by Enid Blyton
They reached it and looked upwards. It towered up, steep and sheer. Nobody could climb that, not even Snowy!
‘Now where were the others when they disappeared?’ said Jack. ‘About here, I think.’
He led the way to an uneven slab of rock. Hanging down in front of it, over the rocky wall, was a thick curtain of greenery, half bramble, half creepers of some kind, all matted together.
The children thought this mass of green was actually growing on the wall, in the same way that many other little plants and ferns grew. It was only when the wind blew strongly, and the curtain-like mass swung backwards and forwards a little that Lucy-Ann guessed it wasn’t growing out of the wall – it was hanging down, covering it!
She caught hold of it. It swung back like a curtain! Behind it was the wall, right enough – but there was a split in it, a great crack that reached up about twenty feet.
‘Look!’ said Lucy-Ann. ‘This is a kind of curtain, Jack. And look at the big crack in the wall behind. Is this where they went yesterday?’
‘Gosh, yes! They must all have gone quickly behind this curtain of creepers,’ said Jack. ‘And I thought they had vanished! Hold it up, Lucy-Ann. Let’s see the crack. I bet they went through that!’
All three passed easily behind the swinging curtain of creeper and bramble. They could slip through the crack without any trouble at all. Once through it they found themselves in an immensely high cave, very round, and with no roof that could be seen, though Jack flashed his torch up as far as he could manage.
‘It’s like a hole in the mountain,’ he said. ‘It goes up goodness knows how high!’
‘Did the others come in here?’ asked Dinah, staring upwards. ‘Where did they go then?’
‘Can’t think,’ said Jack, puzzled. ‘I say, look here – look what’s in the middle of the floor! I almost went into it!’
He flashed his torch on to the floor of the cave – but there was hardly any floor to be seen! Most of it was taken up by a silent black pool, whose surface had no wrinkle or ripple!
‘It’s not a nice pool,’ said Lucy-Ann, with a shudder.
‘This is a most peculiar cave,’ said Dinah. ‘No roof – no floor – only a deep pool! And no sign of where the others went yesterday.’
‘There must be some way out,’ said Jack, quite determined to search until he found it. He began to walk all round the cave, flashing his torch on it, inch by inch. But there was no opening anywhere, not even a tiny hole. The walls were absolutely solid.
‘Well, there’s no passage leading out of this cave!’ said Jack, giving it up. He glanced up to the roofless top of the cave. ‘The only way is up there! But there are no footholds to climb up – nothing! Nobody could possibly climb up these steep walls.’
‘Well then – is there a way out through the pool?’ said Dinah, half in fun.
Jack looked at the black pool. ‘No, I don’t see how that pool can possibly contain a way out of this cave. Still – it’s the only thing I haven’t examined. I’ll have a swim in it – or wade across!’
But it was too deep to wade. Jack took two steps and the water came over his knees. He stripped off his clothes and plunged in. Lucy-Ann didn’t like it much. She watched Jack anxiously as he swam across and back.
‘Can’t feel the bottom at all,’ said Jack, kicking out with his legs. ‘Must be awfully deep. A bottomless pool and a roofless cave – sounds odd, doesn’t it? I’m coming out now. The water’s icy cold.’
He found his footing almost at the edge of the pool, slipped and went in again. He reached out to grasp the edge and his hand found something else. It felt like a small steering-wheel under the water!
Jack got out and dressed. He was shivering too much to do any more investigation till he had some clothes on. Then he knelt down by the edge of the pool and put his hand in to feel the curious wheel-like thing again.
‘Hold my torch, Lucy-Ann,’ he commanded. ‘There’s something odd here!’
Lucy-Ann held the torch in trembling fingers. What was Jack going to find? ‘It’s a little wheel,’ he said. ‘Why is it here? Well, wheels are meant to turn, so I’ll turn it! Here goes!’
He turned it to the right. It ran easily. And then he jumped violently because both the girls screamed loudly and clutched him hard!
16
Inside the mountain
‘What’s the matter?’ shouted Jack, jumping up. ‘What’s happened!’
Lucy-Ann had dropped the torch in her fright. The light went out and they were in darkness. She clutched at Jack again and startled him.
