Minnow on the Say by Phillipa Pearce

Author:Phillipa Pearce [Pearce, Phillipa]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780192732989
Publisher: Oxford University Press Children's Books
Published: 2012-02-16T00:00:00+00:00

When Philip came to the single rose

Over the water

The treasure was taken where no one knows

None but my daughter.

David stuffed the paper into his pocket, gathered up the two pairs of shoes and ran back and after Adam.

Adam was just stepping into the Minnow when David rejoined him. There was still no conversation between them. As they paddled out into the main river, the Great Barley church clock struck a quarter to midnight. It startled David to realize how short a time they had been out: his parents and Miss Codling would still be in their first sleep, unaware of doings by night and hopes proved as insubstantial as moonshine.

They parted at the Mosses’ landing-stage, having spoken no word more than what had been said under the single rose.

The next day, instead of sleeping late, David was awake especially early, and at once with the thought of Adam in his mind. As soon as he was free, he went round to Codlings’.

‘He doesn’t seem to be feeling well, this morning,’ said Miss Codling, when he asked for Adam. ‘He’s in bed. Go up and see him.’

David went upstairs and knocked on Adam’s door.

‘Who is it?’

‘Me—David.’

‘No!’ violently. There was no further sound, so David opened the door and looked in. He was at once transfixed by the glare of Adam’s eyes, over the top of the bedclothes. ‘I’m too ill to see you!’

‘Were you hurt last night, after all?’

‘Don’t keep asking me that—no, I wasn’t.’

There was a silence. Then David began timidly, ‘About the treasure—’

‘What’s the use of talking about it? It’s gone—stolen! We showed the way to the hiding-place when we first went there; in the next three days, somebody went and got it. Mr Smith probably—yes, he’s gloating over it now.’

David had to contradict. ‘Someone found the hiding-place and stole the treasure, but we couldn’t have shown them the way. Look at this.’

He held out the strip of paper that he had not dared to show to Adam the night before. Adam took it unwillingly even now, and went red with anger as he saw the familiar rhyme. He choked. ‘It was left there for us to find—as a sneer! To make sure we knew someone had got there before us! Mr Smith—I’m sure it was Mr Smith—he followed us after all. He—’

‘But, Adam, it can’t be that. This must mean that whoever found the hiding-place did it by working on the clue of the rhyme—else why was it there at all? We didn’t give the hiding-place away.’

Adam began to be more puzzled than angry. ‘Yes, I suppose that’s true; but then, how could Mr Smith—or anyone—know that rhyme? It’s always been more or less of a secret.’

‘When the Smiths called on your aunt, she may have told them.’

‘She wouldn’t.’

‘Or, perhaps, while she was out of the room, they looked in her bureau.’

‘It’s kept locked.’

‘Perhaps it was unlocked that day.’

Adam threw back the bedclothes and began getting into his dressing-gown, with an air of resolution. ‘It won’t be pleasant, and I don’t expect it’ll get us the treasure back, but we’ll have to talk to Aunt Dinah.

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