The Sea of Adventure (8 page)

The boat nosed into the channel. As Philip said, the water was deep there — it was a natural little harbour. There was a ledge of rock on which they could land. Could anything be better? — Hurrah for Puffin Island!

Chapter 10

A LITTLE EXPLORING

"ISN'T this a gorgeous place?" said Jack, as the boat glided gently into the little channel. There was just room for it. "It might be a boat-house made specially for the Lucky Star."

Bill leapt out on to the rocky ledge, which did very well for a landing-stage. Sheer above them on each side rose rocky cliffs. Rows and rows of birds sat on the ledges, and there was a continual coming and going. There was also a continual dropping of eggs, knocked off by the careless birds. One broke near Bill, and splashed its yellow yolk over his foot.

"Good shot!" he yelled up to the circling birds, and the children roared.

They made the boat fast by tying the mooring-rope round a convenient rock. The boat bobbed up and down gently as waves ran up the little channel and back.

"Tide's up now," said Bill. "When it goes down there will still be plenty of water in this channel. The boat will look much lower down then. Now — is there a way up the cliff from here? We don't want to have to walk down the ledge and clamber round the cliff over hundreds of rocks before we get on to the island proper."

They looked round. Jack ran up the rocky ledge, and then turned and gave a shout. "Hi! We can get up here, I think. There are rocky shelves, like rough steps, going up the cliff — and there's a break in it a bit above. We could probably clamber out all right, and find ourselves right on the island."

"Well, you four go and explore," said Bill. "I'd better stay with the boat and see that she doesn't get her sides smashed in against these rocks. You look round the island and see if you can spot a sheltered cove somewhere, that I can take the boat round to."

The four children left the boat and followed Jack. Kiki flew on ahead, calling like a gull. Up the rocky ledges went Jack. They were almost like giant steps, roughly hewn by the great wintry seas for century after century.

As Jack said, the cliff had a deep cleft in it just there, and the children found that they could make their way through it, and come out on to the cushions of sea-pinks beyond. It needed a bit of clambering, and they were out of breath when they reached the top — but it was worth it.

The sea spread bright blue all round the island. The sky looked enormous. Other islands, blue in the distance, loomed up everywhere. A real colony of them it seemed — and their island was in the centre.

Then Jack gave such a yell that everyone jumped. "Puffins! Look! Hundreds and hundreds of them!"

The children looked to where Jack pointed and there, among the sea-pinks and the old heather tufts, were the most curious-looking birds they had ever seen.

They were dressed in black and white. Their legs were orange — but it was their extraordinary bills that held the children's attention.

"Look at their beaks!" cried Dinah, laughing. "Blue at the base — and then striped red and yellow!"

"But what enormous beaks!" cried Lucy-Ann. "They remind me a bit of Kiki's."

"Puffins are called sea parrots," remarked Jack, amused to see the crowd of solemn-looking puffins.

"Their eyes are so comical," said Philip. "They stare at us with such a fixed expression! And look at the way they walk — so upright!"

The colony of puffins was as good as a pantomime to watch. There were hundreds, thousands of birds there. Some stood about, watching, their crimson-ringed eyes fixed seriously on their neighbours. Others walked about, rolling from side to side like a sailor. Some took off like small aeroplanes, eager to get to the sea.

"Look! — what's that one doing?" asked Lucy-Ann, as a puffin began to scrape vigorously at the soil, sending a shower of it backwards.

"It's digging a burrow, I should think," said Dinah. "They nest underground, don't they, Jack?"

"Rather! I bet this island is almost undermined with their holes and burrows," said Jack, walking forward towards the colony of busy birds. "Come on — do let's get near to them. Kiki, keep on my shoulder. I won't have you screaming like a railway engine at them, and scaring them all away."

Kiki was most interested in the comical puffins. She imitated their call exactly. "Arrrrr!" they said, in deep, guttural voices. "Arrrrrrrr!"

