A SETBACK
"I wouldn't bank on finding treasure," Grimshaw advised. "What those
old pirates got they spent as they went along. They warn't of the
saving kind. 'Easy come, easy go' was their motto."
"That's true enough of the majority of them, no doubt," conceded Drew.
"The common sailors got only a small portion of the loot anyway. But
some of the leaders were shrewd and far-sighted men. They didn't look
forward to dying as pirates. They wanted to save enough to buy their
pardons later on and live the rest of their lives ashore in peace and
luxury. What was more natural than that they should hide their shares
of the plunder on some of the little islands they were familiar with?
They wouldn't dare to keep it on their ships, where their throats might
be cut at any moment if their crews knew there was treasure aboard."
"That's true enough," admitted his employer.
"And if they did bury it," pursued the young man, encouraged by this
concession, "why shouldn't a good deal of it be there yet? Gold and
silver and jewels don't perish from being kept underground. And as
most of the pirates died in battle, they had no chance to go back and
dig the plunder up from where they had buried it."
"But some of the crews must have been in the secret," objected Tyke,
"an' after the death of their captains what was to hinder them from
going after the doubloons an' getting 'em."
"There might have been a good many reasons," answered Drew. "In the
first place, the captains seem to have had a cheerful little habit of
killing the men who did the digging and leaving their skeletons to
guard the treasure-chests. And even when that didn't happen, what
chance would the common sailor have had of going after the loot? He
couldn't have got a ship without giving away his secret, and the minute
he'd given it away his own life wouldn't have been worth a copper cent.
"And then, too," went on Drew, warming to his subject, "look at all the
traditions there are on the subject. Where there is so much smoke
there must be some fire. A single rumor wouldn't amount to much, but
when that rumor persists and is multiplied by a thousand others until
it becomes a settled belief, there must be something in it. The rumors
are like so many spokes of a wheel all pointing to a single hub, and
that hub is--treasure!"
"I declare! you're getting all het up about it," grinned Tyke, as Drew
paused for breath. "But all the same, my boy, you want to get back to
earth. You've got as good a chance of finding hidden treasure as I
have of taking first prize in a beauty show."
"What's the matter with taking a look in Manuel's box and finding out
what it was he was so anxious about?" questioned Drew, a little dashed
by Tyke's skepticism.
"Well, perhaps we shall some time later on," conceded Tyke, somewhat
doubtfully. "We can't think of doing it until we git moved an'
settled. We've got enough on hand now to keep us as busy as ants for a
good many days to come."
Drew was disappointed, but as his employer had spoken there was nothing
more to be said, and he regretfully followed Grimshaw to the ground
floor.
The chronicle of his life for the rest of that day and the two
following could be summed up in the one word, work--hard, breathless,
unceasing work. A reminder had come from Blake that the moving must be
expedited, and from Tyke himself down to Sam no one was exempt.
Not that the thought of Ruth Adams was ever for long out of Drew's
mind. But the colors had grown more sombre in his rainbow of hope. He
had snatched a few moments from his noon hour on the second day to run
over to the _Normandy_, and although this time he saw Captain Peters,
it was only to learn that he could expect no help from that quarter.
The captain was curt and irritable after his prolonged drinking bout,
and answered chiefly in monosyllables. No, he had not seen any young
girl come aboard two days before. Did not know of any one who had.
"Now you git out," snarled Peters in conclusion. "You'll git no
information here. Make no mistake about that!"
Drew was startled by the change in Captain Peters' manner and look.
The skipper glared at him as though Drew were a strange dog trying to
get the other's bone. The young man's temper was instantly rasped; but
Peters was a considerably older man than he, and he seemed to be
laboring under some misapprehension.
"I assure you, Captain Peters," Drew said, "my reasons for asking were
perfectly honorable."
"You needn't assure me of anything. Just git out!" roared the skipper
of the _Normandy_; and, seeing that there was nothing but a fight in
prospect if he remained, the young man withdrew. On deck he saw the
second officer, and that person winked at him knowingly and followed
him to the plank.
"Old man on the rampage?" he asked.
"Seems to be," said the confused Drew.
"Chance was, that that Bug-eye you knocked out the other day is a
pertic'lar friend of the skipper's. But gosh! you're some boy with
your mits."
