We found out we were in a big attic that covered the whole of the house.
Part of it was floored over and part of it was just joists with the lath
and plaster showing on the under side. It looked as if there was about
an acre in it, and it was full of angles and brick chimneys and little,
funny-shaped windows, and rubbish, and trunks and goodness knows
what--except things to eat.
We were there, and no chance of getting out right away, so the idea of
getting something to eat was one that came pretty quick. It went about
as soon as it came.
"Guess we'll have to gnaw air," says I, kind of down-hearted.
"L-l-lucky," says Mark, "if Jethro don't gnaw us."
"What'll Plunk and Tallow do when we don't show up?"
"Nothin', I hope," says Mark. "Rock'll f-find some way to tell 'em we're
penned up here, and I guess they'll have sense enough to do n-nothin'
but hang around to see what t-turns up."
"They'll hang around," says I. "You couldn't drive 'em away. Don't think
they'd sneak off and leave us, do you?"
"Not them," says Mark, and the way he said it would have sounded pretty
good to Tallow and Plunk if they had heard. It showed that Mark _knew_
them, and was sure he could depend on them no matter what happened.
"L-let's rummage around," says Mark.
We stirred things up good, because Mark said you never could tell what
you were going to find in an attic, and if there was anything there to
throw any light on Rock's affairs, why, we wanted to know it. There were
trunks and boxes of old clothes, and busted chairs, and piles of old
magazines and books, and hats, and shoes. You could find 'most anything
you didn't want there, but not much you did want, unless you was
figuring on dressing up for a masquerade.
Over in a corner, though, I found a little rocking-chair for a baby, and
what was left of a doll's house and some busted toys.
"Look here," says I. "I wonder what Mr. Wigglesworth was doin' with
these kid things. Didn't have any that I ever heard of."
"No," says Mark, but his eyes began to shine like everything. "Not that
we heard of. Maybe, Binney, there's n-n-nothin' to this, but maybe it's
the m-most important thing we've run onto in this whole business."
"How?" says I.
"B-because," says he, "it makes it l-look as if what I was hopin' was so
might be so."
"Um!" says I. "How int'restin'."
Well, we kept on digging into things, and after a while Mark hauled out
one of those old-fashioned photograph-albums that fasten with a brass
catch in front. It wasn't a big plush one, like we got to home on the
center-table, but a little leather one about six inches long and four
wide and two thick. We went over by a window and looked through it. My!
but it was comical--the clothes folks used to wear, and the faces they
wore when they went to have their pictures taken!
We looked at every picture careful. Along at the front we recognized Mr.
Wigglesworth when he was a young man, with Burnside whiskers and funny
pants, and his hair all plastered down in front and combed up on the
side. After a few pages was another picture of a young woman sitting on
a rock with Mr. Wigglesworth standing behind her with his hand on her
shoulder.
"Look at that!" says Mark, excited as a bantam rooster. "He was married.
See? B-b-bet that p-picture was taken on their weddin' trip. It's a
weddin'-trip-lookin' picture," says he.
"Yes," says I, "it sure looks foolish."
"Hum!" says he. "This is important."
"Good," says I.
But the next picture--that was what startled both of us, for--maybe you
won't believe it--but it was the Man With the Black Gloves, only about
twenty years younger than he is, and not wearing the gloves, but just as
mean and ornery-looking then as he is now.
"There," says Mark, "I g-guess when we leave here we t-take this album
along."
"Why?" says I.
"All those p-pictures," says he, "has the names of the photographers on
'em, and the p-places where they was taken. We can go there or write
there, and t-trace back somethin' about Mr. Wigglesworth's family."
But we hadn't seen all the album yet. There was, farther on, a picture
of Mrs. Wigglesworth (at least we guessed it must be Mrs. Wigglesworth)
with a baby on her lap, and Mark was like to jump out of his skin.
"I knew it m-must be," says he. "We're gettin' hot," says he.
After that came a lot of pictures of a kid--a girl, and she kept getting
older and older, until the last one showed she was maybe eighteen or
nineteen, somewheres around there--about as old as a school-teacher,
maybe. And then there wasn't any more of her, and there wasn't any more
of Mrs. Wigglesworth, either.