‘Something touched me!’ she whispered. ‘Something ran its fingers all down me. Oh, Jack, what was it?’
‘Yes, and me too,’ said Dinah, in a trembling voice. ‘I felt them. They touched my shoulder softly and then ran all the way down to my feet. What is it, Jack? There’s something here. Let’s get out.’
‘Where’s the torch?’ said Jack impatiently. ‘Oh, Lucy-Ann, I hope it isn’t broken. You idiot, dropping it like that.’
He groped about for it on the floor and found it. Luckily it hadn’t rolled into the pool. He shook it and the light came on. Everyone was very thankful.
‘Now, what touched you?’ demanded Jack. ‘Nothing touched me!’
‘I don’t know,’ said Lucy-Ann. ‘I want to get out of here, Jack. I’m frightened.’
Jack swung his torch round behind the girls. He saw something that made him cry out in surprise. The girls didn’t dare to look. They clung to him, trembling.
‘See what touched you? A rope-ladder falling down just behind you!’ laughed Jack. ‘Well, what a surprise! You’d never dream of that!’
Dinah pulled herself together at once, and forced herself to laugh. ‘Well! Fancy that! I really did think it was somebody touching me. It felt just like it.’
‘It must just have run down quietly behind you from somewhere up high,’ said Jack, flashing his torch upwards, and following the ladder with the beam as far as he could. ‘Well, you made me jump all right when you yelled. I almost went head-first into the pool!’
‘It happened when you turned that wheel down there,’ said Lucy-Ann, still shivering a little.
‘Yes. A very clever little idea,’ said Jack. ‘I must say this is a jolly well-hidden entrance to the mountain – better even than Ali Baba’s cave! First there’s the green curtain. Then just a crack in the rock. Then you come in and see nothing but a black pool and a roofless cave. Most people would just say, “How odd!” and go out again!’
‘Yes. They would never, never guess about the ladder that comes tumbling down when you turn the wheel hidden so cleverly in the water,’ agreed Dinah. ‘Most ingenious, all of it. Somebody with brains lives in this mountain!’
‘Yes,’ said Jack thoughtfully. ‘Brains that work and produce minor earthquakes and crimson smoke, and plan for landing-grounds for helicopters on mountain-tops – and keep packs of Alsatians that would terrorize anyone roaming too near the mountain. Very remarkable brains! I wonder exactly what those brains are after!’
The girls stared at him in the dimly lit cave, with the black pool glinting up at them. Jack sounded very serious. He felt serious too. There was something very strange about all this. Something very clever. Much too clever. What could be going on?
He stared up the ladder. He felt very much inclined to go up it. He longed to see what was inside the mountain – and he wanted to find Philip again too. Then a hollow voice made them all jump violently.
‘Naughty boy! Pifflebunk!’
‘It’s Kiki,’ said Jack, relieved. ‘You wretched bird, you made me jump! What do you think of this cave, Kiki?’
‘Pifflebunk,’ repeated Kiki, and made a noise like a mowing-machine. It sounded terrible in that roofless cave. The noise seemed to go up and up endlessly. Kiki enjoyed the sound. She began all over again.
‘Be quiet,’ said Jack. ‘Goodness knows what will happen if your noises arrive at the top of this ladder, and somebody hears them
!’
‘You’re not going up, are you, Jack?’ asked Lucy-Ann, afraid, as she saw Jack place a foot on the lowest rung of the rope-ladder.
‘Yes. I’ll just go up to the top and see what’s there and come down again,’ said Jack. ‘I don’t expect there’ll be anyone on guard, because nobody would ever dream of us guessing the secret of getting the ladder down. You two go out into the sunshine and wait for me.’
‘No. We’re coming too,’ said Lucy-Ann. They had lost Philip. She wasn’t going to lose Jack! So she and Dinah began to climb up behind him.
The ladder was well made and strong. It swung to and fro a little as the three of them climbed it. Up they went, and up and up. There seemed no end to it!
‘I’m stopping for a rest,’ whispered Jack. ‘You stop too. It’s frightfully tiring, this.’
