The Secret of Saturday Cove Read online

  Her eyes bright, Sally lowered the candle over a stained scrap of canvas that David held flat on the floor. It was a faded and crudely drawn chart. In one corner the name, Jonathan Blake, was written in a childish script.

  “It’s so old it’s all yellow,” Sally murmured.

  “That’s why I studied it. Now look a-here.” Tensely, David’s finger traced the rude but certain outlines of Saturday Cove.

  Sally crouched, wondering, over the chart.

  “Don’t go dripping wax all over it,” her brother warned. “See. Here’s Blake’s Island, with a square to mark this house. Then all these little islands with no names on them. But look — ” David tapped his forefinger over a small circle. “What do you see?”

  “I see a little circle for an island,” Sally said unevenly.

  “Look in the circle.”

  Sally looked, and drew in her breath. Very faint, so dim that she could scarcely make it out, she saw the careful cross of a small X.

  Chapter

  2

  AN ENEMY AND AN ISLAND

  SAN ENEMY AND AN ISLANDALLY looked up, her face aglow. “It’s a cross, David! On an island! I’ll bet anything it’s where Jonathan buried the treasure.”

  “Could be.” Carefully, David rolled up the old chart and tied it with a piece of string from his pocket. “But don’t get your hopes up. . . .”

  “But why don’t we just follow the chart?”

  David laughed shortly. “That’s easier said than done. It’s only a rough sketch drawn by someone who didn’t know beans about the cove.”

  “Jonathan? But Jonathan lived here.”

  David led the way back to the kitchen. “That’s right. But the family had just settled on the island when all this happened, Dad said. They probably hadn’t done much scouting around the bay, what with clearing the land and raising the homestead.” Thoughtfully, he handed the chart to Sally while he scattered the ashes of the fire. “The cove is drawn too short and the islands are spaced wrong. I recognized Blake’s only by the little beach and the square that marks this house. But anyway it’s a good clue. I want Dad and Poke to see it.”

  “David? Can’t I help?” There was no mistaking the longing in Sally’s voice.

  “Maybe.” Her brother snuffed out the candle and flung open the door. “Look, Sally. The storm is over.”

  They gazed out upon a fresh and shining world. The sun sparkled on the spruces and the spruces breathed in the light wind. For an instant the two stood silent in the doorway. Then David said, “We’d better get going.”

  Down on the little beach the Lobster Boy lay safe but stranded, yards from the ebbing tide. David and Sally removed their shoes and socks and rolled up their jeans. Then they dragged the dory down the flats and into the water.

  Soon they were beating their way through the cove toward Fishermen’s Dock. Sally, with Jonathan’s chart held proudly in her lap, half turned in the bow to watch their progress. As they entered the inner harbor David cut down his speed as usual. They were halfway to the town landing when they noticed the boat — a powerful mahogany inboard, new to the cove. It was roaring away from the yacht club float too fast for courtesy or safety, and it was bearing straight down on them. For a moment David stared, waiting for the other to check his speed, to change his course.

  Then he shouted to Sally, “Hold on!” He pushed the stick to starboard as far as he dared, but in a flash the newcomer followed them. For a chilling instant it seemed that the two boats must crash head-on. Then the faster boat shied easily to one side, leaving the little dory pitching crazily in its wake.

  David steadied the Lobster Boy on her course and said nothing. But his lips pressed angrily together as the tall boy in the other boat shouted, “Quit holding up traffic!” Then, with an insolent burst of power, the cruiser continued out of sight around the point.

  Wrathfully, Sally stared after the show-off. “He could have upset us.”

  David’s face was grim. “He practically did.” But there was much work to be done and the day was ending. Talk could wait.

  With the motor idling, they drew alongside the lobster car, a padlocked floating crate where David kept his catch until he sold it to the hotel. Into this he emptied the day’s catch, the mottled shellfish splashing one by one into the dark water.

  Sally rinsed out the bait pail, then helped swab the dory, dipping the sponge over the side into the cold water of the harbor. Finally, they had made the Lobster Boy fast for the night, and David led the way up the ramp in silence.