But Mark was satisfied. "Look at that last p-picture," says he. "Who
d-does it resemble?"
"Nobody I kin see," says I.
"All right," says he; "jest wait."
"I hain't got anythin' else to do," says I, "so I might 's well."
He stepped back and almost went off of the floor and stepped on the lath
and plaster between the joists.
"Lookout!" says I. "You'll go right through."
He slapped his knee. "Right t-through!" says he. "Ain't we fat-heads?
Say, Pekoe's room's over about there, hain't it?" says he, pointing
across the attic.
"Somewheres," says I.
"Anyhow," says he, "we hain't been wastin' time."
He went to the back of the house and paced off toward the front.
"I calc'late Pekoe's room is about under here," says he, and got down on
his knees and began working cautious at the plaster between two laths
with his knife. He picked and picked, and at last got a hole through
about as big around as a lead-pencil, then he got down on his stummick
and looked through it.
"Mr. Pekoe," says he.
"What?" says Pekoe's voice, kind of muffled-like.
"We're h-here," says Mark, "up in the attic. Jethro's got us cornered,
but he don't know it."
"That's where you're ahead of me," says he; "Jethro's got me cornered
and he _does_ know it."
"Tell me all you know about Rock and his f-f-father," says Mark.
"Don't know much about Rock," says Pekoe, "except that his father always
kept him in school, and sometimes had pretty hard work to find the money
to pay for it. Mostly Big Rock was in South America or Alaska or Burma
or Africa or somewheres, trying to find a gold mine or a diamond mine,
or somethin'. He never got to the United States at all. He wasn't a
feller that talked much, but when it came to _acting_ well, you can bet
he was right there. There never was a squarer pal than Big Rock, and
there's men that loves him from Nome to Cape Town."
"Where was Rock's m-m-mother?"
"Big Rock never mentioned her, but I knew she was dead. Been dead since
Rock was a little baby. Guess that's why Big Rock went to
globe-trottin'."
"You don't know her name?"
"Never heard it."
"And Big Rock's d-dead now?"
"Not by a jugful," says Pekoe. "I thought he was, and he thought he was
goin' to be, but I got a letter from him a week ago, and he says he got
over that sickness, and for me not to take Rock to Wicksville if I
hadn't, and if I had, to git him back again, because he didn't want the
boy to go there while he was alive. He says he didn't want to be
beholdin' to a man while there was a chance of keepin' away from it. The
way he wrote made me think he had some sort of a grudge ag'in' this Mr.
Wigglesworth."
"And that's all you know?"
"Every livin' thing," says he.
"All right," says Mark. "Now we won't t-talk any more, 'cause Jethro
might hear. We're g-goin' to git away, and we'll git you away as soon as
we kin. I guess things is g-goin' to happen around here perty sudden."
"Hope so," says Pekoe. "They would happen sudden if Big Rock was to show
up."
"Good-by," says Mark, "till we see you again."
"Now," says I, "let's figger on how we're goin' to escape from the
dungeon."
"'Tain't a d-dungeon," says Mark. "We're shut up in the tower of the
Knight we've been f-fightin'. There's men-at-arms crowdin' all around,
and the drawb-bridge is up and the moat's full of water. I guess he's
holdin' us for ransom."
"If I don't git somethin' to eat perty soon," says I, "he won't have
anythin' _to_ ransom."
"Food," says Mark, "hain't to be thought about in sich circ'mstances.
Here we be shut in the same t-tower with the young Duke that we're
liegemen of, and his father's retainer, the Knight Pekoe. What's food
compared with sich things?"
"Even a Duke," says I, "wouldn't be much good if he didn't eat for a
week or two. I guess they'd be lookin' for a new Duke to take his job."
"The b-best of it," says Mark, "is that the Duke's secret is hid in this
Castle Wigglesworth. If we could git it we could rescue the Duke and the
Knight would wish he hadn't ever been born."
"You hain't figgerin' on tryin' to follow up that paper thingumbob of
Mr. Wigglesworth's, be you?"
"We're inside the castle," says Mark, "and the enemy don't know it.
