book together. Yes. It looked as if the figures at one side of the page might be dates, but they could make nothing of the words: “Da fiadh dheug … damh a fireach …” On and on it went, short entries and each with its figure at the side. “Damh is eildean.” Here and there was a short word like “is” and a shorter like “a” but all the other words belonged to no language that they knew, and if it was written in code, perhaps even “is” and “a” did not mean what they usually meant.
“I know what it is,” said Titty suddenly. “It’s Gaelic. It belongs to one of the natives. A savage Gael. Look here, Roger. You put it back where you found it.”
All three of them looked at the ridge before them, and up the long wild valley and down again at the cove far away below them where the mast of the Sea Bear spoke to them of friends and allies. There were no Gaels to be seen. Up here, on that hill above the sea, on the top of the old dwelling place of Picts who had been dead a thousand years, they might have been the only people in the world. But there was the biscuit box and its contents to show that someone counted the old Pict-house so much his own that he could safely leave his things in it.
“Dick,” said Dorothea, “do look, before Roger puts it back.”
But Dick took no more than a polite interest in the biscuit box, exercise book and hunk of cake. He was bursting to be gone and had almost done what he had to do. He had made a sketch of the mound from one side, giving a rough idea of its shape. Now he was making a drawing of it to show as well as he could the way in which it was built. There was a circle with a smaller circle for the dip made by the fallen roof and dotted lines to show how the tunnel lay.
“Bother whoever he is,” said Roger, slipping over the edge with the box to put it back in the tunnel.
“Father’ll want to know how big it is round,” Dorothea was saying, looking over Dick’s shoulder, as Roger came climbing back, wiping the earth from his hands. “It’s for Father,” she explained. “He always wants to know shapes and sizes when anybody finds antiquities.”
“Boats are what Daddy always measures,” said Roger.
Dick was pacing earnestly across the dip. “Five steps,” he said, “and it’s about thirty round. Very thick walls. And the dip isn’t quite in the middle. That means that the wall is thickest where the tunnel goes in.” He wrote the figures beside his diagrams.
“And now,” he said, “I’m off.”
“Much better come with us,” said Titty.
“I’ve got to go down to those lochs,” said Dick. “It’s the very last chance of seeing Divers.”
“Oh, let him go,” said Dorothea.
“We’ll explore along the slopes of the Northern Rockies,” said Titty, glancing up the valley and then at the chart. “We’ll come back past Upper and Lower Lochs. They’ll show us the way to the beck … burn. And we’ll follow the burn past the other side of the Hump until it comes to the waterfall and our cove. “
“Dick,” said Dorothea, “are you going to stay at those lochs all the time?”
“I expect so,” said Dick. “There’s sure to be some birds, even if there aren’t any Divers.”
“Good,” said Titty. “We’ll pick you up on our way back to the ship.”
“But don’t wait for us if they sound the foghorn. Go straight back to the Sea Bear,” said Dorothea. “Only do listen for it … if he’s watching birds, you know …” She looked at the others. They laughed. They both knew that if Dick was looking at anything, even if it was only a caterpillar, you could shout at him from close by without his hearing.
“I’ll hear all right,” said Dick, putting his notebook in his pocket. “Good-bye.”
“Look here,” said Roger. “Even if somebody else is using this place, we’ll never find a better one for eating our grub.”
“Eat yours with us, Dick, and get it over,” said Dorothea.
“I can eat it going along.”
“Susan’ll be very fierce if you forget it,” said Titty.
“Bother birds,” said Roger. “Adventures are much better.”
But Dick was already over the edge of the mound, and hurrying on his way to the lochs, thinking of the time that he had already had to waste.
Dorothea watched him. Now and again, as he dropped into a dip in the uneven ground, she lost sight of him, and then saw him again as he came up on the other side of it, moving quickly slantwise down the slopes of the long ridge that sheltered the valley from the north.
She turned to find that the other two explorers had emptied their knapsacks and were opening their packets of sandwiches.
“Roger’s quite right,” said Titty. “Going a long way, it’s easier to carry your grub inside.”
Dorothea wriggled out of the straps of her own knapsack and sat down beside them. In that hollow on the top of the old Pict-house, she thought, an escaping prisoner could hide from his pursuers. One moment, before sitting down, she could see for miles, out over the sea or up the valley to the mountains. The next, sitting on the ground, she could see nothing but sky and the short blades of grass stirring against the blue just above the level of her head. “Invisible to all but the eagle, the fugitive rested and was safe,” she murmured to herself.
“What?” said Roger, taking a bite from a sandwich.
Dorothea started. “Nothing,” she said. “I was only thinking how secret this place is.”
“Listen!” said Titty. “Listen!”
“Bagpipes!” said Roger.
Faintly, from far away, the skirl of bagpipes drifted down the wind.
They jumped up.
“People … quite near …” said Titty.
“I can’t see anyone,” said Dorothea.
“You can’t tell,” said Titty. “Somebody may be seeing you.”
“Come down,” said Roger. “Come down, and then you can’t be seen even if there’s somebody watching.”
They dropped and for a moment waited silently, listening for the pipes. They could still hear them.
“It’s the other side of the Northern Rockies,” said Titty. “A road goes over where that gap is.”
“There’s a robber castle just over the top of the range,” said Dorothea.
DICK GOES OFF TO THE LOCHS
“Conspicuous house,” said Titty, looking at the sketch on the little chart.
“Far enough away, anyhow,” said Roger, and took another bite.
