When Croyden had got Parmenter's letter from the secret drawer in the
escritoire, he rang the old-fashioned pull-bell for Moses. It was only
a little after nine, and, though he did not require the negro to remain
in attendance until he retired, he fancied the kitchen fire still held
him.
And he was not mistaken. In a moment Moses appeared--his eyes heavy
with the sleep from which he had been aroused.
"Survent, marster!" he said, bowing from the doorway.
"Moses, did you ever shoot a pistol?" Croyden asked.
"Fur de Lawd, seh! Hit's bin so long sence I dun hit, I t'ink I'se
gun-shy, seh."
"But you have done it?"
"Yass, seh, I has don hit."
"And you could do it again, if necessary?"
"I speck so, seh--leas'wise, I kin try--dough I'se mons'us unsuttin,
seh, mons'us unsuttin!"
"Uncertain of what--your shooting or your hitting?"
"My hittin', seh."
"Well, we're all of us somewhat uncertain in that line. At least you
know enough not to point the revolver toward yourself."
"Hi!--I sut'n'y does! seh, I sut'n'y does!" said the negro, with a
broad grin.
"There is a revolver, yonder, on the table," said Croyden, indicating
one of those they used on Greenberry Point. "It's a self-cocker--you
simply pull the trigger and the action does the rest. You understand?"
"Yass, seh, I onderstands," said Moses.
"Bring it here," Croyden ordered.
Moses' fingers closed around the butt, a bit timorously, and he carried
it to his master.
"I'll show you the action," said Croyden. "Here, is the ejector,"
throwing the chamber out, "it holds six shots, you see: but you never
put a cartridge under the firing-pin, because, if anything strikes the
trigger, it's likely to be discharged."
"Yass, seh!"
Croyden loaded it, closed the cylinder, and passed it over to Moses,
who took it with a little more assurance. He was harkening back thirty
years, and more.
"What do yo warn me to do, seh?" he asked.
"I want you to sit down, here, while I'm away, and if any one tries to
get in this house, to-night, you're to shoot him. I'm going over to
Captain Carrington's--I'll be back by eleven o'clock. It isn't likely
you will be disturbed; if you are, one shot will frighten him off, even
if you don't hit him, and I'll hear the shot, and come back at once.
You understand?"
"Yass, seh!--I'm to shoot anyone what tries to get in."
"Not exactly!" laughed Croyden. "You're to shoot anyone who tries to
_break_ in. For Heaven's sake! don't shoot me, when I return, or any
one else who comes legitimately. Be sure he is an intruder, then bang
away."
"Sut'n'y, seh! I onderstands. I'se dub'us bout hittin', but I kin bang
away right nuf. Does yo' spose any one will try to git in, seh?"
"No, I don't!" Croyden smiled--"but you be ready for them, Moses, be
ready for them. It's just as well to provide against contingencies."
"Yass, seh!" as Croyden went out and the front door closed behind him,
"but dem 'tingencies is monty dang'ous t'ings to fools wid. I don'
likes hit, dat's whar I don'."
Croyden found Miss Carrington just where he had left her--a quick
return to the sofa having been synchronous with his appearance in the
hall.
"I had a mind not to wait here," she said; "you were an inordinately
long time, Mr. Croyden."
"I was!" he replied, sitting down beside her. "I was, and I admit
it--but it can be explained."
"I'm listening!" she smiled.
"Before you listen to me, listen to Robert Parmenter, deceased!" said
he, and gave her the letter.
"Oh, this is the letter--do you mean that I am to read it?"
"If you please!" he answered.
She read it through without a single word of comment--an amazing thing
in a woman, who, when her curiosity is aroused, can ask more questions
to the minute than can be answered in a month. When she had finished,
she turned back and read portions of it again, especially the direction
as to finding the treasure, and the postscript bequests by the Duvals.
At last, she dropped the letter in her lap and looked up at Croyden.
"A most remarkable document!" she said. "Most extraordinary in its
ordinariness, and most ordinary in its extraordinariness. And you
searched, carefully, for three weeks and found--nothing?"
"We did," he replied. "Now, I'll tell you about it."
"First, tell me where you obtained this letter?"
"I found it by accident--in a secret compartment of an escritoire at
Clarendon," he answered.
She nodded.
"Now you may tell me about it?" she said, and settled back to listen.
"This is the tale of Parmenter's treasure--and how we did _not_ find
it!" he laughed.
Then he proceeded to narrate, briefly, the details--from the finding of
the letter to the present moment, dwelling particularly on the episode
of the theft of their wallets, the first and second coming of the
thieves to the Point, their capture and subsequent release, together
with the occurrence of this evening, when he was approached, by the
well-dressed stranger, at Clarendon's gates.
And, once again, marvelous to relate, Miss Carrington did not
interrupt, through the entire course of the narrative. Nor did she
break the silence for a time after he had concluded, staring
thoughtfully, the while, down into the grate, where a smouldering back
log glowed fitfully.
"What do you intend to do, as to the treasure?" she asked, slowly.
"Give it up!" he replied. "What else is there to do?"