They clung to the rungs and rested, panting a little with their long climb. Lucy-Ann didn’t like to think how far away the foot of the cave was. Nor did she like to think how far away the top of the ladder was!
They went on again. It was pitch dark, for Jack had put away his torch, needing both hands to climb with. Lucy-Ann began to feel that she was in a peculiarly horrid nightmare – one in which she would have to climb ladders in the dark until she awoke in the morning!
‘I say – I can see a dim sort of light now,’ whispered Jack. ‘I believe we must be coming to the top. Don’t make any noise.’
They got to the top just as Lucy-Ann felt that her arms would not hold on to the ladder any longer. As Jack said, there was a dim light there. He climbed off on to a rocky floor, and the girls followed. They all lay panting for a few minutes, unable even to look round and see where they were.
Jack recovered first. He sat up and gazed round him. He was in a little chamber, lighted by a dim lamp. Big stone jugs full of what looked like water stood at the back, with mugs near by. Jack’s eyes gleamed. Just what they wanted after their terrible climb! He fetched a jug and three mugs and the three of them drank deeply of the ice-cold water.
‘Now I feel better,’ said Jack, with a sigh. He put back the jug and mugs. There was nothing else to see in the room at all. At the far end was an open passage-way, leading into the heart of the mountain.
Jack went to it. Lucy-Ann called softly to him. ‘Jack! Aren’t you coming back? You said you’d only go to the top and look!’
‘Well, I’m looking,’ said Jack. ‘There’s a narrow passage here. Come and see. I wonder where it leads to.’
The girls went to see. Jack wandered along a little way and the girls followed, not liking to be left alone. They came to another dim lamp, set on a rocky shelf in the passage wall. Jack went on and on, following the winding passage, coming to lamp after lamp that lighted the way.
‘Come back now,’ whispered Lucy-Ann, pulling at his sleeve. ‘We’ve gone far enough.’
But Jack felt that he couldn’t possibly go back now. Why, he might meet Philip round the next corner! So on he went.
They came to a forking of the passage, which suddenly divided into three. The children stopped, wondering where the three passages led to. They all looked exactly the same to them.
And then, out of one passage capered somebody they knew very well indeed. It was Snowy!
The kid was as delighted to see them as they were to see him. He butted them all, rubbed his nose into their hands, and bleated joyfully. Jack felt pleased.
‘We’ll follow Snowy,’ he said to the girls. ‘He’ll lead us to Philip!’
So they let the little kid dance in front of them, leading the way. He led them down the passage, into a vast, hall-like cave, into another passage, and then, to their great surprise, they came to a most amazing place.
It was like a vast laboratory, a work-room set in the heart of the mountain. It lay below them, and they had to lean over a little gallery to look at it.
‘What is it?’ whispered Lucy-Ann, awed at the amount of curious things there. There was no enormous machinery – only a vast network of gleaming wires, great glass jars standing together, crystal boxes in which sparks and flames shot up and down, and rows upon rows of silently spinning wheels that shone strangely as they spun. The wires ran from these all over the place.
In the middle of the work-room shone a curious lamp. It had many sides, and it glowed first one colour and then another. Sometimes it was so dazzling that the children could hardly look at it. Sometimes it died down to a faint red, green or blue glow. It seemed alive – a monster eye that watched over everything in that secret laboratory.
The children gazed, fascinated. There was nobody there at all. Everything seemed to work on its own, never stopping. The wheels spun round, the wires gleamed, and nothing made any noise beyond a very quiet humming.
And then – and then there began that faint, far-off rumbling they knew so well. Far below the laboratory, deep deep down, came a stirring and a groaning, as something happened in the depths of the mountain. Then, as had happened before, the mountain quivered a little, and shook, as if something tremendous had happened deep underground.
The great lamp in the middle suddenly grew bright, so bright that the children crouched back, afraid. It grew crimson, the brightest crimson they had ever seen in their lives. It began to belch out tiny puffs of crimson smoke.
Jack began to choke. He pushed the girls back into the passage, and they breathed the fresher air there in relief. Snowy, frightened, crouched against them.