  A genial, foghorn voice hailed them from the wharf, and they glanced up to see Uncle Charlie. Leaning on a piling and smoking his pipe, he looked as seamed and as comfortable as an old glove.

  “How’s the haulin’?” he shouted, as if a large expanse of water still separated them.

  David grinned and raised his voice. “There’s nothing wrong with the hauling, Uncle Charlie. I’ve averaged one and a half to a trap for ‘most a week now.”

  “No need to yell,” bellowed the old lobsterman, and he tinkered cheerfully with his hearing aid. “At thirty-six cents a pound, that ain’t hay, is it?”

  “I had a good teacher,” David told him generously.

  “Shucks, son, you’re a natural-born salt. Which is a sight more’n I can say for that young trouble-maker that just went out.”

  Sally was still blazing with indignation. “Did you see what happened?”

  Uncle Charlie snorted. “I see the whole thing. That was Roddie McNeill, and somebody ought to paddle him good or else teach him how to act in a boat. Foolin’ around like that, and headin’ out at this hour.”

  David frowned. “McNeill? The same Mr. McNeill who bought Grindstone Point from Dad?”

  “Ayuh. Same McNeill.” Uncle Charlie knocked the ashes out of his pipe. “They’re putting up a big house down to the point.”

  David nodded, bitterly feeling the loss of Blake land. Then Uncle Charlie shouted a fresh bit of news.

  “Young Roddie aims to do some haulin’, so they say.”

  Sally broke in, “Hauling! Why, that smarty-cat doesn’t know one end of a boat from the other.”

  “He’ll learn,” Uncle Charlie said dryly. “Haulin’s hard work, and it’ll mebbe make a man of him,” he added.

  David’s heart sank at the prospect of Roddie McNeill hanging around the cove. “Where does he keep his boat and his gear?” he asked.

  “Likely over to the yacht club.” Losing interest, Uncle Charlie put his pipe away. He ignored the town clock that rose above the elms on Main Street and squinted up at the sky. “Close to suppertime. I’ll give you young’uns a lift home. But first, step over to the shack a minute. I got something for you.” The old lobster-man was pleased with himself. He was about to play Santa Claus. David knew the signs.

  Together, the three crossed the wharf and crunched up the clamshell path to the sheds where the lobstermen kept their gear.

  The old man had recently given up lobstering in order to tend his antique shop nearby. “Not that I’m gitting too old to haul,” he told everyone loudly. “I ain’t.” And to prove it, he still maintained his gear shed and hauled a few traps whenever he had a hankering for a lobster stew. This gave him excuse enough for spending his spare time around Fishermen’s Dock with his pipe and his cronies.

  Between the rows of traps piled outside to dry, they approached the old shed, as familiar to the children as home. For they had often gone out with Uncle Charlie when he was lobstering full-time, or passed a foggy morning by his little stove, helping him to mend his gear.

  Actually their great-uncle, Charlie Blake had long been their favorite relative. It was from him that David had learned most of what he knew about lobstering. And it was Uncle Charlie who had given David the dory that he had reconditioned into the Lobster Boy.

  The old man unlocked the door and they entered the sun-pierced gloom of the shed. David sniffed curiously at the smell of fresh paint in the air.

  “You handling
all the gear you can?” yelled Uncle Charlie.

  “Not exactly,” David admitted. “But I can’t line up any more this season.”

  “Well, son,” chuckled Uncle Charlie, “you’ve got ’em lined up now, fifteen of ’em. Fresh-painted, too.” There along the top of Uncle Charlie’s bench was a neat row of main buoys — old, but solid and sun-dried. Each had a new coat of red-and-black paint underneath its green tip — David’s colors. And each was marked with David’s number and his initials.

  Speechless, the boy looked at Uncle Charlie whose lean face shone with pleasure.

  “Shucks. They’s no point in letting this gear just loaf around. You can set these any time you’ve a mind to. Traps outside to go with ’em.”

  “Thanks, Uncle Charlie!” David said with all his heart.

  “Ayuh,” said the old man, embarrassed. “Here’s a key. You might’s well use the shack, too. They’s room enough for the both of us.”

  Before David could answer, Uncle Charlie changed the subject. “How’s the swimming, Sally?”

