THE WILL AGAIN--SEARCHING FOR A CLUE TO THE PAPER--BARBE ROUGE'S
WILL--A PROBABLE CLUE--HOPES AND DOUBTS--PERPLEXED--A MEMORABLE
TRAWL BY MOONLIGHT--A REAL CLUE AT LAST--THE PLACE OF THE SKULL
FOUND.
As soon as I was able I went out walking each day, and so rapid was my
convalescence that in ten days I was quite myself again. Alec had during
my enforced idleness been extra busy, and had made both house and garden
look very trim. He had not been able to go far away, for fear I might
want him, and thus had spent his time near home.
From joking in the first instance we had now become quite familiar with
our new appellations; thus I was Crusoe, and Alec was Monday, that being
the day on which I saved him. For the sake of being as near like the
hero of Juan Fernandez as possible, I should have liked to call him
Friday; in fact, Good Friday, but as he came on the wrong day, Monday
had to be his name.
As I write these pages, I can, in fancy, hear his voice shouting to me
on the island,
"Crusoe! Crusoe! where are you? Rob--in--son Cru--soe, ahoy!"
Being August, the fruit was ripe and very plentiful; in fact, it seemed
a sin to see it hang on the bushes and trees till it dropped upon the
ground, simply to serve the purpose of manure. To obviate this we made a
whole copper full of jam, and in making it we got into a pretty pickle,
both of us being up to our elbows in stickiness, but the jam _was_
prime!
Whatever I did, or wherever I went, the paper I had found in the old
leathern cup always haunted me. Moreover, when it did not haunt _me_, I
haunted _it_; for I took it to various parts of the island, and taking
my stand in a certain place, would represent the spot shewn by the skull
in the drawing. Then Monday would measure in various directions to see
if he could get the measurements correct to certain rocks or tree
stumps, to see if they tallied with the paper, but it was no use,
nothing would coincide with that faded paper.
We tried the Creviçhon, but nothing there agreed; then La Fauconnaire,
but could make nothing of that either, so we had again to let the matter
rest.
One day, however, it suddenly struck me that as none of the trees on the
island were one hundred years old, I might have spared myself the
trouble of attempting them when making my calculations and measurements.
By the way, perhaps it would be as well to state what the precise
contents of my document were. Here is a copy:--
"This is the Will of Jean Tussaud, Master Mariner of C----
(sometimes called Barbe Rouge). To the person who is lucky enough
to find my treasure house, I herewith declare him to be my heir,
and whatsoever he may find shall be his, and for his sole benefit.
"My chief mate, William Trefry, a Cornish man, wished to become my
heir before my death, but I could not agree with him on that point,
although I left him in possession of the key of my 'petites fées'
(little fairies). The key and a valuable knife are all I gave him.
"The bearings of my treasure house are these:--
[Illustration:-THE PUZZLING DOCUMENT-]
"The lucky one will find the following property.... (Here follows a
list of many valuable articles, and winds up with), 'and lastly my
pretty box of _petites fées_.'
"I leave Jethou to-night to join my vessel, which is about to make
a voyage to the West Indies, to see what business can be done
there. I leave this paper, so that should I never return, the goods
I have so industriously and riskily gathered together, may still be
of service to someone who may have skill enough to discover their
whereabouts.
Signed
"JEAN TUSSAUD (Barbe Rouge),
"Feb. 19, 17--."
Here was a puzzle to which for weeks I could obtain no clue whatever,
but one day as I was sitting under the shade of the huge walnut tree
overlooking the garden, the idea came into my mind that this kind of
tree flourishes for generations, and from the gigantic proportions of
this particular tree, it must be a great deal more than a century old.
I found Monday, and asked him how old he thought it would be, and he
gave it as his opinion that it was one hundred and fifty years old, if
it was a day. Then said I,
"What is the French for walnut tree?"
"Noyer," was his reply, and into my pocket went my hand to bring out the
mystic document to see if there was an N on the chart. Joy, there was,
and at sight of it my hand trembled violently, and I felt ready to choke
with excitement, as I believed I had now a key to the finding of the
treasure.
Monday was as excited as myself, all he could exclaim was, "Oh, la, la!
Oh, la, la!" which was with him a mark of supreme delight.
We fetched the yard measure, and commenced our survey, as I shrewdly
guessed the fine old mulberry tree had something to do with the
calculations; if so the distance from the mulberry tree (Murier
accounting for the letter M) to the walnut tree would be twenty-four
yards; so we measured, but could not make the distance correct, as we
made it 26-2/3 yards, or just eight feet too much. This quite nonplussed
us, and our excitement greatly abated; but we were not yet vanquished,
and set our wits to work to discover the meaning of another of the
letters from which we could take further measurements.
