“Why doesn’t Paul come?” wondered Jack impatiently. “What a time he is! Surely the ladder is safe now.”
Mike peered up. The moon shone brightly on the tower of the Old House, and the rope-ladder hung against the wall, quite straight and firm.
“It’s funny,” said Mike. “Do you suppose he doesn’t dare to risk himself down our ladder?”
“Can’t imagine what he’s doing,” said Jack. “We can’t stand here all night. I do wish he’d hurry.”
The two dogs came running up. They had finished their bone. They nosed round the two boys, licking their hands. Jack patted them. “Don’t you bark at Paul when he comes down the ladder,” he warned them. “He’s a friend of ours - so don’t you dare to make a sound. Do you hear, Tinker? Do you hear, Don?”
The dogs wagged their tails. They did not understand what Jack was saying, but they liked to hear him talking to them. Jack looked impatiently up the ladder once more. He shook it - but still nothing happened.
“I’ll climb up softly and see what’s up,” said Mike at last. “He may be waiting for one of us to tell him how to climb down.”
“All right,” said Jack. “I’ll hold the ladder as firmly as I can. Good luck!”
Mike began to climb the rope-ladder. He went up the side of the tower in the bright moonlight like a little black shadow. The girls at Peep-Hole could see him quite well through the field-glasses. They were puzzled to think why Mike should go up the ladder instead of Prince Paul coming down.
Mike went up and up. At last he came to the window where Prince Paul had taken in the top of the ladder. He put his head cautiously above the window-sill - caught sight of a little boy sitting on a couch at the far side of the room, looking very scared - and then a voice said, “Got him!” and Mr. Diaz leaned out of the window and took firm hold of poor Mike!
Mike did not dare to struggle, for he was afraid of falling down the ladder. He had to let himself be hauled into the tower room. Mr. Diaz stood him on the floor and then quickly pulled up the rope-ladder, jerking it roughly from Jack’s hands below.
“And now we have two prisoners,” said the soft sleepy voice of Luiz, and Mike saw that he was there too, standing behind Mr. Diaz.
Mike said nothing. He just stood there, looking angry. He glanced at Prince Paul. The little boy called out to Mike.
“I would have warned you, but I dared not. They came into the room and saw me fixing the ladder - and they made me sit over here whilst they waited to see if you would come up.”
“And he came up,” said Mr. Diaz. “And here he can stay. And to-morrow, Luiz, we will board up this window so that neither Paul nor this inquisitive boy can signal to the other tiresome children. They must do without his company until Friday, when we take Paul somewhere that is not crowded out with curious children, who get themselves into trouble through poking their noses into somebody else’s business.”
“You will have to miss a little of your holiday,” said sleepy-eyed Luiz to Mike. “But Paul here will welcome your company, I am sure! Maybe this will teach you not to interfere another time in what is no business of yours!”
The two men went out of the tower-room, locked the door and bolted it. Mike shot to the window and leaned out.
“Jack! Jack!” he called in a low voice. “Are you there?”
“Yes,” said Jack from behind a bush. “What’s happened?”
“They’ve pulled up the ladder and made me a prisoner too,” said Mike. “But they don’t know you’re outside, Jack. Go back to the others and tell them and see if you can think of some idea to get us out. You won’t be able to signal to-morrow because this window is going to be boarded up. You’ll have to be jolly clever to rescue us. They are taking Paul away somewhere else on Friday and I expect they’ll set me free then; but we must be rescued before or we’ll never know where Paul has gone.”
Jack listened to this long whisper in silence. He was angry with himself for having let Mike go up the ladder. He might have thought that maybe someone was waiting up there to catch one of them. “All right, Mike, old chap,” he said. “I’ll get you both out somehow. Cheer up. I’m going back now.”
He slipped through the bushes to the wall. He climbed up a tree, whilst the dogs whined below, sad to see him go, and then dropped on to the top of the high wall. He jumped from there to the ground, took a quick look round to see if anyone was about and then tore off in the moonlight to Peep-Hole.
The girls were waiting for him, both in tears, for they had seen all that had happened through their field-glasses.
“Oh, Jack, oh, Jack!” wept Nora. “How can we get poor Mike back? Oh, why did you let him go up? We could see somebody waiting at the side of the window and we couldn’t warn you.”
