The children stood up and craned their necks round the rocky edges of the cave. The moon came out for a moment, and coming nearer and nearer to the shore a large motor-boat could be seen, glinting in the moonlight. Its hum was loud in the stillness of the night.

It shut off its engine and ran gently into the little cove where George kept his boat. The children could no longer see it.

“It must be by George’s small wooden jetty,” whispered Jack. “Well, we shall see what kind of goods the smugglers are bringing in, when they pass us on their way to the cliff-path.”

They all waited impatiently. The sound of hushed voices came to them, and the thud of the boat against the wooden pier. The children waited and waited. Then there came the sound of humming once again, and the motor-boat slid out of the cove and made its way swiftly out to sea and round the rocky headlands.

“They’ll be coming by in a second,” said Jack. “Now be quiet as mice, everyone - don’t sneeze or cough for goodness’ sake!”

Nora at once felt as if she was going to sneeze. She took out her hanky and buried her face in it. How dreadful if she gave their hiding-place away just at this most important moment!

But the sneeze didn’t come - and nobody came. Not a shadow passed in front of the children’s cave. Not even a voice could be heard now.

After half an hour, the children became impatient.

“Jack, what’s happened, do you suppose?” whispered Nora.

“Can’t imagine,” said Jack. Then a thought struck him. “I say! I wonder if the boat came to fetch anyone! We shouldn’t see them come by if they’d gone in the boat!”

“Well, then, we might as well go out and look round a bit,” said Mike. “Can we, Jack?”

“All right,” said Jack. “But for goodness’ sake be quiet!”

They made their way softly to the little cove where the wooden pier stood. George’s boat was beside it. Jack shone his torch on the ground and pointed out the footsteps in the sand.

“Let’s follow them backwards and see where they come from,” said Mike. “I simply can’t understand how those men came down to the beach to-night without us seeing them pass.”

So, with the help of the torches the children followed two pairs of footsteps from the cove, round the beach - and into a big cave!

“So they must have been hiding here all the time!” said Jack.

“Look,” said Mike, in a puzzled voice, swinging his torch all over the sandy beach. “There are no more footsteps beyond this cave - they didn’t come to the cave by the cliff-path, that’s certain. Then how did they come?”

“Jack! Mike! There must be a secret passage from the Old House to the beach!” suddenly said Nora, in such a loud whisper that the others jumped.

“Sh!” said Jack. Then he too began to whisper loudly. “I believe Nora’s right! Of course! There’s a secret passage from the shore to the Old House! Why didn’t I think of it before! My goodness, Nora, that was smart of you to think of that.”

“The passage must begin in this cave, where the men’s footsteps go,” said Nora, pleased and excited to think that Jack thought she was smart. “Let’s go in and explore.”

“And walk straight into dear Mr. Diaz and his friend Luiz!” said Jack. “No, thank you. Besides, I’d prefer to do it in daytime. It’s a bit too creepy now. Come on, let’s go back to bed and talk.”

They all went back up the steep cliff-path, through the scented garden and into their tower. The girls curled up in one bed in the top room and the boys in the other.

And they talked. How they talked! They were so thrilled with the night’s adventure that it was dawn before they thought of really going to bed.

“You see, what happened was they signalled to the boat to come in with the smuggled goods, whatever they were,” said Jack, for the twentieth time, “and Mr. Diaz and his friend slipped down from the Old House to the shore by the secret passage that leads to that cave - and then they took the goods up that way back to the Old House. So we never saw them.”

“When can we explore the cave for that secret passage, Jack?” said Peggy longingly.

“To-morrow!” said Jack, hugging his knees, as he sat in Mike’s bed.

“To-day you mean!” said Mike, with a laugh, and he pointed to where the eastern sky was beginning to shine with a silvery light. “It’s to-day now. Come on, we really must go to sleep for a bit!”

The girls went down to their room. The boys settled into their beds and were asleep in a few seconds. It seemed as if they had only been in bed for a few minutes when Dimmy awakened them at half-past seven.

“Are you never going to wake to-day?” she said in amazement. “Did you keep awake half the night, you naughty children?”

“Perhaps we did, Dimmy, perhaps we did!” said Jack, with a laugh - and not another word would he say to explain why they were all such sleepyheads that morning!

The children were half sleepy, half excited at breakfast-time. Dimmy couldn’t make them out at all.

“I don’t understand what’s the matter with you all to-day.” she said, as she passed them their cocoa. “First you yawn, then you giggle, then you rub your hands together in glee, then you yawn again. Are you planning any mischief?”

“Oh no, Dimmy,” said everyone together.

“Well, see you don’t,” said Dimmy.

“Dimmy, would you give us a picnic lunch, please?” said Jack. “We’d like to be out till tea.”

“Very well,” said Dimmy. “You shall have some little veal and ham pies that I made yesterday, some ginger cake, and some ripe plums and lemonade. Will that do? Oh, and you can have some hard-boiled eggs, too, if you like.”

“Lovely!” said everybody. Nora got up and hugged Dimmy. “You’re a dear!” she said. “It’s lovely staying with you!”

Dimmy prepared their lunch whilst the children collected electric torches, and also candles and matches in case their torches failed. They talked excitedly. It was lovely to be going to find a secret passage.

Dimmy gave them the lunch done up in two kit-bags. Jack put one on his back and Mike put the other on his. They called good-bye and ran off down the garden path to the cliff. Down the steep rocky steps they went, on to the beach.

The sea had been right up to the cliff and had washed away the footsteps of the night before. But the children knew which cave the men had come from and they made their way there, first looking to see that nobody else was on the beach too.

They came to the cave. The entrance was large and open. The cave ran back a good way, and was very dark and damp. Seaweed grew from the walls, and at the foot the red and green sea anemones grew, like lumps of jelly, waiting for the tide to sweep into the cave again so that they might open like flowers.

The children switched on their torches. They swung them here and there, all around the cave, looking for the passage that led from the cave.

At first they could find nothing at all. “It’s nothing but walls, walls, walls,” said Mike, flashing his torch round the damp rock that made the sides of the cave. “And at the back it just ends in rock too. Oh dear - I wonder if after all there isn’t a passage!”

“Look here!” shouted Jack suddenly. “What’s this?” He held his torch fairly high up one wall. The children crowded round eagerly. They saw rough steps hewn in the rock - and they could see that the seaweed that grew around had been bruised and torn.

“See that seaweed?” said Jack excitedly. “Well, somebody has trodden on that! That’s the way - up there! Come on, everybody!”

With their torches flashing the children tried to climb up the steep rocky steps in the cave-wall. They were slippery, and it was very difficult.

Suddenly Peggy caught sight of something that looked like a black worm hanging down the wall, and she shone her torch on it.

“Here’s a rope!” she said. “Look! Look! It must be to pull ourselves up by!”