Major Boucher continued. ‘How Craig tumbled to it I don’t know, but he showed me a spade guinea which he had found across there in Mr McIlhagga’s field while ploughing. Then the rogue produced Felicity’s bracelet, which he had stolen, to prove that the coins were the same. I saw red, of course, and told him I’d report the matter to Mr Rochford-King at once, but he was ready with his answer. He said that if I did, he would maintain that it was I who was trying to steal the treasure, not him.’

  Major Boucher sighed. ‘I knew Mr Rochford-King would never believe that, but knowing Felicity I was afraid she would refuse to marry him with any hint of suspicion hanging over my head.’

  ‘Oh, father,’ said Felicity, ‘and there I was worrying about you.’ She was sitting against the arm of his chair, and she squeezed his shoulder affectionately.

  ‘Then how did the bracelet come to be in your desk?’ I asked him.

  ‘Very simple, really,’ said Major Boucher. ‘I told Felicity she had most probably lost it in the fall up in the plantation, not realising, of course, that she was wearing it in the newspaper photograph taken afterwards on the night of the gymkhana, which you spotted, Tapser.

  ‘At the same time, as you lads also discovered, I did succeed in recovering it, and was trying to think of a suitable place to put it where she would find it without suspecting anything.

  ‘So,’ the Major continued, ‘I agreed to help Craig, but with the idea that I’d use him to find the treasure and then turn him over to the police at the last moment. However, he would have got the better of me had it not been for you lads.’

  ‘But how on earth did you find the secret tunnel?’ asked Mr King.

  ‘Well,’ said Major Boucher, ‘it was through Craig really. I don’t know how the guinea he found came to be over there in Mr McIlhagga’s field. Perhaps Sir Timothy dropped it while inspecting the ground above the tunnel. Who knows? But you know how these things sometimes turn up, especially when a field is being ploughed.

  ‘In any case, there was no doubt about it, it was a spade guinea, and, what was more, it was of the very same year as the one on Felicity’s bracelet. So I decided to work on the assumption that its location was of some significance. The only thing I could see about it, however, was that if I drew a line from the castle through the approximate spot where Craig said he found it, the line cut across the nearest landmark – the mound, or fairy fort as it’s called, on Wariff Hill.

  ‘Then, on checking with the museum in Belfast, I was told that Wariff Hill used to have an old Gaelic name.’

  He showed us a piece of paper with the words, Tuama an Fhir Mhairbh, written on it.

  ‘The pronunciation of it,’ he went on, ‘is Thooama un irr Wariv, and that, no doubt, is how Wariff Hill got its name.’

  ‘But what does it mean?’ I asked him.

  ‘Ah, that’s the point. It means the Mound of the Dead Man. It’s a burial mound – not a fort.’

  ‘Bedad you’re right,’ said Juno, who, as I said before, speaks a bit of Irish. ‘Tuama’s the Irish for tomb or mound.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ said Mr King, ‘probably from the Latin tumulus, meaning the same thing.’

  Major Boucher nodded and continued, ‘Like every-one else, I never had any reason before to consider the mound of the fairy fort as anything but what its name implied – a fort. And, of course, I had no way of knowing what it was called in Sir Timothy’s time.

  ‘Nevertheless,’ he said, flicking back his drooping white moustache with his forefinger, and obviously feeling rather proud of himself, ‘I knew I had at last discovered the “dead man” of the Legend of the Golden Key. I also discovered that burial mounds in this country have entrance passages to quite large chambers. There are many mounds, or passage graves as they are sometimes called, the best example being at Newgrange in County Meath. Many of the country’s smaller mounds, of course, haven’t been excavated yet, but I realised that if the mound on Wariff Hill had been opened in Sir Timothy’s time, the entrance shouldn’t be too difficult to find.

  ‘Those three thugs Craig hired went to the hill, and sure enough they succeeded in unearthing an entrance to the mound beneath a clump of briars and rubble.’

  ‘So that was the cave I was in!’ said Cowlick.

  The Major nodded.

  ‘And the lights we saw were theirs?’ said Doubter.

  ‘Yes, most probably. They used the old farmhouse in the meadow as their headquarters, and it was they who beat up poor Juno here in the belief that he had found Craig’s guinea which they had so carelessly dropped.

  ‘Anyway, as I was saying, they found the entrance. What was more, they found that a deep shaft had been sunk in the earthen floor of the chamber. Climbing down an old iron ladder attached to the side of it, they discovered a tunnel going off in the direction of the castle. However, the tunnel had caved in not far from the castle. So, while they worked to clear it, I began a search here to see if I could find the entrance at this end.

