Authors: John Keir Cross
At the back of the Doctor’s house, just beyond the
part they called the laboratory, there was a little wood, or copse, of fir
trees. We were strolling here “quite joco,” as Mrs. Duthie would say, when
suddenly the trees stopped, and there in front of us was an enormous high
wooden enclosure—a sort of palisade, like the one in
Treasure Island,
only much much bigger. It was as high as a good-sized house, and at least two
hundred feet square (Mike paced it out, and each side was 110 paces, and we
always used to reckon one of Mike’s measuring steps as a little over two feet).
“Hullo, what’s this?” said Mike.
“It’s some sort of house,” said Jacky.
“House my foot,” I chimed in. “Whoever built a house
that size? Besides, it hasn’t any roof—and where are the windows?”
“Well, they might be going to add a roof—you never
know,” said Jacky sulkily. “And maybe it’s a special new type of house without
windows. They’re up to all sort of experiments these days.”
While we were arguing like this, young Mike was
searching all over the palisade for some gap or knot-hole to peer through. He
now gave a cry to indicate he had found one.
“I say, just come and have a look at this,” he yelled.
“What on earth do you suppose it can be?”
We went over beside him and I bent down and looked
through the hole. Unfortunately, it was a very little hole, but I was able to
see enough through it to thoroughly whet my curiosity. (Jacky has just stopped
me to say I’ve used a split infinitive and that that is bad grammar. I should
have written “thoroughly to whet my curiosity,” or “to whet my curiosity
thoroughly.” Well, it doesn’t much matter—you’ll know what I mean, and that’s
the main thing.)
Now, where was I?—oh yes, the thing inside the
enclosure. It was, as far as I could see, an immense sort of shell, like the
fuselage of a huge aeroplane, and it was made of some sort of metal, very
highly polished, so that it shone in the sunshine. Every now and again, in the
wall of it, there were small round windows, like port-holes in a ship, only
they seemed of enormously thick glass, and bulged a great deal, like Mrs.
Duthie’s spectacles. It was lying, as far as I could judge, on a big wooden
platform that was inclined at an angle of about forty degrees. I could not see
far enough to my left or right through the knot-hole to be able to get any sort
of glimpse of the ends of the thing.
“It looks like a boat, almost,” I said, looking round
at Mike, while Jacky had a turn at the knot-hole.
“That’s exactly what I thought,” nodded Mike. “And it’s
on a sort of big slipway, like a kind of launching ramp. But where’s the water?
There isn’t any water for miles.”
“If only we could see properly,” grumbled Jacky. “This
knot-hole is no good. Can’t you find a bigger one, Mike?”
Mike stood looking thoughtful for a moment. He has a
way of standing with his arms akimbo, seeking what he calls “inspiration.”
Then, when it arrives, he hits his brow a great smack. This is what he did now.
“I’ve got it,” he cried. “Paul, I’m going up one of
these trees. Then I’ll be able to see in over the top of the wall. Give me a
hoist up, will you?”
We chose one of the highest of the trees, and Mike was
up it in an instant, like the young ape we have always said he was. We could
see him from below clinging on to one of the slender top branches of the fir,
and craning his neck to peer into the enclosure. He gave a long low whistle of
excitement.
I was just getting ready to swarm up one of the other
trees myself, when Jacky, who was standing a little distance away, came running
over to me to say that she could see through the trees that Doctor Mac and
Uncle Steve had come out of the laboratory and were strolling back towards the
study across the lawn, very deep in conversation.
“And it just struck me,” she added, “that this thing,
whatever it is, must be pretty secret, or they wouldn’t have shoved the wall
round it. I think we’d better not be found looking in at it—I vote we go and
join the two of them, and we can come back some other time and explore this
whole place properly.”
I agreed that this was a good idea and we whistled to
Mike to come down. Uncle Steve and the Doctor had gone into the study through
the French windows by the time we emerged from the wood. On our way across the
lawn, Mike explained to us in an excited low voice what he had seen from the
tree-top.
