“I dare say,” said George. “What do you want it for?”
“It’s a secret,” said Mike. “We’ll tell you later on.”
“You can go to my old boat in the cove and open the locker there,” said George. “There’s a mighty lot of string and stuff all tangled up there. You can have the loan of it if you want it.”
“Oh, thank you, George!” cried the four children, and they tore off to the cove. They found George’s boat and opened the locker at one end of it. Sure enough there was a mighty lot of string and twine and rope there, that George used for mending and making fishing-nets.
“Goodness! It’ll take some time to untangle all this!” said Peggy.
“Well, there’s four of us to do it,” said Jack. “We might as well sit here in the boat and get on with it now.”
“What shall we make the rungs of the ladder with?” said Peggy.
“There’s some little wooden stakes, quite strong, in Dimmy’s garden shed,” said Jack. “I saw them there the other day. They would be the very thing!”
“Look! Look!” said Peggy suddenly, in a low voice. The others looked up, and saw, coming across the sand towards them, the yellow-haired woman who had been with Mr. Diaz in the car, and who lived at the Old House.
“That must be Mrs. Diaz,” said Nora. “Is she coming to talk to us, I wonder?”