  ‘I began to tap the back wall systematically.’ The Major turned to Mr King. ‘That’s when you came across me one night in the library, and I’m afraid I made up that story about the attempt to steal the paintings.’

  Mr King gestured with his hand to indicate that it didn’t matter, and the Major continued. ‘After that, I couldn’t risk being caught at the wall again, especially in the middle of the night, so I tried it from another angle.

  ‘I had discovered the tunnel running from the stone tower to the kitchen. It had been used, I think, in olden days as the way by which staff could come and go without being seen. Somehow I felt it might just run near the other tunnel, and I was right. When we broke through the back of one of the cells, there it was. It was easy to find the secret door from the inside. As you’ve seen, there are stone steps leading right up to it in the middle of the wall of the Stags’ Hall.’

  ‘If the fairy fort, or the mound, is the dead man of the legend,’ said Totey, ‘what does it mean when it says, but life allows?’

  ‘Yes, well I’ve given that a lot of thought, and I think what it means is that the tunnel was an escape route. If the castle had been attacked, it would have allowed the occupants to get away with their lives. That would explain why Sir Timothy chose that particular hiding place for half of his gold. He, no doubt, learned the secret from his father, and he too would have passed it on, but then as you probably know, his daughter’s death had an unfortunate effect on his mind. He must have died without disclosing the presence of the tunnel to anyone, not even to his brother who took over the castle.’

  ‘But how did you know where the treasure chest was?’ asked Cowlick.

  ‘Well,’ the Major explained, ‘there was no sign of it anywhere else in the tunnel, and according to tradition it had been hidden outside the castle but within the estate, so we realised it had to be in the section that had caved in. You know the rest of the story. The digging was done under cover of the ghost affair. Craig had initiated that earlier as a cover for any noise that might be made in the search for the treasure, and to keep the castle as deserted as possible at night.’

  ‘That still doesn’t explain what happened to the treasure,’ said Cowlick. ‘We thought there would be a fortune.’

  ‘Alas, so did I,’ sighed Major Boucher. ‘The only thing I can think of is that Sir Timothy must have drawn upon his secret reserve after all.’

  ‘Then why should he leave one guinea in the box?’ asked Doubter.

  ‘Yes, why indeed?’ said Mr King. ‘Unless, of course, someone else left it there …’

  ‘How do you mean?’ asked Major Boucher.

  ‘Well, we’ll never know for certain, of course, but here’s what I’d like to think happened …’ Mr King paused for a moment to collect his thoughts and then continued, ‘I’d like to think that … that the young lovers didn’t drown themselves in the Devil’s Cup, but that perhaps they solved the riddle – after all, they did meet up around Wariff Hill, or so it’s said – and that they eloped with the money that was rightfully theirs, leaving behind them a single spade guinea on purpose.’

  ‘But why bother to leave just one?’ asked Curly.

  ‘Well,’ said Mr King, ‘don’t forget, that’s what Sir Timothy gave them, or rather his daughter. A guinea, and a vague promise. Small consolation indeed, when he refused them permission to marry.

  ‘So, by leaving one guinea in the treasure chest, perhaps they were letting him know, in the only language he understood, that love had found a way and had triumphed over greed. Yes, by jove, I think it’s much more likely that it was the loss of the gold that drove Sir Timothy mad! What do you say to that, eh?’

  Naturally, we hadn’t thought of that possibility, and we found the idea of the young couple eloping with the treasure highly pleasing.

  ‘But if you’re right,’ Major Boucher reminded him, ‘that would mean the treasure is lost to you too … and you need it far more than Sir Timothy ever did.’

  ‘Maybe so,’ said Mr King, ‘but I think there is treasure of a kind in the fact that the legend has been solved. Think of the marvellous tourist attraction it provides. I had doubts about throwing the castle open to the public before, but not now. Visitors will come to hear the story of the Legend of the Golden Key, now that we can tell it from beginning to end. They’ll want to see the Devil’s Cup and the secret doors and passages, and the place where the treasure chest was found. We can display the chest, and the two guineas and the bracelet, and sell visitors’ guidebooks with the story of the legend. Yes indeed, thanks to you, my dear Major, and to all these lads, and of course to their dog, the castle is assured of a source of income from now on.’

  ‘Then the legend will come true after all,’ I said.

  Mr King smiled, and taking Felicity’s hand in his said, ‘But it has come true already – doubly so, I think. After all, the young lover found wealth, happiness and a bride-to-be, didn’t he? And I too have found all three – for aren’t happiness and a bride-to-be wealth of a very special kind?’

