"The entrance to a real pirate cave, you mean!" said Jerry. "Glory,
Chris, I really shouldn't wonder if it were. Captain Kidd was up and
down the coast here. What if they buried stuff in there and then
propped a big chunk of rock up against the hole?"

"I wish we had a telescope," I said, "though I don't suppose we
could see into the blackness with it. Mercy, I wish we _could_ get
out there! It's more worth exploring than ever."

"Let's tell Mother and Aunt!" said Greg, and started running back
down the beach, shouting something all the way.

Mother said, "Nonsense!" and, "Of course it's a natural cave in the
rock. You probably only noticed it today."

But she and Aunt Ailsa shut up the H.G. Wells book and came to
look. They did think, when they saw it, that it was something new.
Aunt Ailsa thought it looked very exciting and mysterious, but she
agreed with Mother that it was no sort of place to go to in a boat.

"Just look at the white foam flinging around those rocks," she said;
"and there's practically no surf on today."

We had to admit that it wasn't a nice-looking place to land on from
a rowboat, but we did wish that we were hardy adventuring men, bold
of heart and undeterred by grown-ups. We knew, too, that Captain
Moss would say, "Pshaw!" if we told him there might be treasure on
the Sea Monster, and he certainly wouldn't risk the _Jolly Nancy_ on
those rocks in her nice new green paint.