"Arrrrrr!" answered Kiki at once, and various birds looked up at her enquiringly.

To the children's huge delight the puffins were not in the least afraid of them. They did not even walk away when the children went near. They allowed them to walk among them, and although one aimed a peck at Philip's leg when he stumbled and almost fell on top of it, not one of the others attempted to jab with their great beaks.

"This is lovely!" said Lucy-Ann, standing and gazing at the extraordinary birds. "Simply lovely! I never thought birds could be so tame."

"They're not exactly tame," said Jack. "They're wild, but they are so little used to human beings that they have no fear of us at all."

The puffins were all among the cushions of bright sea-pinks. As the children walked along, their feet sometimes sank right down through the soil. The burrows were just below, and their weight caused the earth to give way.

"It's absolutely mined with their burrows," said Philip. "And I say — it's not a very nice smell just about here, is it?"

It certainly wasn't. The boys soon got used to it, but the girls didn't like it. "Pooh!" said Lucy-Ann, wrinkling up her nose. "It's getting worse and worse. I vote we don't put our tents up too near this colony of puffins — it's as bad as being near a pig-sty."

"Don't make a fuss," said Jack. "Hey, come here, Kiki!"

But Kiki had flown down to make friends. The puffins gazed at her fixedly and solemnly.

"Arrrrr!" said Kiki politely. "ARRRRRRRR! God save the King!"

"Arrrrr!" replied a puffin, and walked up to Kiki, rolling from side to side like a small sailor. The two looked at one another.

"I shall expect Kiki to say how-do-you-do in a minute," said Dinah, with a little squeal of laughter. "They both look so polite."

"Polly put the kettle on," said Kiki.

"Arrrrr!" said the puffin, and waddled off to its hole. Kiki followed — but apparently there was another puffin down the hole, who did not want Kiki's company, for there was soon an agonised squeal from the parrot, who shot out of the hole much more rapidly than she had gone in.

She flew up to Jack's shoulder. "Poor Kiki, what a pity, what a pity!"

"Well, you shouldn't poke your hose in everywhere," said Jack, and took a step forward. He trod on a tuft of sea-pinks, which immediately gave way, and he found his leg going down into quite a deep burrow. Whoever lived in it didn't like his leg at all, and gave it a vicious nip.

"Ooooch!" said Jack, sitting down suddenly and rubbing his leg. "Look at that — a bit right out of my calf!"

They went on through the amazing puffin colony. There were puffins on the ground, in the air — and on the sea too! "Arrrrr! Arrrrr! Arrrr!" their deep calls sounded everywhere.

"I'll be able to take some magnificent photographs," said Jack happily. "It's a pity it's too early for young ones to be about. I don't expect there are any puffin eggs yet either."

The puffins were living mainly in the green little valley between the two high cliffs. Philip looked about to see if there was any good place to pitch their tents.

"I suppose we all want to make Puffin Island our headquarters?" he said. "I imagine that nothing will drag Jack away from here now. He's got cliffs where guillemots and gannets nest, and a valley where the puffins live — so I suppose he's happy."

"Oh yes," said Jack. "We'll stay here. This shall be our island — we'll share it with the puffins."

"Well, we'll find a good place for our tents," said Philip. "Then we'll bring our goods and chattels here and camp. We'd better find a place where there's a stream, though . . . if there is one on this island. We shall want water to drink. And let's look for a cove where we can put the boat. We can't very well leave it in that narrow channel."

"Look — there's a dear little cove down there!" said Dinah suddenly, pointing to the sea. "We could bathe there — and the boat would be quite all right there too. Let's go and tell Bill."

"I'll go," said Philip. "Jack wants to stare at the puffins a bit more, I can see. I'll take the boat round to the cove with Bill, and you two girls can find a good place for our tents. Then we'll all help to bring the things there from the boat."

He ran off quickly to find Bill and tell him where to put the boat. Jack sat down with Kiki to watch the puffins. The girls went to look for a good place to put up their tents for the night.