“It’s immense,” he said. “You never saw anything like
it—honest you didn’t. It goes very tapery and pointed to one end—the end low
down on the ramp—and it bulges up to a big round sort of head at the other
end—it’s exactly like an enormous pear. And there are all sorts of little
nozzles, like guns, sticking out all over it—a great mass of them at the
pointed end, one or two along the sides, and then some more at the blunt end,
though not so many as at the pointed end. There’s a ladder goes up to a big
doorway in the side near the bulgy end—if you two hadn’t called me down I’d
have thought out some way of getting over the wall to find out what it’s like
inside.”
By this time we had reached the study. Uncle Steve and
Doctor Mac were talking very earnestly and quietly together. They broke off
when we went in through the French windows, and after a few moments of
chatting, Uncle Steve said that it was time we were thinking of getting back
home. So we said cheerio to Doctor Mac and set off.
As we walked through the fields to the cottage, I said
to Uncle Steve in an innocent voice:
“By the way, Uncle Steve, we were walking about in the
woods up at Doctor Mac’s house, and we came across a big sort of wooden
enclosure thing. What’s it for?”
Uncle Steve looked a bit uncomfortable.
“Oh, that,” he said. “Yes.
. . .
Well, you see, that’s really a secret, you know. The Doctor is
carrying out some very special scientific experiments that nobody’s supposed to
know anything about, and that’s one of the places where he works at them.”
“What sort of experiments?” asked Mike. “They must be
very odd if he needs a great big place like that for them.”
“Oh, just experiments, you know,” said Uncle Steve,
getting more and more embarrassed. “As a matter of fact, you’re not really
supposed to have gone into the wood at all—I should have told you it’s out of
bounds. Next time you see the Doctor you had better not mention you were
there—he’s very touchy about his work.”
And he suddenly changed the subject to talk about our
holiday plans for the next day. So we knew we were on to something. We all
three of us looked at each other and gave a secret smile, and Mike winked.
For the next few days nothing much happened. We had a
good enough time among the hills and so on, but there was nothing spectacular.
I thought a lot about what we had seen in the enclosure, and wondered often
what Doctor Mac’s experiments could be. And I knew that Mike was doing the
same.
One thing that added to the mystery of it all was the
behavior of Uncle Steve. He seemed to have something on his mind. He went very
often to see Doctor Mac, then when he came home he would sit for hours just
thinking—sitting in the evenings at the window simply staring at the sky. One
night it rained very badly and we had to stay indoors. We half-expected he would
read or tell us some of his stories, or at least do something to entertain us.
But no—he sat in a corner all the time, brooding and chewing at his pipe-stem,
and Mike and I were forced to play draughts, while Jacky got on with a bit of
sewing.
Then suddenly, one evening, while Jacky and I were
sitting reading in a little summer-house sort of place right at the foot of
Uncle Steve’s garden, Mike came rushing up to us with his face all red with
excitement.
“I’ve got it!” he yelled, slapping his brow like a little
lunatic. “Oh boy, I know what that thing up at the Doc’s place is! It’s a
rocket!”
“A rocket?” I said. Mike nodded, and Jacky stared at
him as if he’d gone off his nut.
(Insert note by Jacqueline Adam:
I’m putting a note in here because Paul keeps on
thinking he can do his big brother stuff and make me out as if I were stupid.
Well, I’m not. I didn’t say anything when Mike told us about Doctor Mac’s
rocket, because I had suspected it was a rocket all along, so there—and that’s
more than Paul ever did!—J. A.)
“Yes, a rocket,” went on Mike. “The old Doctor’s been
experimenting with them a long time. It was Mr. McIntosh, the gamekeeper, that
told me,” he continued. “Some of the Doctor’s laboratory assistants are in
lodgings with his sister in Pitlochry, and they let him into the secret. They’ve
been building experimental rockets for the Doctor for years—though this is the
biggest one ever. They think he’s a little bit dotty, as a matter of fact.”
By this time I had realized the full weight of what it
was that Mike was telling us.