  Sally bit her lip. “I’m — I’m taking lessons at the beach, but . . . .” Her voice trailed away.

  Without a word, Uncle Charlie reached up to his top shelf. He handed her a dusty bottle. Inside was a tiny full-rigged ship, complete to the last miniature lifeboat and anchor.

  “That’s a present ahead of time for learning to swim. You’ll learn soon,” he promised.

  Sally’s eyes grew round and slowly filled with happy tears. Unable to speak, she gave the old man a fierce hug.

  “Shucks,” said Uncle Charlie. “Let’s git out of here.”

  The afternoon air smelled of wild roses growing behind the sheds and of rockweed on the flats.

  “Look,” Sally cried softly. “The island has David’s colors.”

  Beyond the point lay Blake’s Island, richly banded in color. It was green-tipped with spruces above the broad band of red where the dying sun tinted the ledges. And below at the waterline shone the wet black of rock-weed. David felt a quick rush of pride. Why, in a way, Blake’s Island, owned as it had been by generations of Blakes, was his own.

  Uncle Charlie slapped his trousers. “Gitting towards suppertime. Let’s git goin’.”

  The ancient car started up with a hoarse roar, and they jounced away from the docks.

  “Speaking of islands,” bellowed Uncle Charlie over the racket of the engine, “I hear tell Mr. McNeill wants to buy one off’n the point. I guess all that money of his is burnin’ a hole in his pocket.”

  David felt Sally’s elbow dig sharply into his side. Which island contained the old Blake treasure? Suddenly David was impatient to reach home.

  They pounded over the bridge at Goose Creek and roared down the narrow road that led north along the shore.

  “How many islands your folks own now, David?” bawled Uncle Charlie.

  “Just Blake’s. And Tub Island, of course, since it’s joined to Blake’s by a sand bar.”

  “That’s a-plenty,” boomed the old man, “taxes bein’ what they are.”

  “You own Blueberry Island and Little Fox, too, don’t you?” asked Sally. “I bet you’d never sell them.”

  “Sell ’em tomorrow for a wooden nickel,” chuckled Uncle Charlie. “Sick and tired of payin’ the taxes.”

  But he doesn’t mean it, David reassured himself. For, taxes or no taxes, Uncle Charlie was too much of a Yankee trader ever to part with anything without what he called “a good dicker.”

  They rounded the bend and came to an explosive halt under the elms that sheltered the Blake house.

  “Well, it’s most suppertime,” Uncle Charlie announced. And with a quick wave, he bounced off in a cloud of dust.

  Supper was creamed salt cod and garden peas, and David ate hungrily, listening to Sally’s high-flown account of the afternoon’s adventures. By the time Mrs. Blake served the rhubarb pie, tart and hot from the oven, Sally had slowed down.

  Then David brought up the subject that lay uneasy on his mind. “Dad, have you heard about Mr. McNeill wanting to buy an island?”

  Mr. Blake’s years of teaching had given him the look of a patient scholar. He looked especially patient, as he sipped his coffee.

  “Well, David,” he began, “like all the Blakes, you hate to see the land go. But it’s bringing a good price now. This is the time to sell. The island costs money each year in taxes, you know.”

  Shock, like a cold wave, broke over David. He laid down his fork and stared aghast at his father. “But you’d never sell Blake’s, Dad. Not Blake’s!” Impatiently, he waited for his father’s answer.

  “Now, David,” said his mother gently. “It just isn’t sensible to hold onto land that doesn’t bring any income. The old house out there is going to ruin. We simply can’t afford it. But Mr. McNeill will pay us a fair price. He said that of all the islands in Saturday Cove, his son’s first choice is Blake’s.”

  “His son! What does his son want with Blake’s?” David broke in. He saw again the contempt on Roddie McNeill’s face as he broke the harbor rules for the fun of it.

  “According to his father, the boy likes to do a little shooting and camping,” said Mr. Blake. “And I gather that young McNeill gets pretty much what he wants.”

  David was silent. He thought of the house and its great fireplace where he could warm himself during cold hauls. This would be Roddie’s camp. He thought of the island squirrels that by summer’s end would be all but tame — the little shy rabbits that lived in the island woodlot. These would be Roddie’s targets.