They wandered over the island. Beyond the puffin colony, just at the end of it, before they came to the high cliffs at the other side of the island, was a little dell. A few stunted birch trees grew there, and banks of heather.

"This is just the place," said Dinah, pleased. "We can put up our tents here, be sheltered from the worst of the wind, watch the puffins, go down to bathe when we want to, and when we're tired of that, go cruising round the other islands."

"A very nice life," said Lucy-Ann, with a laugh. "Now — is there any water about?"

There was no stream at all on the island — but Dinah found something that would do equally well. At least, she hoped it would.

"Look here!" she called to Lucy-Ann. "Here's an enormous rock with a hollow in its middle, filled with water. I've tasted it and it isn't salt."

Lucy-Ann came up, followed by Jack. Dinah dipped in her hand, scooped up a palmful of water and drank. It was sweet and as pure as could be.

"Rain-water," said Dinah, pleased. "Now we'll be all right — so long as it doesn't dry up in this hot weather. Come on — let's go back to the boat and collect all the things we want. We'll have to do a bit of hard work now."

"We'll wait here a bit," said Jack, coming up with Kiki. "I expect Bill and Philip will be bringing the boat round to the cove over there — then we'll go and tell them we've found a good place, and help to bring the things here."

It was not long before Bill and Philip ran into the cove with the boat. Bill leapt out, took the anchor well up the beach and dug it in. He saw Jack and the girls and waved to them.

"Just coming!" he cried. "Have you found a good place for the tents?"

He and Philip soon joined the others, and were pleased with the little dell. "Just right!" said Bill. "Well, we'll bring all the things we want from the boat straightaway now."

So they spent quite a time going to and from the cove, laden with goods. It did not take quite as long as they feared because there were five of them to do it, and even Kiki gave a hand — or rather a beak — and carried a tent-peg. She did it really to impress the watching puffins, who stared at her seriously as she flew by, the peg in her big curved beak.

"Arrrrr!" she called, in a puffin voice.

"You're showing off, Kiki," said Jack severely. "You're a conceited bird."

"Arrrrr!" said Kiki, and dropped the tent-peg on to Jack's head.

It was fun arranging their new home. The boys and Bill were to have one tent. The girls were to have the other. Behind the tents Lucy-Ann found a ledge of rock and below it was a very large dry space.

"Just the spot for storing everything in," said Lucy-Ann proudly. "Jack, bring the tins here — and the extra clothes — there's room for heaps of things. Oh, we are going to have a lovely time here!"

Chapter 11

HUFFIN AND PUFFIN

"ISN'T it about time we had a meal?" complained Jack, staggering over with a great pile of things in his arms. "It makes my mouth water to read 'Spam' and 'Best Tinned Peaches' and see that milk chocolate."

Bill looked at his watch and then at the sun. "My word — it certainly is time! The sun is setting already! How the time has flown!"

It wasn't long before they were all sitting peacefully on tufts of sea-pink and heather, munching biscuits and potted meat, and looking forward to a plate of tinned peaches each. Bill had brought bottles of ginger-beer from the boat, and these were voted better than boiling a kettle to make tea or cocoa. It was very warm indeed.

"I feel so happy," said Lucy-Ann, looking over the island to the deep-blue sea beyond. "I feel so very very far away from everywhere — honestly I hardly believe there is such a thing as school, just at this very minute. And this potted meat tastes heavenly."

Philip's white rats also thought it did. They came out from his clothes at once when they smelt the food. One sat daintily upright on his knee, nibbling. Another took his tit-bit into a dark pocket. The third perched on Philip's shoulder.

"You tickle the lobe of my ear," said Philip. Dinah moved as far from him as she could, but she was too happy, like Lucy-Ann, to find fault with anything just then.

They all ate hungrily, Bill too, their eyes fixed on the setting sun and the gold-splashed sea, which was now losing its blue, and taking on sunset colours. Lucy-Ann glanced at Bill.