
“Was, you mean, don’t you?” Bill asked.
“What do you mean, was? Caves don’t run around you know.”
“No, but you want to remember that they have earthquakes out here and
that cave may have vanished a long time ago. That’s what I’m most afraid
of,” Bill explained.
“Of course that’s a chance we’ve got to take. If it’s gone we’re out of
luck, that’s all.”
“So far as finding the platinum is concerned you mean?” Gordon asked.
“Certainly that’s what I mean. We’re having the trip in any case.”
“Well, are we going to start to-day or wait till to-morrow?” Bill asked.
“I guess it’s too late to do much to-day,” Rogers said, “but we might
take a walk down to the shore and see what it looks like.”
“Wait a minute till we hide those cells,” Bill suggested. “We’ve got to
put them where no one will find them and I don’t mean maybe.”
A good hiding place was soon located behind one of the rocks which
formed the rim of their bowl, as Gordon called it, and they were soon on
their way to the shore only a short distance away.
“There are your cliffs all right,” Gordon said as they stood on the sand
close to the water’s edge and looked at the rocky formation.
They had reached the shore by means of a defile which led between two
jutting masses of rock and was hardly wide enough to allow them to pass
in single file.
“It’s low tide now,” Rogers declared.
“And at high tide the water must reach to the foot of the cliff,” Bill
added. “We’ll have to watch our step and not get caught by the tide.”
“Yep, that wouldn’t be so good,” Gordon agreed.
“Well, it shouldn’t take us very long to go over the ground,” Bill mused
as he glanced both ways. “There can’t be more than a mile either side of
where we are to this end of the island and if we don’t find it at this
end we’re——”
“Out of the game,” Gordon finished for him.
They walked slowly back and, as it was nearly five o’clock when they
reached the bowl, they at once set about preparing supper.
“You must have thought we were going to stay here a long time,” Bill
said as he began taking their cooking utensils from the plane.
“Well, I thought I might as well get plenty while I was at it,” Rogers
told him.
“A man after my own heart,” Gordon declared slapping him on the back.
“Feed him and you’ve a friend for life,” Bill laughed.
There was plenty of dry bits of wood lying about and in a very few
minutes Gordon had a fire going between two rocks just over the edge of
the bowl.
“What’s the bill of fare?” he asked.
“Sirloin steak two inches thick,” Rogers told him.
“My, but I think you’re a very nice man,” Gordon chuckled.
“I told you,” Bill chimed in.
“Say, fellows, I’ve been thinking,” Gordon suddenly said as they were
sitting around the fire a couple of hours later.
“Impossible,” Bill declared.
“Why is it impossible?” Gordon demanded.
“Well, the act of thinking implies the possession of something with
which to do the thinking and——”
“Oh, you mean brains,” Gordon interrupted.
“I believe that’s what one thinks with,” Bill told him.
“Well, I’ve got ’em and as I was about to say, when I was so rudely
interrupted, I’ve been thinking——”
“You said that before,” Bill again broke in.
“I’ve been thinking about that noise we heard last night.”
“Well, what about it?” Bill demanded as he paused.
“I’ve got to know what it was.”
“Well, I sure hope you find out.”
“I’m not going back home till I do,” Gordon assured him.
“I’m with you there,” Rogers told him. “As soon as we find the platinum
we’ll go back and investigate.”
“I don’t believe in spooks but if there are any such animals, believe
me, they live on that island,” Bill declared.
“I wonder how far away we are from anyone here,” Gordon said a few
minutes later.
“I don’t suppose there’s a soul within twenty miles of us,” Rogers told
him.
“You getting scared?” Bill laughed.
“Scared nothing,” Gordon snapped. “I was just curious, that’s all.”
“That’s what killed a cat,” Bill told him.
It was getting dark by this time and Rogers suggested that they turn in
and get up early, reminding them that it would be high tide about nine
o’clock and that if they were to do any searching in the forenoon they
would have to get an early start. So half an hour later they were all
asleep in the pup tents. Gordon had fallen asleep more than half
expecting to be awakened by that same weird cry that had disturbed him
the night before. But there was no disturbance and it was light when
Bill called him.
“Going to sleep all day?” he asked him as he grabbed hold of his feet
and pulled him from the tent.
“What time is it?”
“Almost four o’clock.”
“Gee, I must have overslept,” Gordon groaned sitting up and rubbing his
eyes. “Is Steve up yet?”
“Sure he is.”
“But I don’t see him.”
“He’s gone for some water. There’s a little brook about fifty rods back
that he discovered yesterday while we were getting supper. I’ve got the
fire going.”
“Here he comes now.”
“Breakfast will be ready in two shakes of a lamb’s tail,” Bill told him.
Bill was almost as good as his word and by five o’clock they were ready
to start exploring. The tide was coming in but there was a strip of sand
some forty feet wide between the sea and the cliffs.