Never have a b-better chance to snoop around, if we wait till after
dark."
"Without nothin' to eat," says I.
He jest sniffed.
"And," says I, "with the risk of this Knight Jethro findin' us
snoopin'."
"You hain't s-s-scairt, be you?" says he.
"I hain't what you'd call easy in my mind," says I.
"All right," says he. "If that's the way you f-f-feel, we'll jest
escape, and I'll git Plunk or Tallow to come back with me when we can
git a chanct."
"You won't," says I, "because so long as I'm here I might as well stick.
If them kids can do it, I guess I can."
"I knew you would, Binney," says he, which ended that. I was elected to
stay, hungry or no hungry, so I settled down and made believe I was
eating an apple pie. But that didn't do much good. It just made me
hungrier.
"Wish we could c-c-communicate with our faithful friends, the Knights
Tallow and Plunk," says he.
"We can try," says I.
"There's a ladder l-leadin' to a trap door in the roof," says Mark.
"Let's go up it and see what there is to see."
The ladder went up over in a front corner, and I scrambled up it first.
Mark came right behind me. I unhooked the trap door cautious and shoved
it up; then I poked my head through. There was a flat place about six
feet square with a railing around it, and I knew we were on top of a
sort of little tower on the front of the house.
"Come on," says I, "but keep down. We can hide behind this railin'
here."
"'Tain't a railin'," says Mark, "it's a battlement."
That's the way with him. When he's playing a thing he _plays_ it, and
sticks to details. Everything you say or do has got to be the way it
would be if what you was doing was real instead of make-believe. He was
the greatest make-believer I ever saw.
We crawled out on the roof, and looked around pretty careful, I can tell
you. Nobody was in sight for a while. Then we saw Rock in the yard, and
after a while we saw Plunk and Tallow coming toward him. They stopped
and talked with their heads close together.
"Our t-trusty friends," says Mark, "have found a way of t-talkin' to the
young Duke."
"Yes," says I, "they're doin' it the usual way--with their mouths."
"We got to let them know we're h-h-here," says he.
"Yell at 'em," says I.
He just looked at me, and then got his slingshot out of his pocket and
put a pebble in the leather. Then his eyes sort of twinkled, and he
says, "If I hit where I aim, Plunk Smalley's g-g-goin' to git a
s'prise."
Plunk's back was toward us, so I sort of guessed.
Mark aimed careful and let her fly. In a jiffy Plunk clapped his hand to
the seat of his pants and let out a holler you could have heard in
Illinoy. Then him and the others looked all around and Mark stuck up his
head pretty slow, and then his hand, and waggled it.
Plunk and Tallow and Rock saw it, but they had sense enough not to
waggle back. They knew Jethro might see them. So they just nodded their
heads and made believe they was looking at something else.
"Now," says Mark, "we'll give 'em their orders."
"How?" says I.
"Write 'em," says he, "and chuck 'em over." He got out his pencil and
wrote a note that said:
_Faithful Knights_:--The Knight Binney and me is safe. Our presence
hain't known, and we got to talk with the prisoner Pekoe. In the tower
where we're hid we found other secrets that is important to the young
Duke. Tell him his father's alive, and is a great man, so the prisoner
Pekoe says. We hain't going to escape till we see if we can get past the
men-at-arms and the bad Knight Jethro, and hunt around in the dungeons
under this castle to find out what the writing left by the Earl
Wigglesworth leads to. You faithful knights stick around till you hear
from us, but don't be seen. If we don't show up by midnight, you better
wake up Lawyer Jones and tell him what has happened, and for him to come
out with his men-at-arms to rescue us. If you hear three whistles inside
go and bang like everything on the front door and holler fire. All in
the young Duke's service,
_Mark Tidd, Knight_
Then he folded it and, making sure Jethro wasn't watching, let it
flutter over the edge. It fell to the grass quite a ways off and pretty
soon we saw the knights and the young Duke go over to it, and Tallow put
his foot on it. After a while he sat down, and we saw him stuff it in
his pocket. Then they all went over to the arbor and out of sight. We
knew they were reading the note, and that they would stick just like
Mark told them.