Highway Pirates; or, The Secret Place at Coverthorne

CHAPTER XV.
IN DESPERATE STRAITS

Dazed by the sudden alarm, I lay for a moment hardly knowing where I was; then another lash of icy cold water across my face brought me to my senses, and I sprang to my feet.

Never shall I forget those terrible moments as we stood in pitchy darkness, relieved only by the faint, uncanny, phosphorescent light of the sea-water. The thudding boom of a big wave striking against the cliff and bursting in through the narrow archway, then the peculiar hollow sound the water made as it rushed along the cavern, and the fierce splash with which it expended its force against our platform – all are sounds which seem to echo in my ears even now as I write.

"The wind's come at last!" shouted George, and added something further which I could not catch.

"We're safe here," I answered at the top of my voice.

"I've no idea what the time is," he replied; "but I don't believe it's high water yet – the tide's still rising."

For just a few moments I think even brave George Woodley was panic-stricken at our hazardous situation, and his words added a fresh terror to the darkness. If the tide was still flowing, then it was only a matter of waiting till we should be washed away and drowned. There was apparently nothing to be done but to take up our position as far back as the width of our platform would allow, and so remain till our fate was decided.

The air was full of a fine drenching mist, but as yet only the broken spray from the waves had reached us. Trembling with cold and terror I stood, hoping against hope that the tide had reached its height or begun to ebb; then suddenly a larger sea than had hitherto entered the cavern swept clean over our place of refuge, the rushing surf whirling and hissing round our feet like a thousand serpents. The water had not taken us much above the ankles, but in that awful darkness I imagined for a moment that the end had already come, and clung to George with a cry of alarm.

"We must climb higher, Master Eden," yelled Woodley, his words, though shouted in my ear, almost drowned in the rush of the back-wash. "We must climb the rock; there's a ledge above us, if we can only get to it."

The words had hardly been uttered when, as though to enforce the necessity of his suggestion, another deluge of foaming surf swept over the rock, and I heard a clattering, bumping noise, the woeful significance of which I did not realize at the moment. Groping with our hands over the surface of the cold, slippery stone, and yelling directions to each other, though our heads were not two feet apart, we climbed precariously from one foothold to another till we reached a ledge some five or six feet above the level on which we had hitherto been standing. This was as far as we could get, for above us the end wall of the cave rose precipitously, as though the rock had been hewn to stand the test of line and plummet.

Weary, wet, and chilled to the bone, in such a miserable condition I think I would hardly have troubled to avoid a speedy ending to all my misfortunes if death had presented itself in a less terrible form. But the fearful churning of that wild water was sufficiently appalling to cause one to cling with frenzied earnestness to any position of safety; for to be drawn down into that raging tumult was as dreadful to contemplate as being flung bodily into some enormous piece of whirling machinery, to be ground and dashed out of all human shape by a force as pitiless as it was overwhelming.

Higher and higher rose the tide. Now our platform was completely awash, and the seas, dashing against the end of the cavern, leaped up like hungry wolves, and soaked afresh our already sodden clothes with icy water. Thrown back in echoes from the arched roof of the cave, the noise of the sea was probably magnified tenfold, and in the darkness was terrifying to hear, while the compressed air rushed through the opening above us with a long, whistling sigh. The wonder seems to me that the pair of us did not lose our reason. Happily for us, in those days folks were evidently made of tougher material, both as regards muscle and nerve, else I could hardly have survived the exposure of that night, let alone its long agony of suspense. As it was, I had come about to the end of my tether; and had it not been for Woodley, I should never have survived to write the present story. There came a boom louder than we had heard before. I seemed to feel that mighty mass of broken water sweeping towards us through the gloom. Then with a crash it burst over the lower ledge, and rose level with our armpits. I felt my numbed fingers relaxing their hold, and with a wild, despairing cry was slipping from my place, when Woodley seized me with one arm round the waist as the water subsided with a deafening roar.