‘That’s the smoke we saw coming out of a hole in the side of the mountain,’ whispered Jack. ‘There must be a chimney-pipe built from that lamp, right away up the mountain to the hole, where the smoke can escape.’
‘What’s going on, do you think?’ asked Dinah, in awe. ‘What’s all that wire for, and the crystal boxes and things?’
‘I haven’t the least idea,’ said Jack. ‘But it’s plain that it’s something very secret, or they’d never do all this here, in this lonely, inaccessible place.’
‘Atom bombs or something, do you think?’ asked Lucy-Ann, with a shiver.
‘Oh, no – you want enormous buildings for that,’ said Jack. ‘No – it’s something very odd and unusual, I should think. Let’s go back and peep.’
They went back, but everything was just as it had been, the wheels spinning silently, the crystal boxes sparking and flaming up and down inside, the great lamp watching like an eye, now crimson, now blue, now green, now orange.
‘Let’s go round the gallery and see where it goes to,’ whispered Jack. ‘I feel as if I’m in some sort of Aladdin’s cave now – the Slave of the Ring might appear at any moment!’
They wandered on and came to another extraordinary place. It was really only a high-roofed cave – but it was made into a great, sumptuous hall, with flights of steps leading up to what looked like a throne. Beautiful hangings hung down the walls from the roof, which glittered with shining lamps shaped like stars.
The floor was laid with a golden carpet, and ranged on each side were beautiful chairs. The children stared in astonishment.
‘Whatever’s all this?’ whispered Dinah. ‘Does some king live here? The king of the mountain!’
17
Philip again
‘It’s peculiar there’s nobody about at all,’ said Jack, staring round at the silent hall. ‘Not a soul to be seen! I wonder where everyone is. All those wheels and wires and things whirring away busily by themselves, with nobody to see to them – and now this great empty place, with its throne and gorgeous hangings!’
‘Jack!’ said Dinah, pulling at his sleeve. ‘Can’t we find Philip now and rescue him? We’ve only got to go back through those long passages and down the rope-ladder! Snowy will take us to Philip, and we can take him safely to the entrance of the mountain.’
‘Yes. That’s a good idea,’ said Jack. He stroked the little white kid by his side. ‘Where’s Philip?’ he whispered, and gave Snowy a push. ‘You show us, Snowy.’
Snowy butted Jack gently. He didn’t seem to know wh
at the boy meant. Jack gave it up after a bit. ‘We’ll wait and see if Snowy goes off by himself,’ he said. ‘If he does, we’ll follow him.’
So they waited. Snowy soon became restive and set off down the big hall past the great throne. The children followed cautiously, keeping by the walls, as far in the shadows as possible. Snowy disappeared through some deep red curtains. The children peeped through them. On the other side was what looked like a small library. Books lined the walls. The children looked at the titles curiously. They could not understand what any of them meant. Most of them were in foreign languages, and all of them looked very learned and difficult.
‘Scientific books,’ said Jack. ‘Come on. Snowy has gone through that opening.’
They followed him. He saw that they were coming and waited for them. They hoped he was taking them to Philip!
He was! He led them upwards through a curiously rounded tunnel-like passage, lit at intervals by the same kind of dim lamps they had seen in the first passages. It was weird going along in the half-dark, not able to see very far in front or behind. Snowy trotted in front like a little white ghost.
They passed big openings filled with what looked like stores of some kind. Boxes, chests, packages of all kinds were there, flung in higgledy-piggledy.
Jack paused to examine some. There were foreign labels on most of them. One had been opened, showing tins of food.
‘Look,’ said Jack, ‘it’s what I said. They have their food brought here – by the helicopter, I expect. I wonder what in the world they’re up to.’
They came to some steps hewn out of the rock itself. These led upwards rather steeply in a spiral. Snowy bounded up lightly, but the others panted as they went up and up, twisting and turning with the spiral of the stairway.
They came to a door set fast in the side of the stone stairway. It was a stout wooden door, with great bolts on the outside. Snowy stopped beside this door and bleated loudly.
Then the children’s hearts jumped as they heard a familiar voice. ‘Snowy! I’m still here! I can’t get to you, Snowy, but never mind!’