our preserves. No fishermen came this way, the lobster-pots
being all to the east, and the stark headland of the Red Neb
made the road to them by the water's edge difficult. The tan-
work lads used to come now and then for a swim, but you
would not find a tan-work lad bathing on a chill April night.
Yet there was no question where our precursor had gone. He
was making for the shore. Tam unshuttered his lantern, and
the steps went clearly down the corkscrew path. 'Maybe he is
after our cave. We'd better go cannily.'

The glim was dowsed - the words were Archie's - and in
the best contraband manner we stole down the gully. The
business had suddenly taken an eerie turn, and I think in our
hearts we were all a little afraid. But Tam had a lantern, and it
would never do to turn back from an adventure which had all
the appearance of being the true sort. Half way down there is
a scrog of wood, dwarf alders and hawthorn, which makes an
arch over the path. I, for one, was glad when we got through
this with no worse mishap than a stumble from Tam which
caused the lantern door to fly open and the candle to go out.
We did not stop to relight it, but scrambled down the screes
till we came to the long slabs of reddish rock which abutted on
the beach. We could not see the track, so we gave up the
business of scouts, and dropped quietly over the big boulder
and into the crinkle of cliff which we called our cave.

There was nobody there, so we relit the lantern and examined
our properties. Two or three fishing-rods for the burn,
much damaged by weather; some sea-lines on a dry shelf of
rock; a couple of wooden boxes; a pile of driftwood for fires,