That sea, I believe, was the largest which swept through the cave, and shortly after this the tide must have commenced to ebb; but of what happened next I had positively no remembrance, nor, strange to say, had George. Whether he held on to me after I lost consciousness, or whether we both continued to cling with a blind instinct of self-preservation to our ledge when our overtaxed brains had become oblivious to our surroundings, I cannot tell. How we maintained our foothold through the succeeding hours of darkness is a mystery. The next recollection I have is of finding myself lying on my side on the platform, staring blankly at the tossing surf as it rushed through the distant arch of rock in the gray light of morning.

The sea was rough, and a strong wind was blowing; but terrible as it had seemed at high water and in the darkness of night, it could not have been more than what seamen term half a gale, or we must certainly have been swept away and drowned.

I was so numbed that it was with great difficulty I could move my stiffened limbs and stagger to my feet; and when George spoke to me I discovered that I was nearly deaf – a result probably due to aggravation of the cold from which I had previously been suffering. What sort of an object I myself presented I have no means of telling, but when I looked at George I was shocked at his woebegone appearance. His face was haggard and pinched with cold, and something of that long night of terror seemed to remain in the wild glitter of his eyes. His cap was lost, and his sodden and dishevelled clothing hung about him like rags. Becoming aware of the fact that I was looking at him, he pointed, mutely with his finger. I saw in a moment what he meant; and if it had been possible for hope and courage to sink lower in my breast, they would surely have done so then. The sea had made a clean sweep of the rocky platform, and the raft was gone!

Save one piece of splintered board, which the waves had wedged into a fissure of the rock, not a fragment of wood remained in our possession; and not only had the wreckage been washed away from the spot where we had stored it, but the retreating tide, and some change in the currents, seemed to have carried it once more out to sea. I had reached a condition of despair and misery far beyond that which can find relief in tears; I could only stare in a dull, stupefied fashion at the empty space of cold, wet rock.

Woodley said something, but I could not catch his words.

"Speak louder," I answered, in a voice as hoarse as a crow's. "I can't hear; I believe I'm going deaf."

"All the timber's gone – every inch," cried George, coming nearer. "I've been having a look round, and there's nothing left but a lump of cheese and a bundle of rope what's up there in the 'cupboard.' I'm afraid we've played our last card, Master Eden."

I knew what he meant. If the sea continued rough, as there was every probability of its doing, we should never be able to hold out a second time when the tide rose and once more flooded our refuge. The misery and mental anguish through which we had passed had, I think, gone far to rob us both of the fear of death; but the form in which it appeared was terrible to contemplate, and the longing for life still throbbed fiercely in our breasts.

I said nothing; but feeling the water squelching in my boots, I emptied them, and then began stamping my icy feet in order to restore the circulation. Was there no hope? Must we remain like condemned criminals watching the angry water slowly rising till it claimed its prey? Of escape there seemed no possible chance, but in the anguish of our desolate condition I prayed fervently to God for fortitude and consolation to support us in our last hours.

Making cups of our hands, we drank from the trickling water as we ate our cheese. We had little to say to each other; even George seemed to have abandoned hope, and to be nerving himself up, that when the time came he might make a brave ending and encourage me to do the same.

"It seems months since I took you up at the Sportsman, Master Eden," he said, after a long silence. "Ah me! you little expected you was starting on such a queer journey."

He spoke in so kind and gentle a manner that I knew instinctively his thoughts and regrets were more for me than for himself. Somehow his tone, and the memories which his words awakened of the many times I had clambered up beside him on those happy days when I had returned to the home and dear ones I should never see again, broke me down; and rising hastily, I went forward to the edge of the platform and stood there, vainly endeavouring to stifle my sobs. I was but a boy, and am not ashamed now to remember those emotions.

I must have stood like this for some time, when I heard George call me; and looking round, I saw him standing gazing up at the roof of the cavern above his head.

"Master Eden, come here a minute, sir," he said.

I turned on my heel and obeyed, wondering what he wanted.

"Look here, sir," he continued, as I reached his side. "D'you see that hole up above there? I wonder how far it goes."

