“I’ve found it, I’ve found it!” yelled Jack, dancing round the room like a clown in a circus. “It’s all here - there’s a map of it and everything!”
The girls squealed. Dimmy sank down into her chair again. She wasn’t used to these adventures!
“Show! Show us the map!” yelled Nora. She swept aside her plate and glass with a crash, and Jack set the old diary down on the tablecloth.
“Listen,” he said. “This is Dimmy’s grandfather’s entry for the third of June, exactly one hundred years ago! He says, ‘To-day has been the most exciting day of my life. I found at last the old hidden passage between Peep-Hole and the Old House tower. A gull fell into the chimney of my room and I climbed up it to free the bird. Whilst I was there I pressed by accident on the great stone that swings round to open the passage in the wall of the tower.’ ”
“O-o-oh!” squealed Nora. “We can find it too!”
“Don’t interrupt,” said Peggy, her face pale with excitement. “Go on, Jack.”
“He goes on to tell how he got into the passage, which runs down the walls of our tower to the ground, up the cliff to the Old House, branches off to join our own secret passage somewhere, and also goes on to the tower of the Old House, up and inside the thick walls there, and into the topmost room of the tower!” Jack could hardly speak, he was so thrilled at having found what he wanted.
“There’s a rough map here that he drew after he had found out all about the passage. He kept the secret to himself, because he was afraid that if he didn’t his father might have the passage blocked up.”
Everyone pored over the map. It was faded and difficult to see, even under the magnifying-glass, but the children could plainly follow the passage from their tower, downwards in the wall right to the ground and below it, then underground to the Old House, up through the thick walls there, and into the top room of the Old House tower.
“I knew I was right! I knew I was right!” said Dimmy, quite as excited as the children.