  “And, too, Blake’s is the best buy for the McNeills,” his father was saying, “since it’s the nearest island to their point.”

  David said bitterly, “Their point!”

  “The McNeills own it now,” his father reminded him. “Times change, David. We can’t be sentimental about the land.”

  Sally had gazed from one of them to the other. Now she burst out, “But what about the Blake treasure? Just when we’ve found our clue, that man can’t go buying up the islands.”

  “Eat your pie, Sally,” said her mother. “That treasure isn’t likely to turn up after all this time. And even if it did, it never was money, you know — just household goods that they valued in those days.”

  Mechanically, David finished supper and gazed through the window at the tulip tree that grew by the gate. In the century since a Blake sea captain had brought it home and planted it there, it had grown strong and beautiful.

  The boy took a deep breath. “As far as the treasure goes, I don’t think it’s on Blake’s, anyway. But John Blake’s home island ought to be worth more to this family than money.”

  Mr. Blake raised a quiet brow at his wife, but David missed it. An idea came skyrocketing into his mind, raising with it a high, new hope.

  “Dad! Mother!” He faced them earnestly. “It’s been good hauling these last few weeks. I’m putting all I planned to into my college fund, and a little more besides. With my new traps I’ll have enough extra money by the end of August to pay those taxes myself.”

  Mrs. Blake rose hastily and murmured something about “seeing to the stove.”

  Her husband said nothing for a long minute. Then he cleared his throat and looked up. “And what if your good luck doesn’t hold, David? What then? Supposing you strike a slack season? Or suppose a storm hits you and you lose your gear?”

  David thought this over. Then he said quietly, “I’d like to try it, Dad. I think I can do it.”

  “You like lobster fishing that well, do you?”

  The boy hesitated, then tried to put his thoughts into words. “I love it, Dad. It’s the sea, I guess. It’s — big. It’s never the same for long, but it’s always wonderful, and beautiful, and . . . .” David groped for the right word.

  “Challenging?”

  “That’s it!”

  Mr. Blake nodded. “You’ll find that owning an island will be quite a responsibility. But I don’t believe it will prove too big for y
ou.” He turned from the gratitude in his son’s face and called toward the kitchen. “Ellen! Remind me to see Lawyer Perry tomorrow. We’re making over the deed to Blake’s Island to one David Blake.”

  Mrs. Blake returned with hot coffee. She had a tender smile for her husband. “John, what a lovely way to settle things. I didn’t want to sell Blake’s.”

  “Neither did I,” John Blake declared, and all four laughed with relief.

  “If Mr. McNeill wants an island so bad,” Sally put in ungrammatically, “Uncle Charlie says he’ll sell Little Fox or Blueberry for a wooden nickel.”

  “What makes you think the treasure isn’t on Little Fox or Blueberry?” David asked.

  “Perhaps we can tell something from that old chart you found,” said Mr. Blake. “Let’s have a look at it.”

  “I held it on my lap all the way in,” Sally began. Then she broke off and her eyes went blank.

  “Uh-huh,” said David, exasperated. “You left it in Uncle Charlie’s gear shed.”

  But Sally’s hand had gone to her mouth in horror. “I had it on my lap. I kept it safe on my lap all the way in to the cove.” Stricken, she turned to her brother. “Oh, David,” she wailed. “I never once had it in the shed. When you yelled, ‘Hold on’ when that Roddie McNeill headed into us, it must have been then . . . .”

  David stared at her in disbelief. “Do you mean to say you lost that chart overboard?”

  Sally, unable to answer, bit her lip and nodded.

  David rose to his feet and pushed back his chair roughly. Anger darkened his face, and scorn for Sally tightened his voice. “I turn up the first clue to the treasure that this family’s ever had, and you go lose it overboard like a ninny. It serves me right. That’s what I get for trusting a girl. If it had been Poke, this wouldn’t have happened.”

  A painful lump filled Sally’s throat and the world swam in a sea of shame.

  “I’m off to see Poke,” David told his parents shortly.

  Without looking again at Sally, or seeing the misery in her face, he slammed the door behind him.