The roof of the cave was almost lost to view in sombre shadows; but as I have already mentioned, our eyes had become sufficiently accustomed to the gloom to make out the existence of a curious hole or fissure in the rock, which resembled nothing so much as a wide old-fashioned chimney, and this resemblance was strengthened by the fact that one side of it was level with the end wall of the cavern. More than this we could not tell, an oblong patch of blackness being all that could be seen from where we stood.

"I believe it goes up some way," continued George. "I noticed that the smoke from the fire all went up it, and didn't hang about in the roof yonder; and last night I heard the wind rushing through the opening when the big waves burst into the cavern."

"There are plenty of funny holes worn in the rook along this coast," I replied. "It may go up for a few feet, but there's no chance of its leading out to the top of the cliff."

"No, I don't suppose it would," answered my companion; "but what I've been thinking is, that perhaps it may turn a bit, and so form a ledge where we might take refuge out of reach of the waves."

"But it's out of our reach," I answered, almost petulantly. "We can't climb up the side of a flat rock like flies up a window-pane."

George did not reply for a moment, but remained staring upwards with his head thrown back as far as it would go.

"I believe," he continued, "that if we climbed up to the ledge we were on last night, and I hoisted you on to my shoulders, you might get a foothold still higher up on that shelf. Then there's a crack just below the opening, and if you stuck that piece of plank that's left in the rift, it would make another step, and bring you practically right into the hole. I suppose you've never climbed a chimney, Master Eden; but if you could do as the climbing boys do, work yourself up with your back against one side and your knees against the other, you might see how far it goes. I'll stand below and catch you if you fall."

By the "Foxes" I was accounted one of the best climbers of the tribe, and had a steady head; but I own I was not taken with the guard's proposal. The jagged rock on which we stood was hard and cruel, and it seemed impossible to ascend and descend the shaft without a tumble.

"How about yourself?" I objected. "If I do find a ledge up there, you'll have to stay down below; we can't both stand on each other's shoulders at the same time, and that's necessary for making the start."

"There's that rope, sir," was the reply. "You might find a way of making one end fast; and if so, I'd soon be up after you."

There was a pause.

"It's our only chance, sir," said George. "There's no knowing but what it might save the two of us."

That last remark fired my resolution: it was for him as well as for myself that the attempt was to be made. He had certainly saved my life, and by all the laws of justice and honour I owed him a like return, if such a thing were possible.

"All right," I cried; "I'll try it – now, at once!"

With some difficulty we wrenched the piece of splintered plank from the cranny into which one end had been forced by the sea, after which we scrambled up the ledge on which we had passed those awful hours of darkness. Everywhere the rock was wet and slippery from the drenching it had received during the storm. I felt George's foot slide as I clambered up on to his shoulders, and a horrid feeling of faintness seized me, for I was then high enough to have broken my neck if we had fallen. With dogged determination to get as far as I could, I planted my foot on the narrow shelf which my companion had indicated; and receiving the piece of plank which he handed up, I thrust it into the crack some two feet higher up, and almost in what might be called the mouth of the chimney. Fortunately this crevice was just wide enough to admit the wood a sufficient distance to make it secure; another step upwards, and as I made it my head struck sharply against something projecting from the side of the hole. It was evidently an iron bar bent round in a semicircle, with both ends embedded firmly in the rock. The surface was eaten with rust, but pull and tug at it as I would, it showed no signs of giving. Rising carefully to my full height, I found another piece of iron exactly similar to the first some little way above; then suddenly it occurred to my mind that they had been put there to serve as steps, as I had once seen similar irons placed in a new chimney-stack at Castlefield. Hesitating no longer, I mounted from one to another, until I must have climbed a dozen; then feeling with my hand in the darkness, I discovered an open space, evidently the mouth of some subterranean tunnel.

Far beneath me I could just make out the pale shadow of my companion's upturned face as he gazed anxiously into the gloom, wondering, no doubt, what had become of me.

"George! George!" I yelled excitedly, "I've found the entrance of a passage. Come up quick, and see for yourself. I believe we're saved!"

CHAPTER XVI.
THE SUBTERRANEAN TUNNEL

Whether George understood me I could not tell; he made some reply, but my increasing deafness rendered his words inaudible, I shouted again, and told him of the iron steps I had discovered; and this time he must have heard, for he waved his hand. He disappeared, but after a few moments I saw him again.

