"Are there any bats?" asked Gladys, hanging back.
"Nothing but brickbats," came Sahwah"s cheerful voice from within.
Gladys and Hinpoha crawled through the opening, and Katherine, with a resigned, "Goodbye, dress," followed with Nyoda and Nakwisi and Medmangi.
The room was nothing more than an extension of the cellar, built into the side of the hill, but to them it was filled with romantic possibilities.
"What do you suppose it was?" asked Hinpoha, straining her eyes in the semi-darkness.
"The dungeon, of course," answered Katherine promptly. "Here"s where your beautiful princess confined the lovers that didn"t suit her fancy-light-haired ones and fat ones, especially. She chained them to the wall and the rats nibbled their toes."
"Oh-oh-oh!" shrieked Hinpoha, stopping her ears. "Don"t say such dreadful things. I can feel the rats nibbling at my toes this minute."
The walls of this cellar were badly crumbled, and at the farther side the girls discovered another cave-like opening. This was entirely dark and they hesitated before going in. Then Nyoda took her pocket flash and Gladys found hers, and by the combined glimmer of the two the girls found their way into the farther cave. At first they had to keep the light on the ground to see where to put their feet and they were all inside before Nyoda turned her flash on the walls. Then a great cry of amazement burst from every girl, ending in a breathless gasp. The walls and roof of the cave seemed to be made of precious stones-pearls, sapphires, emeralds, amethysts and diamonds. They caught the gleam from the pocket flashes and twinkled and reflected in a hundred points of dancing light. Great ma.s.ses of crystal, faceted like diamonds, hung suspended from the roof almost touching their heads, seemingly held up by magic.
"Am I dreaming," cried Hinpoha, "or is this Alladin"s cave? What is it, Nyoda? Where are we?"
Nyoda laughed at their open mouths and staring eyes. "Only in one of Nature"s treasure vaults," she said. "This is one of the famous crystal caves that are found throughout these islands. It"s a form of rock crystal, strontia, I believe some people call it, and I don"t doubt but what it"s related to the limestone in the quarries. Take a good look at it, for some of these crystals are simply marvellous."
Their voices echoed and re-echoed weirdly, as they called to each other, the sound seeming to roll along the low ceiling. "Look at this ma.s.s over here," cried Sahwah, penetrating deeper into the cave, "it looks like a man standing against the wall."
"And this one looks like a dog lying down," said Hinpoha, pointing to another.
Laughing, shouting, exclaiming, they explored the wonders of the cave until a heavy shock as of something falling, accompanied by a deafening crash, rooted them to the ground with fright. "What is it? What has happened?" they asked one another, and made their way back to the entrance. But the entrance was no longer there. Where it had been there was a solid wall of stone. Their climbing around among the ruined walls had sent some of the bricks sliding and these had released a large rock which had rolled down directly over the opening into the crystal cave.
With desperate force they pushed against the rock, but their sevenfold strength made no more impression than a fly brushing its wings against it. With white faces they turned to each other when they realized the truth. They were imprisoned in the cave!
"The other direction!" cried Sahwah, shaking off her terror and setting her wits to work. "We may be able to get out the other way." Taking the flashlight from Gladys, whose trembling fingers threatened to drop it, she led the way into the gloomy recesses of the cave, whose depths they had penetrated only a short distance before. They shuddered at the icicle like crystals, which now seemed like long fingers reaching down to catch a hold of them, and shrank back from the crystal ma.s.ses that took the forms of men and animals. These now seemed like ghosts of creatures that had been trapped in the cave as they were. For trapped they were. In a few moments their progress was barred by impa.s.sable ma.s.ses of crystal.
Back again they went to the rock-blocked entrance and beat upon it and pushed with all their might. All in vain. The rock stood firm as Gibraltar. They shouted and called and screamed until the echoes clamored hideously, but no answering call came from the outside. From somewhere, far in the distance, came the dismal sound of falling water, chilling the blood in their veins.
Helplessly the girls all turned to Nyoda, asking, "What shall we do?"
Nyoda stood still and tried to face the situation calmly. She held her flashlight close to the rock and looked carefully all around the edge. At one side there was a tiny fissure, not more than half an inch wide and about six inches long, caused by the irregular shape of the rock. Nyoda regarded this minute opening thoughtfully. "If we could put something through that opening which would act as a signal, we might attract somebody"s attention who wouldn"t be able to hear us calling," she said at length. "Our voices are so m.u.f.fled in here they can"t carry very far outside."
"Is there anybody on the island to see it?" asked Gladys doubtfully.
"There are some people here," answered Nyoda, "because the fishermen stay all the year round. You remember those houses we pa.s.sed on the other side of the quarry, where the nets were hanging in the yard?"
"What shall we use for a signal of distress?" asked Gladys. "Not one of us has a tie or a ribbon on today."
"Use my dress skirt," said Katherine generously. "It"s so torn anyway that it"ll never feel the same again, even if it recovers from this trip." Which was perfectly true. So they tore the wide hem from her dress, which made a pennant about six feet long. Then Sahwah had a further inspiration, and, dipping her finger into a dark puddle formed on the floor by a thin stream of moisture trickling down the wall, she wrote the word HELP on the strip. Nyoda poked the end through the opening and shoved the rest out after it, keeping the other end in her hand, and she could feel by the tugging at the strip that the high wind had caught the portion outside and was whipping it about.