  Felicity and her father were delighted with that, and I don’t mind telling you, after such high praise and fine talk, we were delighted with ourselves too.

  Then it was time to go. My father said our mothers were worried about us, and we had forgotten all about Old Daddy Armstrong.

  Before we said goodbye on the front steps, Mr King asked us how he might reward us for all we had done, and when we said we would like nothing better than to get riding lessons, Felicity thrilled us with the most charming smile you ever saw, and said she’d be happy to have us any time.

  * * *

  We were about to go when Cowlick gave me a nudge, and I reached up and whispered in Mr King’s ear. Cowlick and I had something special we wanted to try. Mr King agreed, and you should have seen the look on everybody’s face a short time later when the two of us waddled out wearing coats of armour!

  However, armour isn’t all the storybooks make it out to be. It’s very heavy, and I couldn’t keep the visor on my helmet from clanging down. Everyone laughed, and we had another good laugh a minute later when Shouting Sam appeared on the avenue. He stopped and looked at us. I saw no more. My visor clanged shut again, I stepped into emptiness and clattered down the steps like an empty bin. I didn’t see him, but I believe Shouting Sam turned and ran as fast as his long legs could carry him. Poor Sam, they said he was the spitting image of the running dead man himself. Come to think of it, he must have thought the same about us!

  I gave Prince a call with my bourtree whistle and we took our leave, although not before Mr King told my father and me that we could hunt in the estate any time we wanted. I suppose it was nice of him all right. Yet, I sort of wished he hadn’t said it. For poaching’s like smoking. Half the fun is in doing it because you’re not allowed to do it. After that I gave up both.

  About the Author

  TOM McCAUGHREN is one of Ireland’s leading authors for young people.

  He has written five adventure books – The Legend of the Golden Key, The Legend of the Phantom Highwayman, The Legend of the Corrib King(new editions of all three published by Mercier Press in 2011), The Children of the Forge and The Silent Sea.

  He has also written three books for teenagers. Two of these – In Search of the Liberty Tree and Ride a Pale Horse – are set against the background of the 1798 rebellion. The third – Rainbows of the Moon – is a highly acclaimed thriller. Set on the Irish border during the recent ‘troubles’, it has been translated into several languages. His five books featuring the fox, published by Wolfhound Press, have also been widely translated.

  As well as several short-listings, his books have won a number of awards for literature. These include the Reading Association of Ireland Book Award 1985, the Irish Book Awards Medal 1987, the White Ravens Selection 1988 (International Youth Library, Munich), the Young Persons’ Books of the Decade Award 1980–1990 (Irish Children’s Book Trust), and the Oscar Wilde Society’s Literary Recognition Award (1992).

  A journalist and broadcaster, Tom McCaughren was RTÉ’s Security Correspondent for many years. He is married and has four daughters.

  The Legend of the Corrib King

  Wings that whistle, Legs that fly... So begins the mysterious invitation that Tasper, Cowlick and his sisters Rachel and Róisín get from Uncle Pakie, asking them to come to the Corrib at dapping time. The kids are intrigued by the strange invitation and head off to to the West of Ireland in search of some fun.

  But when they get there, Uncle Pakie has disappeared, leaving behind him an even more mysterious poem… With their cousin Jamesie, a mine of local information, they set out in a horse-drawn caravan to explore the countryside and find the missing Pakie. All they have to guide them are the clues in the poem…

  ISBN: 978 1 85635 801 9

  The Legend of The Phantom Highwayman

  When Tapser goes to visit Cow-lick, Róisín and Rachel, they set out to investigate the stories of a local highwayman, whose ghost the locals claim can still be seen galloping along the High Road. Soon they find themselves caught up in a tangled web of ghost riders, spies and smugglers.

  ISBN: 978 1 85635 802 6

  For more information and titles, please visit the Mercier Press website http://www.mercierpress.ie/tommccaughren

  About the Publisher

  We hope you enjoyed this book.

  Since 1944, Mercier Press has published books that have been critically important to Irish life and culture. Books that dealt with subjects that informed readers about Irish scholars, Irish writers, Irish history and Ireland’s rich heritage.

  We believe in the importance of providing accessible histories and cultural books for all readers and all who are interested in Irish cultural life.

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  Mercier Press, Unit 3b, Oak House, Bessboro Rd, Blackrock, Cork, Ireland

 

 

  Tom McCaughren, The Legend of the Golden Key

 

 

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