The Girl In the Cave (5 page)

“Be quiet, you silly woman. I'm trying to think.”

Uncle Dermott was wringing his hands together.

“Perhaps we should go. Just pack up and take off. We could move to South America or New Guinea. Nobody would find us there.”

“But you know I hate to travel.”

This was true. Aunt Tina could barely fit out the front door of the house, let alone onto an aeroplane.

“Well then, what do you suggest?”

“I don't know.” Aunt Tina began to cry again. “Dermott, I don't want to go to jail.”

“Will you shut up and let me think? That money must be somewhere in here. We'll just have to search again.”

“But we've looked and looked.”

“Not everywhere. We've never pulled up the floorboards, or looked in the walls.” He rushed from the room. “I'm going to get my crowbar and hammer. You go upstairs and meet me at the attic door. We'll start at the top and work down.”

Aunt Tina sobbed for a few more minutes before pulling herself up slowly from the sofa and starting to plod out of the room.

Inside the cupboard, Kate's head was reeling. She knew where the fortune was! And now that she knew it was rightfully hers, all she had to do was to sneak away tonight and her whole life would change. No more sleeping in a cave, no more cooking and cleaning, and, best of all, no more butterfly killing and toenail scraping.

She'd be rich! She'd be able to afford nice clothes, and a swimming pool, and a big garden with lots of trees and plants for butterflies to live in, and a huge bed and a dog and …

Kate sneezed.

The dust in the cupboard had been tickling her nose for quite a while, but she had been so scared of getting caught that she'd stopped herself from sneezing. Now, though, dreaming about all the things she would do once she escaped, a massive sneeze crept up on her and exploded through her nose and mouth.

Outside, in the lounge room, Aunt Tina's heavy footsteps stopped suddenly.

The problem with sneezes is that they never come alone. Kate felt the horrible tingling building up and up at the back of her throat. She held her breath, she counted to ten she … sneezed again!

In the tiny cupboard the noise echoed around and around, and outside, Aunt Tina's heavy footsteps stomped towards Kate's hiding place.

“Well, well. Look who we have here.”

The cupboard door swung open, and poor Kate squinted in the bright light. She tried to make a dash for it, but after so long cramped up in such a small space, her legs were stiff. Aunt Tina grabbed her by the ear and squeezed so hard that tears sprang into Kate's eyes.

“A sneaky little stickybeak, that's what you are, my girl. A slimy spy! A loathsome listener! I suppose you heard everything?”

“No, Aunt Tina. I fell asleep.”

“Hah!” The massive woman snorted and little waves cascaded all over her body. “I don't believe that for a minute. I think you were listening to things that don't concern you at all.”

“They do concern me.” Kate was suddenly very angry. “You're right, I did hear everything, and now I know the truth I'll make sure that the two of you are caught, and then I'll get Aunt Penelope's fortune, and you'll both go to jail.”

She struggled and kicked, but Aunt Tina simply squeezed her ear harder.

“Is that what you think, you pathetic pipsqueak? And what about Miss Pincushion? What are you going to do about her? Because let me tell you something: the only reason you're still alive today is because she thinks you know nothing about who you really are. That's why she paid Dermott and me to steal you as a baby. If she knows you've found out about the fortune, then you're as good as gone.”

With a sinking feeling, Kate realised that Miss Pincushion knew that Kate had been in the cupboard, and therefore that she'd heard everything. From Miss Pincushion's own mouth, Kate had heard the truth.

“Oh no.”

“Oh no indeed, my girl. Here comes your Uncle Dermott.”

Chapter Seven

Another Cupboard

Slam! The heavy door swung closed, the lock on the outside went “click”, and Kate found herself once more in a cupboard. This time though, it was a different cupboard — the only one in the house with a lock on it, the one in Uncle Dermott's study. She was locked in — she couldn't just swing the door open a crack and peer out whenever she wanted to. It was even more cramped than it had been inside the one downstairs. Uncle Dermott hadn't bothered to take out any of his butterfly nets, so Kate was crammed in with them, and the binoculars, and the field guides, and, of course, the killing jar and bottle of chloroform.

“There. That should keep her out of our hair for a little while.” Through the heavy wood door, Uncle Dermott's voice sounded muffled and fuzzy. “You can stay in there until we decide what to do with you. You'd better hope that I don't just call Miss Pincushion and let her deal with you.”

Kate didn't answer, and after a second or two Uncle Dermott's footsteps clumped away. A couple of minutes later, from up in the attic, Kate heard the sound of floorboards being torn up.

A tiny beam of light reached in through the keyhole, but apart from that it was pitch black. For a few moments Kate tried to rearrange things to make herself more comfortable. What was she to do? She was well and truly trapped and couldn't think of any way out. What if Miss Pincushion came back?

Still, she thought, at least she had a much better idea than anyone else of where to look for Aunt Penelope's fortune. The more she thought about the riddle and the little vein of gold in the back of her cave, the more convinced she was that Aunt Penelope had buried her fortune there.

The crashing and bashing from upstairs was getting louder and louder, and Kate was certain that it would be a while before anyone came to check on her, so she decided to try and get some sleep. The first time that Uncle Dermott had locked her in the cupboard, she had been careful not to disturb any of his equipment. Now she shoved and pushed things around to make a little nest in the bottom of the wardrobe where she could just manage to curl up.

