Five on Finniston Farm by Enid Blyton

his voice, and looking al about to make sure that no one was near. „Do you remember what you told us, George, about a secret passage from the castle to the old chapel?"
    „Yes! Yes! I do!" said George, and Anne nodded, her eyes bright. „You mean the story that old Mr Finniston told us, down at the little antique shop, about the Lady of the castle taking her children in safety from the burning castle, by way of an underground passage to the old chapel? Gosh, I"d forgotten that!"
    „Oh, Julian! Yes, George is right!" said Anne. „Are you thinking that the passage might stil be there, hidden underground?"
    „What I think is this," said Julian. „If the Lady and her children escaped underground, they must first have fled down into the cel ars of the castle - and so the passage or tunnel must have started from there. They couldn"t have escaped in any other way because the castle was itself surrounded by enemies. So she must have gone with her children to hide in the cellars - and then, when the castle fel , she took them safely down the secret passage that led to the old chapel. So that means..."
    „That means that if we can find the secret passage, we can get into the cellars ourselves -
    perhaps before the workmen do!" cried George, almost shouting with excitement.
    „Exactly," said Julian, his eyes shining. „Now don"t let"s lose our heads and get too excited.
    Let"s talk about it quietly - and for GOODNESS" sake keep a watch for Junior."
    „Timmy - on guard!" said George, and Timmy at once went some paces away, and stood up straight, looking now in this direction, and now in that. Nobody could come within sight now, without Timmy giving a warning bark!
    The children settled down beside a hedge. „What"s the plan?" asked Dick.
    „I vote we go to the old chapel, take a line from there to the castle-site, and walk slowly up that line," said Julian. „We might possibly see something that would guide us as to where the secret passage is. I don"t know what - maybe the grass might be slightly different in colour - a bit darker than the surrounding grass, just as it was on the castle-site.
    Anyway, it"s worth trying. If we do see a line of darker grass, or something like that, we"ll dig down underground ourselves, hoping the secret passage is underneath!"
    „Oh Ju! What a wonderful idea!" said Anne. „Come on, let"s go down to the chapel straight away!"
    So off they all went, Timmy, Snippet and Nosey the jackdaw too. He loved being with Snippet, though he teased him unmerciful y. They arrived quickly at the chapel door and went in. „I always feel as if there ought to be an organ playing when I"m inside," said Anne, looking round the stacked sacks of grain.
    „Never mind about organs," said Julian, standing at the open door, and pointing up the hil . „Now see - there"s the place where the old castle stood - where the men are already at work - and if we take a fairly straight line to it, we should be more or less walking over the old passage. I should think the men who made it would drive as straight a tunnel as they could, to save themselves work. A grinding one would take a long time."
    „I can"t see that the grass is any different in colour, along the line I"m looking," said Dick, squinting, and everyone agreed, very disappointed.
    „So there"s nothing to help us!" said George, mournful y. „Al we can do is to walk in a straight line up the hil , and hope to find something that wil tel us if we"re over a tunnel.
    Hollow-sounding footsteps, perhaps!"

    „That"s very doubtful, I"m afraid," said Julian. „Stil , I can"t see that we can do anything else. Come on, then. Al right, Tim, you can come back to us. Look at Nosey, on Snippet"s back again! That"s right, Snippet, roll over and get him off!"
    „Chack!" said Nosey, crossly, as he flew up in the air. „Chack!"
    The six children walked up the slope in as straight a line as they could. They came right up to where the men were digging, without having seen or