"Oooh!” said Nora, as she slipped into the water. “It’s getting jolly cold to bathe in the lake, Jack. Have we got to do this all the winter?”
“Of course not,” said Jack. “We’ll have to give it up soon - but it’s nice whilst it’s warm enough.”
That week the weather became really horrid. Storms swept over the lake and the children thought it looked just like the sea, with its big waves curling over and breaking on the beach with a crash. The waves ran right up the beach and it was impossible to make a fire there. The children got soaked with rain, and had to dry their clothes as best they could by a fire they lighted outside the big cave. This was a good place for a fire, because the wind usually blew from the other direction and the fire was protected by the hill itself.
“I think we’ll have to give up Willow House now and go to live in the caves,” said Jack one morning, after a very wild night. The wind had slashed at the trees all night long, the rain had poured down, and, to the children’s dismay, a little rivulet of rain had actually come into Willow House from the back and had soaked the heather bed Peggy and Nora were lying on. The girls had had to get up in the middle of the night and go to the front room, where the boys slept. This was a squash, but the front room was dry.
The leaves were falling from the trees. Every tree and bush had flamed out into yellow, crimson, pink, brown, or orange. The island was a lovely sight to see when the sun came out for an hour or two, for then its rays lighted up all the brilliant leaves, and they shone like jewels. But now the leaves were falling.
Leaves were dropping down in Willow House from the branches that made the roof. It was funny to lie in bed at night and feel a leaf drop lightly on to your cheek. Willow House looked different now that there were so few green or yellow leaves growing on the roof and walls. It was bare and brown.
Nora caught a cold and began to sneeze. Jack said they must move to the caves at once, or they would all get cold - and if they were ill, what would happen? There was no doctor to make them well!
They dosed Nora with hot milk and wrapped her up in the two new blankets Jack had bought in the village one week when he had been marketing. They set her at the back of the outer cave, with a candle beside her, for it was dim in that corner. She soon got better, and was able to help the others when they made their plans for living in the cave.
“We’ll make this outer cave our living-room and bedroom!” Jack said, “and the inner one shall be our storeroom. We’ll always have a fire burning at the entrance, and that will warm us and cook our food. This is going to be rather fun! We shall be cave-people this winter!”