Lying there, Kate found herself wondering about the mysterious Aunt Penelope. Who was she and why did she have a fortune? And, for that matter, why had she hidden it so well? At that moment, the lullaby she'd remembered the previous afternoon sprung back into her mind:

Night has come my little one,
Here comes the moon, there goes the sun.
So dream some happy little dreams,
Where nothing is quite what it seems.

As far as she could remember, she'd never had anyone sing to her. Uncle Dermott certainly wasn't the singing type, and even though Aunt Tina sang occasionally, her voice sounded more like a car being cut in half with a chainsaw than a soft lullaby. So it was strange that Kate remembered not only these words but also the tune and the sweet, soft voice that used to sing them. She sang them quietly to herself, and then carried on:

Curl up and sleep all though the night
And dream about the morning light.
For if you ha ve the mind to peek,
You'll find the answers that you seek.

In the dark of the cupboard, Kate sat up, puzzled. Where had that verse come from? And what did it mean? She still didn't understand the first part of the song—
nothing is quite what it seems
—and now this new bit about searching for answers.
Peek,
it said. Peek where?

Just above her head the dim ray of light still shone in through the keyhole.

“Hmm. I guess that the only place to peek at the moment is out through there.”

She lifted her eye to the tiny hole and found herself looking straight across Uncle Dermott's study to the far wall, specifically at the display case containing one very rare Italian
Zerynthia polyxena.
Could that be where her answers lay? Italy? What else did the song say? Kate sang it again, quietly to herself.
Nothing is quite what it seems …

“It doesn't make any sense.”

Kate sat back and pondered. It couldn't be Italy, and therefore the answer must be with the butterfly itself. What had Miss Pincushion said? Uncle Dermott, her father's old butler, had
stolen
the butterfly from his master's collection. So surely, if the
Zerynthia polyxena
had originally been part of the Pincushion family collection, then Aunt Penelope might have hidden something in the case. Some clue. Kate realised that somehow she
had
to have a closer look at that case.

But how? She was locked in a cupboard, and there was no way that Uncle Dermott would let her out of his sight for even a second, now that she knew all about the inheritance of Aunt Penelope.

Exhausted from all this thinking, Kate curled up again and went to sleep.

She must have slept for a long time, because when she finally woke, daylight was pouring in through the windows of Uncle Dermott's study, so brightly that even the little amount of light coming through the keyhole lightened up the inside of the cupboard considerably. She gave the door a hopeful rattle, but it was still locked tight. Above her head Kate could hear more floorboards being torn up—the sound of cracking, splintering timber trembled through the entire house. She wondered if Uncle Dermott and Aunt Tina had been up in the attic all night.

“Well,” she said to herself, “I guess that nobody is going to come to my rescue, so I'd better come up with a plan on my own.”

Just saying these words and hearing a voice, even if it was her own, made Kate feel a lot more positive, and in the dull light she looked around.

“Let's see. What do I have that might be useful. Nets … books … an old shoe …”

At that moment, Kate had an idea. A very good one.

“Hmmm … I wonder …”

She needed to get out of the cupboard, and the sound of splintering wood from upstairs gave her an idea. The doors were made of heavy oak, and the lock was old and solid, so breaking out through them was out of the question. Obviously, it would also be better if Uncle Dermott and Aunt Tina thought that she was still safely locked up.

Now, like many old pieces of furniture, this particular wardrobe wasn't made of solid wood. Only the front and the sides, the bits that could be seen from the outside, were heavy oak. The bits that weren't easily visible, like the back and the top, were just thin plywood, held in place by small tacks.

She gave the back of the wardrobe a couple of experimental thumps, but it was leaning up against the wall of the house, so even if she managed to break the thin plywood, she'd still be stuck. So it would have to be the top then.

Carefully, Kate climbed up the shelves of the cupboard like a ladder, getting as close as possible to the top before reaching up and pressing gently against the roof. As she'd hoped, the wooden top of the cupboard was thin and even gentle pressure made it flex slightly. She pushed a little harder, and the wood bent some more, but still stayed nailed firmly to the top of the wardrobe.

The problem was that, clinging to the shelves, she could bang at the roof with only one hand, and even then she had to be careful not to lose her balance. After a couple more minutes trying, she climbed back to the floor and thought again. She had an idea. Grabbing one of Uncle Dermott's long-handled butterfly nets, she carefully unscrewed the net part, leaving her with just the wooden handle. Then, using both hands now, she hammered the handle into the roof.

Bang! With all the noise Uncle Dermott was making upstairs, there was no way she would be heard.

Crash! One of the panels of wood in the top of the wardrobe moved a little bit.

Thump! It came away completely at one end, and flipped back like a hatch cover.

Sunlight flooded into the wardrobe.

“Excellent.”

In a flash Kate was up the shelves again and through the hole, onto the top of the wardrobe. Then, peering down over the edge, she realised that she could simply jump down onto a bookcase, and then to the floor. Before she jumped, though, she pulled the panel of wood back into place over the hole. Let Uncle Dermott try to figure out what had happened to her, she thought. She wished that she could see his face when he opened the cupboard and found nobody there, but she wasn't planning on hanging around.

She was about to leap down onto the bookcase when she had another idea. Lifting the panel of wood again, she reached down inside the cupboard, grabbed the bottle of chloroform from its shelf, and shoved it into her pocket. Just in case.