20 An Astonishing Parcel
It was difficult to do tests in the midst of so much excitement. The story of Mary-Lou and Daphne ran through the school and everyone talked about it. The two girls did not appear in school that day, because Matron was keeping them quiet. They neither of them seemed any the worse for their adventure.
Before afternoon school Darrell, Sally, Irene and Belinda set off up the cliff-path to look for the parcel. The wind had completely died down and it was a lovely day, one of Cornwall’s best. The sky was as blue as a cornflower, and the sea picked up the colour and made the view a really beautiful one, as the girls walked up the coast-path.
“Look—that must be where Mary-Lou was blown over,” said Darrell, pointing to where the cliff had crumbled¹. “And see—surely that’s the gorse bush Daphne wound her legs round. Golly, she must have been scratched!”
The girls stood and looked at the place where Mary-Lou and Daphne had had their frightening adventure. Sally shivered, thinking of what it must have been like in the dark night, with the wind howling round and the sea pounding on the rocks below.
“It’s horrid² to think of,” she said. “Come on—let’s hunt about for the parcel. Mary-Lou must have dropped it somewhere near here, I should think.”
They began to look. It was Darrell who found the parcel, lying wet and torn in the grass some little way off.
“I’ve got it!” she shouted, and ran to pick it up. “Oh, it’s all coming to pieces. The paper is pulpy³, and the contents are coming out!”
“Better take off the paper and carry the things inside home in our hands,” said Sally. So Darrell stripped off the wet, pulpy paper and shook out the contents. They fell on the grass.
They were rather queer. The girls looked at them, lying there. There were four purses of different sizes and shapes. There were three boxes, the kind that brooches or lockets are sold in by jewellers—little leather boxes with a catch you had to press to open them.
Darrell picked one up and pressed it. It shot open—and a little gold bar brooch gleamed inside. She looked at it, bewildered, then passed it to Sally.
“Isn’t that Emily’s brooch—the one she lost?”
“It’s got her name behind it if it is,” said Sally, in a sober voice. She took out the brooch and looked at the back of the little gold bar.

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