Being near N (the walnut tree) I walked round the garden wall to the
point marked EC, but could there find no landmark at all from which to
measure. A century ago something may have stood there, but now it was a
bare spot. Here was another rebuff which seemed to upset my theory
altogether, and Monday with long visage said,
"Crusoe, you are on the wrong scent, you have 'shaken hands with a
shadow.'"
"Wait a bit, Monday. 'A cracked pitcher will hold _some_ water,' and
although I may be wrong on some of the points, I may find at least _one_
correct one presently."
We then walked along to the corner of the wall at the angle of which was
the letter P. At this point stood the well.
"What is French for '_well_', Monday."
"Puit."
"Puit?"
At this I gave a yell of delight.
"Eureka! I believe. Measure away, good comrade; measure away!"
"Where to, noble Crusoe?"
"Ah, where," said I to myself. "Well, measure off twelve yards towards
the centre of the garden, and see if it cuts the line between the
mulberry tree and the big walnut."
We measured to the wall and climbed over, and continued our measuring,
but alas, it went beyond the bee-line between the two trees by about
five feet! Wrong again!
Now I began to get angry, as I saw Monday was laughing up his sleeve at
me, and I called him _Alec_ to shew him I was not in a laughing humour
but thoroughly in earnest.
I walked along next inside the wall to about the point on the paper
marked P, which appeared to me to be at the window of the house.
"What is window, Alec?"
"Fenêtre."
That would not do.
"Now look here, Alec, you are laughing at me again, and I don't like it;
laugh some other time, but for the present give me your full attention,
and don't be a ninny. It is no joking matter, but one upon which I am
very serious and anxious, as I believe there is something attached to
this quest which is really worth a little trouble to elucidate."
"And," replied he, still smiling, "when you get to the end of your
quest, I believe you will 'shake hands with a shadow' as I told you
before. But, Bold Crusoe, I _will_ do my best to help you as a good
comrade should, so I will bottle up my hilarious mood till you find your
treasure, and then I will explode."
"Very well, Monday," I replied. "I trust soon to be able to make you
have a perfect earthquake when I shew you Old Barbe Rouge's 'Petites
fées.' Fenêtre will not do. Now what are we standing near that commences
in French with the letter P?"
Monday looked about and quickly said,
"La porte, the door, porche, the porch; how will they do?"
"Capital! now we are surely on the right track."
So again we brought our measuring stick into play, but again the measure
was not quite right, but still not far out. We made it nearly eleven
yards instead of ten, and although not perfectly correct, it gave me
great hope.
With but little trouble we made out the letters PM to be Porte Magasin
(door of the store house), and again we were about a yard too much in
the measurement. So we left it, and proceeded to the last point, the
letters CC.
The point was outside the walls, and the longest distance of all--the
figures twenty being written on the line. As in the other instances I
asked Monday the names of all kinds of objects to locate the letters CC,
but failed in this, except that I presumed C might be Chaumière =
Cottage.
Next taking our stand at the point which we supposed the centre of the
diagram--the place of the skull--we measured twenty yards towards the
cottage, but it fell short of the nearest point of the building by
nearly six feet; therefore probably it did not refer to the cottage at
all.
We assumed therefore, that a tree or some such object, to which the
letters CC referred, once stood on what was now a pathway joining the
cottage.
We paused in our search for the day, resolving on the morrow to try our
luck by digging a deep hole in the garden at the spot which we _thought_
was the axis of the different radial measurements.
"Begum" followed us about like a district surveyor, and seemed to know
something was on foot as well as himself.
Our work of fishing, shooting, and field work seemed quite in the
background, and very insignificant compared with my treasure hunt; but
Alec seemed to be quite indifferent to it; in fact, I think he had an
idea that my fall had slightly shaken my brain, and perhaps addled it. I
more than suspected this, for I noticed he kept his eye ever on me, and
would scarcely let me out of his sight. Good, faithful fellow!
"What say you to a sail this evening, Crusoe?"
"Just the thing, Monday; it is such a glorious night, and the cool
breeze will do us good. What do you say to a drag with the trawl?"
"The very thing; more fish are caught in one night than in two days, so
let's set to at once, that is, after a good substantial tea."
The meal being finished, we soon got the trawl and gear aboard the
"Anglo-Franc," and away we went in the lovely moonlight, scouring the
bottom of the Perchée between the head of Jethou and the tail of Herm.
The latter island looked delightful in the pale greenish light of the
moon, while Creviçhon towering up against the sky, with the moon behind
it, caused it to look like a silhouette cut out of black cardboard.
