A Fourth Form Friendship Part 11

Were ever four wretched girls in such a predicament? It was a judgment with a vengeance on their naughtiness. To be carried away by the steamer and set down at such a remote place as Sandsend seemed an appalling prospect, and they were quite aghast at the idea.

"Well, we have got ourselves into a sc.r.a.pe!" exclaimed Phbe, as soon as the purser was out of earshot.

"I was so sure it was the ferry-boat!" sighed poor Dora. "I feel as if I were to blame for proposing it."

"It wasn't your fault more than anybody else's," said Myfanwy. "I suppose we ought to have stopped to ask."

"We were in such a hurry!"

"How far is Sandsend from Birkwood?" asked Aldred.

"Six miles. It will take us a most fearfully long while to walk, and it's four o'clock now."

"Oh, dear! We shan't get in till supper. What will Miss Drummond say?"

"There'll be a regular hue and cry after us."

"What will Blanche and Freda do?"

"I suppose they'll go back, when they can't find us, and report us as missing. They wouldn't dare to stay in Chetbourne too long, and be late for tea."

"We're having a free excursion on the steamer, at any rate," said Aldred.

Dora appeared to think that a decidedly doubtful advantage. She was not a good sailor, and the sea was rough now that they were outside the bay.

Phbe, too, began to show signs of distress; and Myfanwy, usually so rosy and talkative, had suddenly grown unwontedly pale and pensive.

Aldred was the only one who enjoyed the voyage; to the others it was the reverse of pleasant, and they were much relieved when the vessel at last arrived at Sandsend. They scurried across the gangway on to the quay with almost undignified haste.

"Oh, it is nice to feel oneself on terra firma again!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Dora.

"Or 'terra-cotta', as the old lady remarked!" laughed Aldred. "I'm afraid you wouldn't appreciate a yachting cruise, Dora."

"I certainly shouldn't. Nothing would induce me to go. I should be lying in my berth the whole time, in a state of utter collapse and misery. No yachting for me, thank you!"

"We'd better ask somebody which is the right way," said Myfanwy. "We don't want to make any more mistakes."

They found, on enquiry, that the high road ran inland over the downs, and that, instead of it being only six miles to Birkwood, as Dora had supposed, it was in reality nearer nine.

"The road twists, and goes round by Greenstaple," said the old sailor who directed them. "It's only a matter of five miles if you went as the crow flies, but you'd maybe get lost on the downs. It's about the same distance along the coast, if you care to go by the sh.o.r.e. The tide won't be up yet awhile, and you'd have ample time to get round the headland, if you stepped out fairly well."

The beach sounded so much the most attractive route that the girls at once decided in its favour. It was a consideration to save four miles, and they all preferred the seash.o.r.e to the hills. If they walked fast, they calculated that it would not take more than a couple of hours, and they would get back to school just before dark.

"We must 'step out', as the old man advised," said Phbe. "No one must slack off, or lag behind."

It was all very well to make good resolutions, but quite another matter to keep them. The beach near Sandsend was an especially fascinating part of the coast. It abounded with little, shallow pools among the rocks, where such a variety of beautiful anemones, madrepores, sea-cuc.u.mbers, and other marine objects might be seen that it almost resembled an aquarium. None of these treasures were to be found at Birkwood, where the cliffs were of a different geological formation; indeed, these particular few miles of sh.o.r.e were a noted spot for zoologists, and could show more choice species than anywhere else within a radius of fifty miles. It was not astonis.h.i.+ng, therefore, that the girls stopped to marvel at some of these flowers of the sea, to watch the anemones stretching out their delicate, brilliantly coloured tentacles, to admire the corallines or the many strange forms of zoophytes, to chase spider crabs, and to pick up rare sh.e.l.ls, and gather some of the lovely seaweeds that fringed the pools. They quite forgot the time, and went dawdling on from one interesting rocky basin to another, wis.h.i.+ng they had a gla.s.s jar, or a bucket, in which they could carry some specimens back to the Grange.

"Don't you think we might put a few anemones in our handkerchiefs?"

suggested Aldred.

"Not an atom of use! They die directly they're out of water. We tried it once before, and it wasn't a success," replied Phbe.

"We'll tell Miss Drummond about the place, and ask her to bring us for an expedition some day," said Dora. "The school aquarium needs replenis.h.i.+ng badly."