“Phew!” I gasped, “a rocket! Well, my hat, if he’s
building a rocket as big as that, he must be hoping to reach the moon at the
very least! I say, Mike—what an idea! Do you suppose maybe he is thinking of
trying to reach the moon?”
“He couldn’t,” said Jacky. “Don’t be silly!”
“You never know,” muttered Mike (who was on my side
the moment he saw that Jacky wasn’t—that’s always the way with us three). “Scientists
are experimenting in some mighty queer things these days.”
He stood for a moment with his arms akimbo, then
suddenly he slapped his brow again.
“Anyway,” he cried, “I’m going to have a closer look
at that thing. And I’ll tell you when—to-morrow!”
“To-morrow?”
“Yes—to-morrow.”
“But we’re going for a picnic to-morrow,” said Jacky. “Don’t
you remember? It’s Mrs. Duthie’s day off, but she’s making us some sandwiches
before she goes to Crieff to see her sister, and we’re going into the hills at
about 11 o’clock.”
“I know,” nodded Mike. “And I for one am coming back
from the hills early in the afternoon.
And
I’m going round by the Doctor’s
house. And I’m going to sneak in through the back way to the little wood. And I’m
going to have a long rope with me, with a big hook at one end—a sort of
grappling iron, see. And if it’s the last thing I do I’m going over that wall
to have a look at that rocket.”
“Don’t be silly, Mike,” said Jacky. “You’ll get into
trouble. Uncle Steve told us that Doctor Mac is very touchy about his work.
Besides, the laboratory men will be there tomorrow afternoon.”
“Not them,” said Mike triumphantly. “That’s another
thing Mr. McIntosh told me. The laboratory men were paid off to-day—they’ve
finished working for the Doctor altogether.”
“Well then, the Doctor will be there himself—probably
with Uncle Steve, too.”
“Not if we go about 4 o’clock. That’s why I’m
suggesting the afternoon instead of the morning—it’s the one time we are likely
to be undisturbed. Don’t you remember what the Doc said last Sunday?—that he
wouldn’t miss his tea at 4 o’clock for anything. He and Uncle Steve will be in
the house at that time.
. . .
Anyway, I’m jolly well going to have a shot at it—and
if you two aren’t with me, well that’s just too bad—I’ll have to go by myself,
that’s all.”
He shut up then, as close as an oyster. And Jacky and
I just knew from experience that as far as Mike was concerned there was simply
nothing more to be said.
To cut a long story short, as they say in books (but
after all, I’ve turned into a writer myself, so why shouldn’t I say it too?),
the next afternoon, at about 3:45, the three of us crawled through the wood at
the Doctor’s house, very stealthily and silently. We had been up in the hills
since 11 o’clock, but all through the picnic there had been a kind of suspense
in us, and an impatience to get on with our plan. That plan was to sneak in
over the wall, have a close look at the rocket to satisfy our curiosity, then
get out again, hang about for a bit, and finally turn up at Uncle Steve’s
cottage at about 6 o’clock—the time we had said we’d be back from the picnic—as
if nothing had happened.
When we got to the wall, Mike went up to the little
knot-hole we knew of. First of all he peered through it, then he listened at
it.
“I was right,” he said in a gleeful whisper. “Not a
soul about. I’m going up.”
He unwrapped a long thin rope from about his waist.
Then he took an ugly big hook out of his haversack (it was an outsize salmon
gaff that he had borrowed from old Mr. McIntosh) and tied it to one end of the
rope with—as he explained—a real unslippable sailor’s knot.
He slung the hook up into the air, and after a couple
of tries it caught firmly on the wood at the top of the enclosure wall. Then,
after spitting on his hands, Mike clambered up, using his feet on the wall and
pulling on the rope—the way natives go up coconut palms, as I expect you’ve
seen in the movies.
When he got up, he sat straddle-wise on top and
whispered down:
“All clear. Come on, Paul—you next. And hurry up about
it.”
I went up. Then Jacky followed, Mike and I hauling on
the rope to give her a hand. Then we lowered Jacky down the other side, and
then I went down, and finally Mike. There we were, in the enclosure, with
Doctor Mac’s rocket in front of us!