"Who would be stifled up in a town with wealth and its attending cares,
in preference to this life of liberty I was leading?" I asked myself,
and for answer gave, "While one is young, full of health, and with no
encumbrances, a Bohemian life is all very well; but what when a wife and
family are dependent on one? That puts a different complexion on the
matter, for one can roam no more."
I recollect this night well, for I revelled in its very antithesis to
life in England. Everything seemed so strange and quiet; the great black
rocks casting their shadows over the phosphorescent waves; the
star-studded sky, with the pale round moon, across which a gentle breeze
wafted silvery gauze-like clouds; the feeling of motion, the sense of
freedom, the love of labour to haul the net, the expectation of what
would be our luck, the merry badinage between my comrade and me, our
little songs between the hauls, and a score of other things cause me to
look back upon this night (and many others) with the thought, "Shall I
ever know such happiness again?"
Many persons, yes, most persons, must have recollections of past pure
delights that steal across their memories of things which happened long
years ago, and cause them to ask themselves the same question, "Shall I
ever know such happiness again?"
Why not? It always seems to strike me that when we are supremely happy,
we do not realise it at the time; but when the happy time has fled, and
has become a memory, we long for its return in vain. We long in vain
for that _particular_ pleasure, but there are present joys for us to
which at the time we do not give heed enough, or instead of _bemoaning
the past_ (which has flown) we should live and enjoy the _tangible
present_.
From moralising to fishing is a long jump, but we must take the leap and
attend to our net again.
After two or three hauls we had almost enough fish, but Alec said, "One
more for luck," and he being Skipper afloat, I Commandant ashore, like a
good A.B., I obeyed. We had caught several fair soles, but our last haul
brought us up two of the largest it has been my lot to capture.
"They are two, but not a pair," remarked Alec.
Neither were they, for when they were measured one was nineteen and a
half inches long, and the other exactly twenty-three inches. We
christened them Adam and Eve, and like a couple of cannibals declared
our intention of eating them for our supper when we got ashore.
As we sailed slowly in against the tide, the question arose who should
devour Adam and who Eve; so we agreed to guess the length of the trawl
beam between the irons for choice of fish.
I guessed first: "Ten feet."
"There," said Monday, "you have nearly taken my guess out of my mouth,
for I was going to say three metres, and that makes it about, let me
see, nine feet ten inches."
"How much is a metre?" I asked eagerly.
"Why about thirty-nine inches and a quarter of your measure," was his
ready reply.
"Then," I rejoined, bubbling over with excitement, "I've discovered the
measurements in the document. Why Old Barbe Rouge was a Frenchman, and
of course used French measure,--the metre! Hurrah!" and I made the rocks
echo with my excited hurrahs and loud laughter.
Adam and Eve were duly cooked, but they were not half eaten, for either
they were too large or our appetites too small by reason of our great
excitement; anyhow, Adam would have sufficed for us both, and Eve would
have made a capital breakfast for us in the morning. As it was, the
mangled remains of the patriarchs remained for our dinner the next day,
as breakfast was, under the circumstances of what happened next day,
quite out of the question.
As we did not get to bed till four a.m. we were not up till ten; in
fact, I slept but little, as dreams of treasure islands, fairy land, and
wonderful nuggets of gold persistently kept me tossing about feverishly,
till my comrade ran in and wanted to know if he was to dig the treasure
up before I was out of bed.
I sprang out of bed and dressed, and in five minutes we were busy with
paper and rule.
Hurrah! with metres instead of yards the distances tallied within a few
inches, so that near the centre of the garden we had a number of pegs
stuck in the mould all round a currant bush, of perhaps three or four
years' growth, which had thus accidentally marked the spot that was
indicated by a skull on the paper.
Now came Alec's turn for excitement, and he was _intensely_ excited. I
must say I liked my form of excitement best, for Monday seemed
completely off his head, and was gesticulating like a monkey dancing a
hornpipe on hot bricks; he was fairly beside himself. I took mine in a
calmer manner, that is, although I was brimful and even bubbling over
with it, I did not rave, but kept as cool as possible, and I remember at
the time thinking it was due to our different nationalities, the
excitable and phlegmatic temperaments predominating in the two
individuals and giving character. Probably a stranger looking on would
have thought us either a couple of fools or a pair of lunatics.
Off came our jackets, and our sleeves were quickly rolled above our
elbows, displaying arms as brown as those of gypsies.
Monday took the pick and I the shovel, and to work we went.
I must not forget to mention that I had told Alec that whatever we found
I should consider it my duty to give up to M. Oudin as the real
proprietor of the island, and to this he readily assented, mentioning
that he at all events could say nothing to my plans, as he was simply my
assistant, my Monday.
[Illustration: Decorative scroll]
[Illustration: Decorative chapter heading]