“I reckon it’ll be a couple of hours before the water gets up to the
rocks,” Rogers told them as they started along toward the north. “Now we
want to keep our eyes peeled and not miss a single bet,” he cautioned
them.
“I guess there’s only one to miss and that’s the cave,” Gordon chuckled.
For the greater part of the way so far as they could see the wall of
rocks was about twelve feet high and very rugged. As they walked slowly
along they scanned every inch closely.
“Looks like a hole up there,” Gordon suddenly cried after they had gone
about a hundred feet.
“Where do you mean?” Bill asked eagerly.
“Right up there above that bit of rock that’s sticking out. Can’t you
see it?”
“I can see the rock sticking out but I can’t see any hole,” Bill
declared.
“Neither can I,” Rogers backed him up.
“You must both be blind,” Gordon asserted. “I believe I can climb up
there.”
“But I tell you there’s nothing there,” Bill insisted.
“I’m going to take a look anyhow,” Gordon insisted as he started for the
foot of the cliff.
But when he got close up to it it did not look so easy. The wall at that
point was almost perpendicular and there seemed to be but few toeholds.
“Give me a boost up so I can reach that crack and I believe I can make
it,” he said.
“Look out you don’t slip now,” Bill cautioned as he bent his knee.
Standing on Bill’s shoulders Gordon found that he could reach the crack
and by drawing himself up he was able to get his feet on an out jutting
rock, but it was a very precarious hold.
“Better spit on your hands,” Bill called up to him.
“My hands are all right but I don’t know what to do with my feet,” he
called back.
But he managed a moment later to get his fingers in another crack a
little higher up and to bring his feet up to a more secure footing on a
bit of ledge. From this position he was able to peep over the rock
behind which he was convinced was a hole into the cliff. But the brief
glance he caught, while almost hanging by his finger tips, showed him
that he had been mistaken. There was no opening there and a second later
he dropped to the sand with a sheepish look on his face.
“Satisfied?” Bill demanded.
“Sure, but I wouldn’t have been if I hadn’t looked,” he replied.
“Then I guess it’s a good thing you looked,” Bill told him.
“Well, there might have been a hole there,” Gordon insisted.
“Sure, but I told you there wasn’t, didn’t I?”
“Believe you did say something to that effect.”
“Well, now that it’s settled, suppose we continue,” Rogers suggested.
They went on for perhaps a quarter of a mile without seeing anything
which even suggested a cave in the rocks and finally Rogers gave it as
his opinion that they’d better turn back. “We’ve got to hurry now if we
don’t want to get our feet wet,” he declared.
But they got back without having to run and Gordon grumbled over the
fact that they would have to wait six hours before they could do any
more exploring.
“That’s the worst of a tide,” he told them. “Up in God’s country you
don’t have to wait for them. The water always stays put and you know
where it is any time of the day or night.”
“Some people would grumble if they were going to be hanged,” Bill
remarked.
“Who wouldn’t,” Gordon retorted.
“I suppose we could take the plane and fly along by the cliff and see
what we could find,” Bill suggested as they reached camp.
“Say, that wouldn’t be a bad idea,” Gordon declared. “It’ll kill time
anyhow.”
“I’m voting for it,” Rogers added.
“All right, then. Wait a minute till I get a couple of cells,” Bill said
as he pulled out the stone which hid the hiding place.
He reached his hand in and a look first of amazement and then of
incredulity spread over his face. “Say,” he called, “Isn’t this the
place where we hid them?”
“Of course it is,” Gordon told him. “Don’t tell me they aren’t there.”
“I’ve got to,” Bill gasped turning about and facing them.
“Nonsense. Of course they’re there,” Gordon cried.
“Feel for yourself.”
Gordon felt and was obliged to acknowledge that the cells were gone.
“What do you know about that?” he cried as he straightened up.
“Someone must have been watching us when we hid them,” Rogers told them.
“See if there are any foot prints,” Bill ordered.
But the sand of the bowl was too thoroughly covered with their own marks
to yield anything and outside there were too many rocks.
“See if any of the other stuff is gone,” Gordon suggested, and they all
rushed to the place where they had cached their provisions. But nothing,
so far as they could tell, had been disturbed and for a moment they
stood and looked at each other speechless. “Can you beat it?” Gordon
finally gasped.
“Looks as though——” Bill began and then broke off sharp. “Wait a
minute,” he cried as he started for the plane.
They saw him jump into the cockpit and bend over the driver’s seat. For
a moment he rummaged in the small compartment and then straightened up
with a cry of triumph.
“Oh, baby,” Gordon shouted as he saw that Bill was holding up two of the
precious cells. “How’d they happen to be in there?”
“They’re old ones,” Bill explained. “And I’d forgotten all about them
till just that minute and even then I wasn’t sure they were there. I
don’t know how much juice there is in them but I reckon there’s enough
to last an hour or more. You know we’ve never used them till they’re
dry.”