“It was bad luck,” said Jack gloomily. “I was an idiot to let him go up. Somehow I never thought of anyone lying in wait for one of us up there.”
“What are we going to do now?” asked Peggy, wiping her eyes. “We’ll have to get Mike back somehow. What will Dimmy say to-morrow morning when he doesn’t go down to breakfast?”
“Cheer up,” he said. “After all, we do know where Mike is - and we’ve only got to go to the police and they’ll get him back for us.”
“There’s only one fat old policeman here and he doesn’t belong to Spiggy Holes,” said Peggy. “And anyway we can’t get him in the middle of the night.”
“I want to tell Dimmy,” said Nora suddenly. “We will have to tell here to-morrow morning anyhow - and I want to tell her to-night. I can’t go to sleep unless we tell somebody grown-up about Mike being caught.”
“But we can’t wake Dimmy in the middle of the night!” said Jack. “We’d better wait till the morning. Mike will be all right to-night; there’s a bed in that tower-room, I saw it through the key-hole last night.”
“I want to tell Dimmy,” wept poor Nora. “I do want to tell Dimmy.”
The little girl felt that if only she could tell somebody grown-up something could be done. Grown-up people were powerful - she even had an idea that Dimmy might march up to the Old House straightaway and demand that Mike should be set free!
“Well, we’ll go and wake Dimmy and tell her now, if you feel you must let her know to-night,” said Jack, who secretly felt as if he would like to tell her as soon as possible too. “She may have a good idea.”
So down the winding staircase of their little tower went the three children, through the tower door into the kitchen and then up the carpeted staircase to Dimmy’s bedroom. They knocked on the door.
“Who’s that?” said Dimmy’s voice.
“It’s us,” said Nora. “Can we come in?”
“Of course,” said Dimmy. “Is one of you ill?”
The children opened the door. Dimmy lighted two candles and sat up in bed and looked at them. Her hair was in two long plaits over her shoulder, and she somehow looked different, but very kind and anxious.
“Where’s Mike?” she said. “Is he ill?”
They sat on her bed, and first one and then another of the children told her the strange story of the Old House, the secret passage from the shore to the cellars of the Old House, the prince who was a prisoner in the tower - and then how Mike had been caught at the top of the rope-ladder.
Dimmy listened in the greatest surprise and astonishment. She asked them questions, she exclaimed in amazement, she groaned with horror when she heard about Mike.
“Well!” she said, when the long story was finished, “so that was your great secret! And a most extraordinary one too. I have wondered what those people up at the Old House were up to - I knew it was something queer and not right. Poor little Prince! What a shame to keep him prisoner like that! I read in the paper how he had disappeared, and no one knew where he was - but little did I think he was so near!”
“How are we to get Mike back?” asked Nora, much happier now that Dimmy knew everything. “And Paul too - he must be rescued before Friday.”
Dimmy thought for a long time. Then she said something that set the children’s hearts beating with excitement.
“My grandfather once told me that there was a secret way between Peep-Hole tower and the tower of the Old House,” she said. “It was often used by the old-time smugglers when they wanted to get unseen from one house to the other. If we could find it, we could reach the tower of the Old House easily, and fetch back the two boys without anyone knowing.”
“Oh, Dimmy!” cried the three children, their eyes shining brightly. “We must find it! We must, we must!”
“Well, we will hunt for it to-morrow,” said Dimmy. “And I think we must get George to help us, because it will mean using a good deal of strength to find a passage that has been unused and hidden for years. As far as I remember, my grandfather said that a great stone had to be swivelled round in the wall of our tower - and certainly none of us could do that. George is very strong, and he can keep a secret too.”
After talking for a little while longer the children were sent off to bed. Before they got into bed they were very much cheered by seeing Mike at the lighted window of the Old House tower, waving to them in the moonlight. He seemed quite cheerful, and Nora and Peggy were very glad to see him.
“Good old Mike.” said Jack, getting into bed. “I hope he won’t be too miserable.”
“So do I,” said Nora. “And, oh, I do hope we find the hidden way between our tower and the other tower. Won’t George be surprised when he hears all we’ve got to tell him! Oh, to-morrow, do come quickly!”