Drew might again have tried to find out from this fellow about the
girl, but he shrank from making her the subject of any general inquiry
or discussion. To him she was something to be kept sacred. His heart
was a shrine with her as its image, and before that image he burned
imaginary tapers with the fervor of a devotee.
One thought came to him with a suddenness that made him quake. Could
it be that she was already married?
He tried to remember whether "Mrs." or "Miss" had preceded the name on
the letter. For the life of him he could not recall. He had so
utterly assumed that she was unmarried, on the occasion of their
meeting, that any thought to the contrary had not even occurred to him
then. He was somewhat comforted by the probability that, had she been
married, her husband's name or initials would have followed the "Mrs."
instead of her given name. Yet, this was a custom that was becoming as
much honored in the breach as in the observance, and the use of her own
given name would not be at all conclusive.
Then, with a great wave of relief, the memory came to him that he had
placed the letters in her left hand and had noted that she had no rings
on that hand at all. The thought had come to him at the time that no
ornament could make those tapered fingers prettier than they were.
His heart leaped with elation. She was unmarried then! She wore no
wedding ring!
There was still greater cause for jubilation. She wore no ring of any
kind! She was not even engaged!
She probably was somewhere in this teeming city. Many times their
paths might almost cross, perhaps had already almost crossed since that
first meeting on the pier.
Fantastic musings took possession of him. Who was it that, in a burst
of hyperbole, said that if one took up his station at Broadway and
Thirty-fourth Street, he would, if he stayed there long enough, see
everybody in the world go past? Or was it Kipling who said that of
Port Said?
Where should he take his stand? What places should he frequent with
the greatest likelihood of meeting her? Theatres, the opera, art
galleries, railway stations, Central Park?
He recalled himself from these fantasies with a wrench. How foolish
and fruitless they were! He was no man of leisure, to do as he
pleased. He was bound as securely to his desk as the genie was to the
lamp of Aladdin, and he must answer its call just as unfailingly.
So, alternately wretched and elated, tasting the torments as well as
the joys of this experience that had revolutionized his life, he tore
desperately into his work, but with the girl's face ever before him.
On the third day after Tyke had received notice to move, the
preparations were far advanced. Delicate instruments had been
carefully wrapped; heavier objects had been clothed with burlap;
truckmen were notified to be ready on the following day. Tyke and Drew
had made frequent pilgrimages to the new place and had arranged where
the stock could be placed to the best advantage. New bills and
letterheads had been ordered from the printers, and even the old sign
over the door, which Tyke obstinately refused to leave behind, had been
taken down to have the old number painted out and the new one
substituted.
There was no elevator in the old building. Drew had often urged
Grimshaw to have one installed, but the old man was dead set against
any such "new-fangled contraptions." So, everything from the upper
lofts, when it was called for, had to be carried or rolled down the
rickety stairs, a proceeding which often roused rumbles of rebellion in
the breast of Sam, upon whom fell the brunt of the heavy work.
He had spent most of that afternoon in getting down the boxes from the
third floor so that they might be within easier reach of the truckmen
when the moving should begin. He was on his way down with one of them,
perspiring profusely and tired from the work that had gone before,
when, as he neared the lowest step, he slipped and dropped his burden.
He was fortunate enough to scramble out of the way of the box and thus
escape injury. But the box itself came to the floor with a crash, and
split open.
Drew and Winters sprang to the help of the porter, and were relieved to
find that he was not hurt. He rose to his feet, his black face a
picture of consternation.
"Dat ole mis'ry in ma back done cotched me jes' when Ah got to de las'
step," he explained. "Ah hope dey ain't much damage done to dat 'er
box."
"Pretty badly done up, it seems to me," remarked Winters, as he
surveyed the broken chest critically.
"Never mind, Sam," consoled Drew. "It wasn't your fault and the old
box wasn't of much account anyway."
Just then Tyke thrust his head out of his office to learn the meaning
of the crash. At the sight of the broken box he came into the shop.
"How did this happen?" he asked.
"Ah couldn't help it, Mistah Grimshaw," said Sam ruefully. "Ma back
jes' nacherly give way, an' Ah had to let go. Ah'm pow'ful sorry, sah."
Sam was a favorite with the old man, who refrained from scolding him
but stood a moment looking curiously at the box.
"Carry it into the office," he said at last to Sam. "And you, Allen,
come along."