"Catch the end of this rope, and make it fast if you can," he roared.

Twice he threw, and I heard the coil of rope whistle in the rocky shaft, but it did not reach my hand; then the third time I grabbed it, and to make doubly sure, I fastened it to two of the iron steps, in case one should not prove equal to the strain of George's weight.

Woodley was an active fellow. He swung on the rope first, to make certain that it would bear him, and then commenced to climb. In less than two minutes he was by my side.

"Well, this is a queer place," he remarked, as he crouched by me in the subterranean tunnel. "Those iron steps weren't put there for nothing; somebody must have used them for going up and down."

"I wonder where this passage goes?" I said. "Perhaps it's part of a disused mine."

"There never was no mine along here that I know of," answered my companion. "The air seems fresh. The only thing is to go along and see where it leads. Be careful, Master Eden; there may be a nasty drop somewhere."

Slowly and cautiously, in the inky darkness, we crept along, at each step making sure of the ground in front of us before we advanced further. The path appeared to make a very gradual slope upwards. We must have gone quite twenty yards, which, owing to our slow progress, seemed treble that distance, and we were beginning to exult in the thought of speedily obtaining our freedom, when there was an exclamation from George, and the next moment we found ourselves brought up short by a bank of earth which completely blocked the passage. Even in the darkness it was not difficult to realize what had happened.

"The roof has fallen in," said Woodley shortly, but the catch in his voice betrayed his bitter disappointment.

There was no help for it – the tunnel was blocked; and in utter weariness we sat down on the rocky floor to rest.

"Well, we're better off here than where we were last night," said George. "We shouldn't live many more hours down below, for I believe the storm's getting worse."

"I wonder what this passage was for?" I remarked, after a few moments' silence. "D'you suppose the smugglers used it for anything?"

"No," answered George. "If the smugglers made it, then old Lewis would have known of its existence, and he'd have tried to escape this way instead of risking his life in that boat."

"He did say something," I exclaimed, suddenly remembering the last words I had heard from the old salt. "I didn't suppose they had any meaning at the time, for I thought he was drunk. Wait a moment, and I'll tell you exactly what they were. He said, 'You'll find it yourself if you look about. I'm the only one as knows.'"

"Then he must have known," said George, "but he didn't want those convict chaps to find out. Perhaps it's a secret among the 'free traders,' or perhaps it's a fact that the old chap was really the only person who knew. I've heard him say that he was a rare climber when he was younger, and had got to places on the cliffs where no one else had ever been. Well, sir, there's a bit of cheese and two apples wedged in that crack of the rock. I'd better go down and fetch them before the tide rises; they'll at least keep life in us for a couple of days."

Slowly we retraced our steps, taking great care lest we should arrive at the opening of the shaft before we knew where we were, and fall through it on to the platform beneath. With the sea rising, there seemed as small a chance as ever that we should get out of the cave alive; but we were, at all events, spared the terrible fate which that morning had seemed inevitable. Woodley descended to the cavern, and having rolled up the two apples and the cheese in his coat, he made fast the bundle to the end of the rope, and I hauled it up. He was in the act of following, and had nearly reached the mouth of the shaft, when I saw him pause and, hanging on the rope with one hand, take something off a ledge with the other.

"What d'you think I've found?" he said, as he joined me again in the tunnel. "Why, that pistol Rodwood left behind. I put it right up there out of harm's way. The little crevice is dry and sheltered, and a good bit above the reach of the waves, so I don't doubt but what the charge will explode all right if it's fired. It don't seem much good to us at present, but it might come in useful to make a signal and attract attention if we could manage to get to the mouth of the cave and sight a passing ship or boat. There!" he continued, as we once more sat down at the end of the passage, and he unrolled our meagre stores from his coat; "that's all we've got in the world, barring the water that trickles down the rock below, and a bottle of sweet oil I've got in my pocket, which my missis asked me to bring her from the chemist's at Welmington. Poor girl! she's wondering what's become of it, and of me, too, by now, I expect. And the stuff isn't much good to us, I fancy. I wish the bottle had been filled with some of that brandy those rascals wasted; we shall be likely to need something of the sort before long, if we haven't wanted it already."

