Pigeon Post. Arthur Ransome

      “It’s all right,” she said. “John and Susan and Peggy must be coming to fetch us across.”

CHAPTER II

      THE PLAN

      TITTY AND ROGER stood on the end of the boat pier, looking up the lake and across to the big hills and the proud peak of Kanchenjunga that they had climbed the year before. Over there was the Beckfoot promontory, hiding the Blacketts’ house, and between the promontory and the islands was the little white sail of the Amazon. And then, as they watched, they began to doubt. Who was sailing her? The little white sail flapped in the wind. If that had happened once they would have thought nothing of it. But it happened again and yet again, and not only when the little boat was going about at the end of a tack.

      “Can’t be John,” said Roger. “Or even Susan. They’d never let her shake like that. And Peggy’s just as good as John.”

      The wind was blowing up the lake and the little boat was beating down against it. A big lake steamer hid her for a moment. Then she was gone behind an island. She turned again and was slipping across towards the mouth of the bay. And every now and then a long-drawn-out quivering of her sail shocked the two experts watching from the pier.

      “There’s a red cap,” said Titty. “That must be Peggy. But it can’t be her steering. I say, Roger, it’s the D’s. Peg’s on the middle thwart. Dorothea’s hanging on to the main-sheet. Dick’s at the tiller. I saw the sunshine on his spectacles. Three cheers. Mrs Blackett must be having them too.”

      “But they didn’t know anything about sailing.”

      “They were learning on the Broads. Don’t you remember? Dot sent a postcard.”

      “Let’s wave,” said Titty. “They can see us now.”

      Peggy Blackett waved back to them. Dick and Dorothea were far too busy.

      “They’re not doing half badly,” said Roger. “For beginners.”

      The little boat came quickly nearer.

      They could see Dorothea holding the main-sheet in both hands, watching Peggy for orders. They could see Dick’s earnest face. They saw Peggy give him a sign. The little boat swung round, headed into the wind, and stopped at their feet. Roger knelt on the pier and grabbed her.

      “Jolly well done,” he said. “Hullo. You’ve got another pigeon.”

      “Hop aboard,” said Peggy. “And hang on to the pier. We’ve got to send her off with a message. What’s the time?”

      “My watch is bust,” said Roger. “It always is.”

      “Fourteen minutes past seven,” said Dick.

      Peggy was scribbling on a bit of paper. She rolled it up tight, opened another wicker basket like the one that had been sent to meet them, and brought out a pigeon. “Come on,” she said. “You slip the despatch under the ring … the rubber one.”

      The pigeon had a metal ring on one leg and a rubber one on the other. Titty, with trembling fingers, trembling for fear of doing it wrong and making the pigeon uncomfortable, slipped in the tiny roll of paper.

      “Off you go,” said Peggy, and the pigeon was circling above their heads, above the yachts in the bay, and was suddenly flying straight as an arrow for the distant promontory.

      “Cast off,” cried Peggy, and in another moment they had left the pier and, with a fair wind to help them, were sailing up the lake after the pigeon.

      “We didn’t start to meet you till we got your message,” said Dorothea.

      “What message?” said Roger.

      “Sophocles,” said Dorothea.

      “Which one is this?” said Titty.

      “Sappho,” said Peggy. “You watch the flagstaff on our promontory. They’ll send the flag up as soon as Sappho’s in.”

      They were hardly clear of Rio Bay before Roger sang out, “There’s the flag.” Away up the lake, a flag, that at this distance looked plain black, was fluttering up the flagstaff on the Beckfoot promontory.

      “Pretty quick,” said Peggy.

      “It’s as quick as a telegraph,” said Roger.

      “Very nearly,” said Dick. “On short distances like this.”

      “There’s Susan … She’s running away.”

      “Gone back to camp,” said Peggy. “They’re busy with the tents. You know we’re camping in the garden …”

      “In the garden?” said Titty, rather sadly.

      “Only till your mother comes to Holly Howe. You won’t have Swallow till then, and we can’t all eight of us cram into Amazon. So Wild Cat Island’s no use. And anyhow, while mother’s the only parent she wants to have us all within reach. She says she’s too busy with paperhangers and plasterers to keep an eye on us if we camp too far from the house. It’s not going to be as bad as it might be. We’re going to do our own cooking. I say, did you know Susan’s blued a birthday present on a mincing machine? To improve the pemmican.”

      Titty cheered up. After all, it was only for a fortnight.

      “Has Timothy come?” asked Dorothea.

      “Not yet,” said Titty.

      “We went to the Luggage Office to ask,” said Roger.

      “I wish we knew when he was sent off,” said Peggy.

      “Can I have a go at the tiller?” said Roger.

      “Come on,” said Dick, and, for part of the voyage home, Titty and Roger took turns in the steering, just to make sure that they had not forgotten their ancient skill, while Peggy told them how the pigeons had been trained little by little to longer and longer flights, and Dorothea told them how she and Dick had been turned into able-seamen on the Norfolk Broads. Soon they were near enough to the promontory to see the white skull and cross-bones on the black flag.

      “I say,” said Titty. “It can’t be piracy or even war while we’re camped in the garden. What’s it going to be? It won’t be North Pole again …”

      “Too jolly hot,” said Roger.

      Peggy looked at them. “Gold,” she said. “Dick’s a geologist and Nancy’s turned him on to reading all Captain Flint’s mining books, and tomorrow we’re going right inside Kanchenjunga to talk to Slater Bob. He’s an old miner, and mother says he knows where we ought to look for it.”

      “Inside Kanchenjunga?” said Titty.

      “With candles,” said Dorothea.

      “Further away from the point!” cried Peggy. “We’ll be aground.”

      They gave the promontory a wide berth, and were presently sailing in towards the mouth of the Amazon river. They pulled up the centreboard and lowered the sail. Peggy took off her shoes and jumped overboard to pull the little boat over the shallows. She climbed in again. They rowed up the river between the beds of tall reeds, far higher above the water than usual, because very little water had been coming down the river during the drought.

      “There’s the boathouse,” cried Roger.

      Beyond the boathouse, where the faded crest of the Amazon pirates was still to be seen, though it badly wanted repainting, was the old grey house of Beckfoot looking very strange with the ladders and scaffolding of the painters. On the lawn between the house and the river were a lot of white tents.

      “Here they are!” That was John’s voice, and there was John himself and Susan coming to the water’s edge to meet them, and a moment later Nancy came racing round the corner of the house.

      “Hullo,”