THE MAJOR EXPLAINS.
"Well," began the major, "I suppose you are all naturally curious
concerning that wallet of mine."
The four lads nodded attentively.
"I must admit we are," volunteered Rob.
They were gathered in the library of Mr. Blake's home. The banker was
seated in his own pet chair, while the major stood with his back to a
bookcase, a group of eager-eyed Boy Scouts surrounding him.
"In the first place," continued the major, "I think you would better all
sit down. The story is a somewhat lengthy one."
The boys obeyed, and the major began:
"I shall have to take you back more than a century," he said, "to the
days when the first settlers located adjacent to the south banks of Lake
Champlain. Among the colonists were my ancestors, Chisholm Dangerfield
and his family. Chisholm Dangerfield was the eldest son of the
Dangerfield family, of Chester, England. He had been left an ample
fortune, but having squandered it, decided, like many others in a similar
case, to emigrate to the new country.
"On arrival here, he and his family went up the river to Albany, and
there, hearing of new settlements along the lake, decided to take up land
there. They went most of the way by water, being much harassed by Indians
on the journey. But without any serious mishaps, they finally arrived at
their destination, and, in course of time, established a flourishing
farm. But Chisholm Dangerfield had a younger brother, a harum-scarum sort
of youth, to whom, nevertheless, he was much attached. When quite young,
this lad had run away to sea, and little had been heard of him since that
time.
"But while his family had remained in ignorance of his whereabouts, he
had joined a band of West Indian pirates, and in course of time amassed a
considerable fortune. Then a desire to reform came over him, and he
sought his English relatives. They would have nothing to do with him,
despite his wealth, and in a fit of rage he left England to seek his
brother--the only being who ever really cared for him. In due time he
arrived at the farm with quite a retinue of friendly Indians and
carriers.
"He was warmly welcomed. Possibly his money and wealth had something to
do with it. I don't know anything about that, however. At any rate, for
some years, he lived there, till one day he fell ill. His constitution
was undermined by the reckless, wild life he had led, and he died not
long after. He left all his gold and jewels to his brother.
"Indians were many and hostile in those days, so in order to be secure in
case of an attack, the elder brother had no sooner buried his kin with
due reverence, and received his legacy, than he decided to secrete the
entire amount of the old pirate's treasure in a cave in a remote part of
the Adirondacks."
"Gee!" exclaimed Tubby, who was hugging his knees, while his eyes showed
round as saucers in his fat cheeks.
"Did the Indians get it?" asked Hiram.
"Wait a minute, and you shall hear," continued the major. "Well, as I
said, the treasure was buried in a cave so securely hidden that nobody
would be able to find it again, except by a miracle, or by aid of the
chart of the spot, which Chisholm Dangerfield carefully made. A few
nights after that, a tribe went on the warpath, landed in canoes near to
the Dangerfield farm, and massacred every soul on the place but one--a
young boy named Roger Dangerfield, who escaped.
"This Roger Dangerfield was my great-great-grandfather. With him, when he
fled from the burning ruins, he took a paper his father had thrust into
his hands just before the Indian attack came. All this he wrote in his
diary, which did not come into my hands till recently. Well, Roger
Dangerfield, left to his own resources, proved so able a youth that he
was, before very long, a prosperous merchant in Albany. But in the
meantime he made several expeditions to the mountains to try to find the
hidden wealth.
"I should have told you that the paper was in cipher, and a very
elaborate one, so that it had never been completely worked out. This, no
doubt, accounts for Roger Dangerfield's failure.
"Well, in course of time, the cipher became a family relic along with
Roger Dangerfield's diary. His descendants moved to Virginia, where I was
born. I recollect, as a youngster, being enthralled by the story of the
old piratical Dangerfield's hidden gold, and resolving that when I grew
up I would find it. We had, in our employ at that time, a butler named
Jarley. I was an only child, and he was my confidant. I naturally told
him about the cipher and what its unraveling would mean.
"This happened when I was about eighteen and home on a vacation. Jarley
seemed much interested, but after both he and I had puzzled in vain over
the cipher, we gave it up. When I came home on my next vacation, I
learned that Jarley had left. His mother and father had died, he
declared, and he was required at his home in Maine. Well, I thought no
more of the matter, and forming new acquaintances in our neighborhood,
which was rapidly settling, I soon forgot Jarley. But one day a notion
seized me to look at the cipher and the diary again.
"But when I came to look for them, they had gone. Nor did any search
result in my finding them. It at once flashed across my mind that Jarley
might have taken them. So fixed an idea did this become, that I visited
the place in Maine to which he said he had gone, only to find that he had
removed soon after his return from Virginia. However, pursuing the trail,
I found that he--or a man resembling him--had visited the spot on the
lake where the old-time house had stood, and had made a mysterious
expedition into the mountains. The spot was at that time known as
Dangerfield, and was quite a flourishing little town, with a pulp mill
and a few other local industries. In that quiet community they
recollected the mysterious visitor well.
"However, as I learned, Jarley had left the town without paying his
guides or the man from whom he had hired the horses, I concluded that the
expedition had not been successful. Then I advertised for the man, but
without success. Then I was appointed to West Point, and for a long time
I thought no more of the matter. In fact, for years it lay dormant in my
mind, with occasional flashes of memory; then I would advertise for
Jarley or his heirs, but without success.
"The last time I advertised was about a year ago. After six months'
silence I received a letter, asking me to call at an address near the
Erie Basin in Brooklyn, if I was interested in the long-lost Jarley. All
my enthusiasm once more at fever heat, I set out for the place. The
address at which I was to call I found to be a squalid sailors'
boarding-house. On inquiring there for James Jarley, the name signed to
the letter, I was conducted into a dirty room, where lay a rough-looking
sailor, evidently just recovering from the effects of a debauch.
"So dulled was his mind, that it was some time before I could explain my
errand, but finally he understood. He frankly told me he was out for
money, and wanted to know how much I would give him for some papers he
had which his father--our old butler, it transpired--had left him. His
father, he said, had told him that if ever he wanted to make money with
them he was to seek out a Major Dangerfield, who would be likely to pay
him well for them.
"But it appeared that his father had also told him that he stood a chance
of arrest if he did so, and that it might be a dangerous step. However,
he told me that he had at length decided to take that chance, and on a
return from a long voyage, during which he had encountered my
advertisement in an old newspaper in a foreign port, he had made up his
mind to find me on his return.
"His father, it appeared, had always kept track of me, but fear and shame
had kept him from trying to arrange a meeting. The son, I gathered, both
from his conversation and the situation in which I found him, had always
been a ne'er-do-well. Well, the matter ended with my paying him a sum of
money for the papers, which as I suspected, proved to be the yellow-paged
old diary and the well-thumbed, tattered cipher. Then I had him removed
to a hospital, where a few days later he died in an attack of delirium."