Although the tunnel was blocked, a cold draught from the cave below seemed to be always blowing through it, every now and again coming in stronger gusts as the storm increased. The darkness was so intense that I already felt it oppressive, and thought that after a time it would become positively unbearable.

"I wonder if the smugglers ever come here now," I said. "They might perhaps know of the place, and use it as a hiding-place for their goods."

With this notion in my mind I went down on my hands and knees, and felt about in order to find anything which might prove that the tunnel had been visited at one time or another by the "free traders." But though I spent some time in groping about in this manner, I picked up nothing but a few fragments of rock. Then I remembered Lewis's words, and how he had distinctly stated that he was "the only one that knows." He had no doubt been led by some accident to discover the shaft and the passage, and had thought fit to keep the knowledge to himself, perhaps intending to make good use of it when any special need should arise for a place of concealment, either for men or "goods."

I sat down again by Woodley, and passing my hand over my clothes to find if they were drying at all, I felt something hard in my inside coat pocket. Wondering vaguely what it could be, I unbuttoned my jacket, and while doing so remembered suddenly the metal tinder-box I had found in the empty desk the day before I left school. I took it out, fumbled with my fingers till I found the flint and steel, and – I suppose for the sake of seeing a ray of light, however tiny and momentary – I struck a spark. I hardly think if I had fired a gun it could have produced a more unexpected effect on Woodley. He sprang to his feet with something like a shout of surprise.

"What's that?" he cried. "A tinder-box! Where did you find it? I made sure Rodwood had taken it with him in his pocket."

"This is another," I answered; "it's one I found at school. The lid fits well, and has kept out the damp, I fancy."

"Bless the boy!" cried George, "why didn't you tell me you had it before? I've been wishing and wishing for one this last hour or more."

"It's precious little good now that you have got it," I replied, handing him the box in the darkness. "We've got nothing to light except the tinder and matches, and that's no practical use."

"Wait a bit," interrupted the guard. "We'll make a lamp. This bottle of oil I've got in my pocket will provide stuff to burn, and a strand of worsted out of one of my socks will make a wick. Hurrah, Master Eden! we'll get a light burning presently, and find out what sort of a place we're in."

"I don't see how you're going to make a lamp," I answered, "unless you hold the oil in the palm of your hand. We've got nothing left – not even that metal cup the men took from poor Tom's flask."

The question was a difficult one to answer. Reduced to the possession of practically nothing but the clothes we wore, it seemed at first impossible to manufacture any implement or vessel, however simple. But necessity is the mother of invention, and certainly the necessity in our case was sufficiently pressing to quicken any inventive faculties we might possess.

After some minutes' thought, and the making of one or two suggestions which had to be abandoned as impracticable, my companion slapped his thigh, exclaiming, —

"I've got it – my old watch!"

With the aid of his knife George managed to remove the works from the old-fashioned turnip-shaped silver case, which was so commonly seen in those days. This formed a sort of cup to hold the oil, which was supplied with a sort of floating wick made of a thread of worsted and a tiny bit of wood, to obtain which we were obliged to descend the iron steps, and bring up the fragment of broken plank from the bottom of the shaft. It was hardly possible that the tiny flame could be kept long alight if exposed to the strong draught which swept through the tunnel; but with a piece of leather cut from the top of his boot, and the big bull's-eye glass of the watch, Woodley managed to fashion a rough but effective shade, and at length the lamp was pronounced ready for use. If we had been a couple of boys about to let off a big sky-rocket, we could hardly have felt more excited as we struck the flint, blew up the spark in the tinder, and ignited first the sulphur match and then the tiny wick. The result was poor enough, but the lamp certainly did burn, giving out perhaps as much light as a modern night-light. To us, however, after having been so long in total darkness, it seemed quite brilliant; and with its aid there was at all events a possibility of our being able to examine our surroundings.