"And what about this stranger?"
"He _must_ give it up!" laughed Croyden. "He has no recourse. In the
words of the game, popular hereabout, he is playing a bobtail!"
"But he doesn't know it's a bobtail. He is convinced you found the
treasure," she objected.
"Let him make whatever trouble he can, it won't bother me, in the
least."
"He is not acting alone," she persisted. "He has confederates--they may
attack Clarendon, in an effort to capture the treasure."
"My dear child! this is the twentieth century, not the seventeenth!" he
laughed. "We don't 'stand-by to repel boarders,' these days."
"Pirate's gold breeds pirate's ways!" she answered.
He stared at her, in surprise.
"Rather queer!--I've heard those same words before, in this
connection."
"Community of minds."
"Is it a quotation?" he asked.
"Possibly--though I don't recall it. Suppose you are attacked and
tortured till you reveal where you've hidden the jewels?" she
insisted.
"I cannot suppose them so unreasonable!" he laughed, again. "However, I
put Moses on guard--with a big revolver and orders to fire at anyone
molesting the house. If we hear a fusillade we'll know it's he shooting
up the neighborhood."
"Then the same idea _did_ suggest itself to you!"
"Only to the extent of searching for the jewels--I regarded that as
vaguely possible, but there isn't the slightest danger of any one being
tortured."
"You know best, I suppose," she said--"but you've had your warning--and
pirate's gold breeds pirate's ways. You've given up all hope of finding
the treasure--abandoned jewels worth--how many dollars?"
"Possibly half a million," he filled in.
"Without a further search? Oh! Mr. Croyden!"
"If you can suggest what to do--anything which hasn't been done, I
shall be only too glad to consider it."
"You say you dug up the entire Point for a hundred yards inland?"
"We did."
"And dredged the Bay for a hundred yards?"
"Yes."
She puckered her brows in thought. He regarded her with an amused
smile.
"I don't see what you're to do, except to do it all over again," she
announced--"Now, don't laugh! It may sound foolish, but many a thing
has been found on a second seeking--and this, surely, is worth a
second, or a third, or even many seekings."
"If there were any assurance of ultimate success, it would pay to spend
a lifetime hunting. The two essentials, however, are wanting: the
extreme tip of Greenberry Point in 1720, and the beech-trees. We made
the best guess at their location. More than that, the zone of
exploration embraced every possible extreme of territory--yet, we
failed. It will make nothing for success to try again."
"But it is somewhere!" she reflected.
"Somewhere, in the Bay!--It's shoal water, for three or four hundred
feet around the Point, with a rock bottom. The Point itself has been
eaten into by the Bay, down to this rock. Parmenter's chest disappeared
with the land in which it was buried, and no man will find it now,
except by accident."
"It seems such a shame!" she exclaimed. "A fortune gone to waste!"
"Without anyone having the fun of wasting it!" laughed Croyden.
She took up Parmenter's letter again, and glanced over it. Then she
handed it back, and shook her head.
"It's too much for my poor brain," she said. "I surrender."
"Precisely where we landed. We gave it rather more than a fair trial,
and, then, we gave it up. I'm done. When I go home, to-night, I shall
return the letter to the escritoire where I found it, and forget it.
There is no profit in speculating further."
"You can return it to its hiding place," she reflected, "but you can't
cease wondering. Why didn't Marmaduke Duval get the treasure while the
landmarks were there? Why did he leave it for his heirs?"
"Probably on account of old Parmenter's restriction that it be left
until the 'extremity of need.'"
She nodded, in acquiescence.
"Probably," she said, "the Duvals would regard it as a matter of honor
to observe the exact terms of the bequest. Alas! Alas! that they did
so!"
"It's only because they did so, that I got a chance to search!" Croyden
laughed.
"You mean that, otherwise, there would be no buried treasure!" she
exclaimed. "Of course!--how stupid! And with all that money, the Duvals
might have gone away from Hampton--might have experienced other
conditions. Colonel Duval might never have met your father--you might
have never come to Clarendon.--My goodness! Where does it end?"
"In the realm of pure conjecture," he answered. "It is idle to theorize
on the might-have-beens, or what might-have-happened if the
what-did-happen hadn't happened. Dismiss it, at least, for this
evening. You asked what I was doing for three weeks at Annapolis, and I
have consumed a great while in answering--let us talk of something
else. What have you been doing in those three weeks?"
"Nothing! A little Bridge, a few riding parties, some sails on the Bay,
with an occasional homily by Miss Erskine, when she had me cornered,
and I couldn't get away. Then is when I learned what a deep impression
you had made!" she laughed.
"We both were learning, it seems," he replied.
She looked at him, inquiringly.
"I don't quite understand," she said.
"You made an impression, also--of course, that's to be expected, but
this impression is much more than the ordinary kind!"
_"Merci, Monsieur_," she scoffed.
"No, it isn't _merci_, it's a fact. And he is a mighty good fellow on
whom to make an impression."
"You mean, Mr.--Macloud?"
"Just so! I mean Macloud."
"You're very safe in saying it!"
