The Project Gutenberg eBook ofThe Dragon's SecretThis ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: The Dragon's SecretAuthor: Augusta Huiell SeamanIllustrator: C. M. RelyeaRelease date: June 12, 2008 [eBook #25770]Most recently updated: January 3, 2021Language: EnglishCredits: Produced by Roger Frank and the Online DistributedProofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DRAGON'S SECRET ***
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
Title: The Dragon's SecretAuthor: Augusta Huiell SeamanIllustrator: C. M. RelyeaRelease date: June 12, 2008 [eBook #25770]Most recently updated: January 3, 2021Language: EnglishCredits: Produced by Roger Frank and the Online DistributedProofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
Title: The Dragon's Secret
Author: Augusta Huiell SeamanIllustrator: C. M. Relyea
Author: Augusta Huiell Seaman
Illustrator: C. M. Relyea
Release date: June 12, 2008 [eBook #25770]Most recently updated: January 3, 2021
Language: English
Credits: Produced by Roger Frank and the Online DistributedProofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DRAGON'S SECRET ***
THEDRAGON’S SECRET
THE
DRAGON’S SECRET
Leslie hurried Phyllis out with what seemed unnecessary haste
THEDRAGON’S SECRETBYAUGUSTA HUIELL SEAMANAuthor of “The Slipper Point Mystery,” “The Girl Next Door,”“Three Sides of Paradise Green,” “The SapphireSignet,” “The Crimson Patch,” etc., etc.ILLUSTRATED BYC. M. RELYEA
THE
DRAGON’S SECRET
BY
AUGUSTA HUIELL SEAMAN
Author of “The Slipper Point Mystery,” “The Girl Next Door,”
“Three Sides of Paradise Green,” “The Sapphire
Signet,” “The Crimson Patch,” etc., etc.
ILLUSTRATED BY
C. M. RELYEA
NEW YORKTHE CENTURY CO.
NEW YORK
THE CENTURY CO.
Copyright, 1920, 1921, byThe Century Co.PRINTED IN U. S. A.
Copyright, 1920, 1921, by
The Century Co.
PRINTED IN U. S. A.
CONTENTS
CONTENTS
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
THE DRAGON’S SECRET
THE DRAGON’S SECRET
The Dragon’s Secret
The Dragon’s Secret
CHAPTER ITHE NIGHT OF THE STORM
It had been a magnificent afternoon, so wonderful that Leslie hated to break the spell. Reluctantly she unrolled herself from the Indian blanket, from which she emerged like a butterfly from a cocoon, draped it over her arm, picked up the book she had not once opened, and turned for a last, lingering look at the ocean. A lavender haze lay lightly along the horizon. Nearer inshore the blue of sea and sky was intense. A line of breakers raced shoreward, their white manes streaming back in the wind. Best of all, Leslie loved the flawless green of their curve at the instant before they crashed on the beach.
“Oh, but the ocean’s wonderful in October!” she murmured aloud. “I never had any ideahowwonderful. I never saw it in this month before. Come, Rags!”
A black-and-white English sheep-dog, his name corresponding closely to his appearance, came racing up the beach at her call.
“Did you find it hard to tear yourself away from the hermit-crabs, Ragsie?” she laughed. “You must have gobbled down more than a hundred. It’s high time you left off!”
She started to race along the deserted beach, the dog leaping ahead of her and yapping ecstatically. Twice she stopped to pick up some driftwood.
“We’ll need it to get supper, Rags,” she informed the dog. “Our stock is getting low.”
He cocked one ear at her intelligently.
They came presently to a couple of summer bungalows set side by side about two hundred feet from the ocean edge. They were long and low, each with a wide veranda stretchingacross the front. There were no other houses near, the next bungalow beyond being about half a mile away.
With a sigh of relief, Leslie deposited the driftwood in one corner of the veranda of the nearest bungalow. Then she dropped into one of the willow rockers to rest, the dog panting at her feet. Presently the screen door opened and a lady stepped out.
“Oh! are you here, Leslie? I thought I heard a sound, and then it was so quiet that I came out to see what it meant. Every little noise seems to startle me this afternoon.”
“I’m so sorry, Aunt Marcia! I should have called to you,” said Leslie, starting up contritely to help her aunt to a seat. “I hope you had a good nap and feel rested, but sometimes I think it would do you more good if you’d come out with me and sit by the ocean than try to lie down in your room. It was simply glorious to-day.”