A part of the passage had evidently been cut through the solid rock, but farther along the roof was of earth, and had been propped up with wooden supports. It was owing to the fact that some of these, no doubt rotten with age, had given way, that the fall had occurred which formed the block against which we had been brought up short. We at once proceeded to examine this obstruction, and had hardly turned our light upon it before we made an important discovery. The fall had not been of sufficient volume to quite block the tunnel; there was a narrow opening still at the top of the heap of débris, but not wide enough, as we could see at a glance, to admit of the passage of a human being.

"Hurrah!" cried the guard. "D'you see that, sir? We'll soon scratch a hole there big enough to crawl through, or my name ain't George Woodley."

"I'm afraid if you do it won't be much good," I answered. "If the roof has fallen here, it's almost sure to have fallen again further on in several places, before the tunnel comes to the surface. This shows that no one has been along it for some time."

We turned away, and examined the rest of the passage as far as the top of the shaft; but only one thing did we find, and that was an empty bottle stowed away in a hole in the rock. It was a queer, misshapen old thing, which had, perhaps, held good liquor in its time, but evidently belonged to a by-gone age. Worthless as it might have appeared under ordinary circumstances, to us it proved a valuable find; and George offered at once to go down and fill it with water from the cave below. The discovery and the suggestion were both made none too soon. Another half-hour and it would have been impossible, for both wind and tide were rising; the big waves were already breaking into the entrance of the cavern with a booming roar, and the boiling surf swept clean over the platform just as George was re-ascending the rope.

I was a strong, healthy boy, but the long hours of cold, terror, and semi-starvation were beginning to tell. I felt weak and feverish, my skin was dry and parched, yet the chill from my sodden clothes seemed still to strike right through into my very bones. With the aid of his knife George fashioned the fragment of plank into something resembling a short spade; then scrambling up the bank of earth, he began to dig with the intention of enlarging the existing hole till it should be big enough for us to crawl through. With burning eyes and chattering teeth I stood below, and assisted as best I could by dragging away the loose earth with my hands. What with my deafness, and with the roar of the sea in the cavern below, I could not hear a word he said, though he did not waste much time in talking.

Our fate must have been decided long before this if we had not found means of ascending the shaft to our present position. The storm had increased in fury, and we could tell each time a big wave swept into the cavern, by the rush of air which came whistling up the shaft and swept in a briny blast along the passage. Suddenly George stopped working, and I saw the dark outline of his figure motionless in the feeble ray of the little lamp.

"What's the matter?" I cried.

He made no reply, but raised his hand as a person would in the act of listening. For half a minute he remained in that position, then resumed his digging. In a very short time, however, he stopped again, and after an instant's pause startled me by leaning forward and shouting at the top of his voice through the hole, —

"Hollo, there!"

Receiving apparently no reply to his hail, he turned and beckoned me to climb up by his side.

"Can you hear anything, Master Eden?" he asked.

I listened intently, but no sound caught my ear but the muffled surge and splash of the water in the cavern.

"There!" exclaimed my companion – "there again! Don't you hear it?"

Still to my dulled hearing no fresh sound was audible.

"What was it?" I asked.

Without answering my question, he once more roared, "Hollo, there!" through the widened hole, and remained with warning hand uplifted, as though expecting an answering shout. "Fancy, I suppose," he muttered at length. "Yet that blind fellow heard something of the sort too. Tut! I think I'm going queer in my head."

He went on digging, but once or twice I noticed that he paused in the same curious manner. I was too weary to pay much attention, but continued laboriously scooping and dragging the earth he loosened till my fingers seemed raw. At length Woodley stopped digging, and sat down for a rest. As he moved the lamp the dim oil flame gave me a momentary glimpse of his face, and on it I thought I detected a queer expression which I had never noticed there before.

For ten minutes, perhaps, he sat regaining his breath, and saying nothing; then turning to me he asked abruptly, —

"Master Eden, do you believe there's such things as ghosts?"

"No," I answered blankly, astonished at the question. A terrible thought flashed through my mind that, as a last crowning horror, Woodley was actually going out of his mind. "No," I repeated in a faltering tone, "I don't believe in ghosts."