"Wherefore?"
"He is absent. It's not susceptible of proof."
"You think so?"
"Yes, I think so!"
"I don't!"
She shrugged her shoulders.
"For he's coming back----"
"To Hampton?"
"To Hampton."
"When?" she said, sceptically.
"Very soon!"
"Delightfully indefinite!" she laughed.
"In fact, within a week."
She laughed, again!
"To be accurate, I expect him not later than the day-after-to-morrow."
"I shall believe you, when I see him!" incredulously.
"He is, I think, coming solely on your account."
"But you're not quite sure?--oh! modest man!"
"Naturally, he hasn't confided in me."
"So you're confiding in me--how clever!"
"I could tell some things----"
"Which are fables."
"----but I won't--they might turn your head----"
"Which way--to the right or left?"
"----and make you too confident and too cruel. He saw you but
twice----"
"Once!" she corrected.
"Once, on the street; again, when we called in the evening--but he gave
you a name, the instant he saw you----"
"How kind of him!"
"He called you: 'The Symphony in Blue.'"
"Was I in blue?" she asked.
"You were--and looking particularly fit."
"Was that the first time you had noticed it?" she questioned blandly.
"Do you think so?" he returned.
"I am asking you, sir."
"Do I impress you as being blind?"
"No, you most assuredly do not!" she laughed.
He looked at her with daring eyes.
"Yes!" she said, "I know you're intrepid--but you _won't_!"
"Why?--why won't I?"
"Because, it would be false to your friend. You have given me to him."
"I have given you to him!" he exclaimed, with denying intonation.
"Yes!--as between you two, you have renounced, in his favor."
"I protest!"
"At least, I so view it," with a teasingly fascinating smile.
"I protest!" he repeated.
"I heard you."
"I protest!" he reiterated.
"Don't you think that you protest over-much?" she inquired sweetly.
"If we were two children, I'd say: 'You think you're smart, don't
you?'"
"And I'd retort: 'You got left, didn't you?'"
Then they both laughed.
"Seriously, however--do you really expect Mr. Macloud?" she asked.
"I surely do--probably within two days; and I'm not chaffing when I say
that you're the inducement. So, be good to him--he's got more than
enough for two, I can assure you."
"Mercenary!" she laughed.
"No--just careful!" he answered.
"And what number am I--the twenty-first, or thereabout?"
"What matters it, if you're _the_ one, at present?"
She raised her shoulders in the slightest shrug.
"I'd sooner be the present one than all the has-beens," he insisted.
"Opinions differ," she remarked.
"If it will advantage any----"
"I didn't say so," she interrupted.
"----I can tell you----"
"Many fables, I don't doubt!" she cut in, again.
"----that we have been rather intimate, for a few years, and I have
never before known him to exhibit particular interest in any woman."
"'Why don't you speak for yourself, John,'" she quoted, merrily.
"Because, to be frank, I haven't enough for two," he answered, gayly.
But beneath the gayety, she thought she detected the faintest note of
regret. So! there was some one!
And, woman-like, when he had gone, she wondered about her--whether she
was dark or fair, tall or small, vivacious or reserved, flirtatious or
sedate, rich or poor--and whether they loved each other--or whether it
was he, alone, who loved--or whether he had not permitted himself to be
carried so far--or whether--then, she dropped asleep.
Croyden went back to Clarendon, keeping a sharp look-out for anyone
under the trees around the house. He found Moses in the library,
evidently just aroused from slumber by the master's door key.
"No one's bin heah, seh, 'cep de boy wid dis 'spatch," he hastened to
say.
Croyden tore open the envelope:--It was a wire from Macloud, that he
would be down to-morrow.
"You may go to bed, Moses."
"Yass, seh! yass, seh!--I'se pow'ful glad yo's back, seh. Nothin' I kin
git yo befo I goes?"
"Nothing!" said Croyden. "You're a good soldier, Moses, you didn't
sleep on guard."
"No, seh! I keps wide awake, Marster Croyden, wide awake all de time,
seh. Survent, seh!" and, with a bow, he disappeared.
Croyden finished his cigar, put out the light, and went slowly
upstairs--giving not a thought to the Parmenter treasure nor the man he
had met outside. His mind was busy with Elaine Cavendish--their last
night on the moonlit piazza--the brief farewell--the lingering pressure
of her fingers--the light in her eyes--the subdued pleasure, when they
met unexpectedly in Annapolis--her little ways to detain him, keep him
close to her--her instant defense of him at Mattison's scurrilous
insinuation--the officers' hop--the rhythmic throb of the melody--the
scented, fluttering body held close in his arms--the lowered head--the
veiled eyes--the trembling lashes--his senses steeped in the fragrance
of her beauty--the temptation well-nigh irresistible--his resolution
almost gone--trembling--trembling----
* * * * *
The vision passed--music ceased--the dance was ended. Sentiment
vanished--reason reigned once more.
He was a fool! a fool! to think of her, to dream of the past, even. But
it is pleasant, sometimes, to be a fool--where a beautiful woman is
concerned, and only one's self to pay the piper.