"Now shout for all you"re worth," commanded Nyoda.
Early that Sat.u.r.day morning the Captain had aroused Slim from his peaceful slumbers unceremoniously. "Hurry up and come over," he said, in response to Slim"s protesting grunt. "Uncle Theodore"s here with his automobile and he"s going to take a run over to Freeport this morning and he said he would take all the fellows along that were ready at nine o"clock. Hurry."
Slim needed no second invitation and roused himself immediately, while the Captain sped to collect the remainder of the Sandwiches, which was accomplished in short order, as none of the other invitations involved resurrection. Nine o"clock found them all on the curbstone before the Captain"s house, standing beside Uncle Theodore"s big car, waiting for the word to pile in. The ride to Freeport was accomplished in a few hours" time and after dinner Uncle Theodore turned the boys loose to see the town by themselves while he transacted the business which had taken him thither. Freeport had no attraction outside of its harbor, and thither the boys betook themselves without delay. Pa.s.senger steamers left every half hour for the various islands nearby; lime boats, tugs and scows crowded the mouth of the river, and the whole atmosphere breathed of ships. The boys stood and watched a while and then pined for something to do.
"Let"s hire a launch," suggested the Captain, who felt that it was up to him to furnish the amus.e.m.e.nt, inasmuch as he had invited them to come along, "and go out on the lake."
Launches were readily to be had and soon they were curving around in great circles through the waves, drenched with the spray, and enjoying it as only boys can enjoy the sensation of riding in a speed boat.
"Let"s go to Rock Island," said Slim, who had not forgotten who else had planned to go there that day.
"What for?" asked the Captain.
"Oh, nothing," answered Slim, "except that there"s a pretty nice aquarium there, and-and the girls said they were going to be there."
"But we were politely invited to stay home, if I remember rightly," said Bottomless Pitt. "They"re going to have a pow-wow, or something like that."
"But if we should run into them accidentally they would probably be glad to see us," persisted Slim. Slim was fond of picnics gotten up by girls on account of the superior quality of the "grub"; he was especially fond of Winnebago picnics, because the Winnebagos treated him better than any other girls he knew, and as mentioned before, he had a decided weakness for red hair. Hence his ingenuous desire to go to Rock Island. The Captain, knowing Slim like a book, laughed. But he, too, wished he had been invited to the picnic, and his reasons coincided in their last item with Slim"s.
"All right," he said, and turned the boat"s head toward the green outline of Rock Island. Half of the distance across the bay the launch wheezed and stopped dead.
"Pshaw," said Slim disgustedly, when the Captain announced that they had run out of gasoline. They had come to a stop just off a small rocky island and with the aid of the one oar the launch boasted the Captain proceeded to paddle in to sh.o.r.e, in the hope that he could obtain gasoline there.
"Regular desert island," grunted Slim, as they walked and met no one.
"None of the cottages seem to be occupied."
"Cheer up; we"ll find someone," said the Captain. "The fishermen live on these islands all winter. Look at the limestone quarries over there."
"And the ruined something or other behind them," said the Bottomless Pitt.
"Let"s cut across here," said Slim, who was ever on the lookout for short cuts. "I see some houses over there."
"And break our necks crawling over those stones," said Monkey. "Not much."
So they started to follow the path that led around the curve of the sh.o.r.e. "Wonder if it wouldn"t have been better to cut across, anyway,"
said the Captain, when they had gone some distance. "These blooming little stones are worse to walk on than spikes. Those rocks couldn"t have been much worse." And he stood still and looked thoughtfully back at the ruined cellar.
"Hi!" he exclaimed suddenly. "What"s that?"
"What"s what?" asked Slim.
"That white rag flying from the rock over there. It surely wasn"t there a minute ago."
"Probably was, only you didn"t see it," said Slim, impatient to go on.
"I"m positive it wasn"t," said the Captain. "I"m going over to have a look at it. When rags start out of rocks there"s something in the wind."
And he walked briskly toward it, the rest following. As they drew near their startled eyes fell on the black letters of the word HELP, traced in wobbly lines.
"Yay!" shouted the boys at the top of their lungs. "Where are you and what"s the matter?"
Apparently from inside the rock came the feeble echo of a shout: "We"re in the cave! The rock covered the doorway!"
"Wait a minute!" called the Captain in answer, and boylike tried to move the rock himself. "Lend a hand, fellows," he said, after one shove against its solid side. They lent all the hands they had, but could not budge it. "Pull the bricks out from around it," commanded the Captain, taking charge of the affair like a general, "and look out for your feet when she lunges over!" They set to work, dislodging the bricks that held it in, and before long it moved, tottered, grated and finally, with a great crash, lunged over and rolled down a little slope.
Pale and shaken, the Winnebagos emerged into the light of day. Had the ghosts of their great grandmothers appeared before them the boys could not have been more surprised. Questions and answers flew back and forth thick and fast until the tale of their finding the cave was told.
"And I"ll never, never, explore anything again!" finished Hinpoha, in an emphatic tone.