They had been walking, or, rather, strolling for about an hour when they reached a small bay, which lay between two promontories. The water here was so low that they decided they might as well cross the sands, instead of keeping close under the cliffs; they made a bee-line, therefore, for the opposite headland, jumping over the narrow channels that intercepted their path. On the flat sandbank they found at least a dozen large jellyfish, left stranded by the tide. Aldred insisted upon picking up some of these and restoring them to their native element; and she kept poking about in so many heaps of seaweed, and investigating such a number of species, that the other girls began to despair of ever getting her back to Birkwood.

"We shall be all in the dark if we don't mind!" remonstrated Phbe.

"We've been sauntering along as if we had the whole day before us."

"And as if there were no tide! Just look behind you!" exclaimed Myfanwy.

Phbe turned round uneasily. What she saw was enough to make her shout wildly to the others, and set off running as fast as she could towards the cliff in front. All the time they had been amusing themselves with the jellyfish, the water had been creeping stealthily and silently up, and had flowed in an ever-widening channel between them and the land. Except for a narrow s.p.a.ce, which led to the rocks at the end of the promontory opposite, they were entirely cut off; and unless they cared to swim it was utterly impossible for them to reach the beach.

Most of them were good runners, and could do well enough at the school sports; but it seemed quite a different matter to race with the tide, and much too risky a performance to be appreciated. They just reached the rocks before the sands were entirely covered, and were obliged to splash anyhow through pools, getting their feet horribly wet, for there was no time to stop and take off their shoes and stockings.

Once on the promontory they were safe enough, and they began to make their way back towards the mainland, scrambling over the rocks, which were slippery and slimy with seaweed, and becoming extremely draggled in the process. There were several claps of distant thunder, and rain, which had been threatening for some time, suddenly descended in a drenching stream. The tide came thundering in, das.h.i.+ng great waves against the rocks, and sending showers of spray to join the rain.

The girls plodded steadily on, hoping that they would soon regain the beach; but it was hard walking, and they were getting wetter every minute. All at once they came to a full stop. In front stretched a channel of water so broad that through the blinding rain they could barely make out the opposite side, against which some very ugly waves appeared to be beating. They gazed at each other in blank dismay.

"Perhaps it's nothing but a creek, and we can get round it," said Myfanwy. "I'm used to this kind of coast in Wales. Let us try to our left; it looks fairly promising."

She led the way, and the others followed as best they could. It was a forlorn hope, however. The end of the promontory was completely surrounded at high water, and was temporarily turned into an island; and for the time being they were as completely stranded as a crew of s.h.i.+pwrecked mariners.

"I'm afraid it's no use," confessed Myfanwy, at last. "We've got ourselves into a tight place, and we shall just have to stay here until the tide goes down."

"Unless we could manage to swim," suggested Dora, looking dubiously over the channel to where some heavy breakers were booming against what seemed through the spray to be a steep and jagged precipice.

"Impossible!" exclaimed Phbe, without any doubt in her voice. "We should be dashed to bits in that rough sea. There isn't a spot where we could land, even if we could struggle across. It would simply be madness."

"I don't want to try!" declared Aldred, with a shudder. "I can't swim, to begin with; and even if I could, I shouldn't venture through those waves. But what are we going to do?"

"Stop here till we can get off, I suppose," said Phbe, shrugging her shoulders. "There's nothing else for it. We're in no particular danger, that's one comfort!"

"Let us climb higher up on to the rocks, and perhaps we may find some place a little out of the rain," proposed Myfanwy.

After considerable hunting about, they did at last come upon a ledge that shelved over so as to form a kind of cave; and creeping underneath, they squatted as close together as they could.

They were feeling the very reverse of jolly. It seemed anything but delightful to be sitting in a cramped position, wet through, without the chance of a meal, and with the prospect of spending perhaps the whole night in such unenviable surroundings.

"I'd give a great deal to be back in the cla.s.sroom, learning my German prep.!" groaned Dora.

"I suppose an adventure never feels nice at the time," said Myfanwy.

"No. I can't help suspecting that Stanley, and Shackleton, and all the explorers didn't enjoy the fun of the thing until they got home and wrote books about it," agreed Aldred.

"It sounds so thrilling when you read it," continued Myfanwy; "but when you're cold and wet and hungry, it takes the romance away."

"I wish we hadn't eaten all our sweets," lamented Phbe; "I'm simply starving!"

It had grown rapidly dusk; there was not even light enough to see their watches, but they calculated that the time must be about half-past six.

They were not sure when the tide would be at the full, nor how soon it would go down again sufficiently to enable them to cross on to the mainland.