Miss Marcia Crane shook her head. “Iknow what is best for me, Leslie dear. You don’t always understand. But I believe this placeisdoing me a great deal of good. I confess, I thought Dr. Crawford insane when he suggested it, and I came here with the greatest reluctance. For a nervous invalid like myself to go and hide away in such a forsaken spot as this is in October, just you and I, seemed to me the wildest piece of folly. But I must say it appears to be working out all right, and I am certainly feeling better already.”
“But whyshouldn’tit have been all right?” argued Leslie. “I was always sure it would be. The doctor said this beach was noted for its wonderfully restful effect, especially after the summer crowds had left it, and that it was far better than a sanatorium. And as for your being alone with me—why I’m sixteen and a quite competent housekeeper, as Mother says. And you don’t need a trained nurse, so I can do most everything for you.”
“But your school—” objected Miss Crane.“It was lovely of your mother to allow you to come with me, for I don’t know another person who would have been so congenial or helpful. But I worry constantly over the time you are losing from high school.”
“Well, don’t you worry another bit!” laughed Leslie. “I told you that my chum Elsie is sending me down all our notes, and I study an hour or two every morning, and I’ll probably go right on with my classes when I go back. Besides, it’s the greatest lark in the world for me to be here at the ocean at this unusual time of the year. I never in all my life had an experience like it.”
“And then, I didn’t think at first that it could possibly besafe!” went on her aunt. “We seem quite unprotected here—we’re miles from a railroad station, and not another inhabited house around. What would happen if—”
Again Leslie laughed. “We’ve a telephone in the bungalow and can call up the villagedoctor or the constable, in case of need. The doctor said there weren’t any tramps or unwelcome characters about, and I’ve certainly never seen any in the two weeks we’ve been here. And, last but not least, there’s always Rags!—You know how extremely unpleasant he’d make it for any one who tried to harm us. No, Aunt Marcia, you haven’t a ghost of an excuse for not feeling perfectly safe. But now I’m going in to start supper. You stay here and enjoy the view.”
But her aunt shivered and rose when Leslie did. “No, I prefer to sit by the open fire. I started it a while ago. And I’m glad you brought some more wood. It was getting low.”
As they went in together, the girl glanced up at the faded and weather-beaten sign over the door. “Isn’t it the most appropriate name for this place!—‘Rest Haven.’ It is surely a haven of rest to us. But I think I like the name of that closed cottage next door even better.”
“What is it?” asked her aunt, idly. “I’ve never even had the curiosity to look.”
“Then you must come and see for yourself!” laughed Leslie, turning her aunt about and gently forcing her across the veranda. They ploughed their way across a twenty-foot stretch of sand and stepped on the veranda of the cottage next door. It was a bungalow somewhat similar to their own, but plainly closed up for the winter. The windows had their board shutters adjusted, the door was padlocked, and a small heap of sand had drifted in on the veranda.
Leslie pointed to the sign-board over the door. “There it is,—‘Curlew’s Nest.’There’s something about the name that fascinates me. Don’t you feel so too, Aunt Marcia? I can imagine all sorts of curious and wonderful things about a closed-up house called ‘Curlew’s Nest’! It just fairly bristles with possibilities!”
“What a romantic child you are, Leslie!”smiled her aunt. “When you are as old as I am, you’ll find you won’t be thinking of interesting possibilities in a perfectly ordinary shut-up summer bungalow. It’s a pretty enough name, of course, but I must confess it doesn’t suggest a single thing to me except that I’m cold and want to get back to the fire. Come along, dearie!”
Leslie sighed and turned back, without another word, to lead her aunt to their own abode. One phase of their stay she had been very, very careful to conceal from Miss Marcia. She loved this aunt devotedly, all the more perhaps because she was ill and weak and nervous and very dependent on her niece’s care; but down in the depths of her soul, Leslie had to confess to herself that she was lonely, horribly lonely for the companionship of her parents and sisters and school chums. The loneliness did not always bother her, but it came over her at times like an overwhelming wave, usually when Miss Marcia failed to respond to some whim or projector bubbling enthusiasm. Between them gaped the abyss of forty years difference in age, and more than a score of times Leslie had yearned for some one of her own years to share the joy she felt in her unusual surroundings.
As they stepped on their own veranda, Leslie glanced out to sea with a start of surprise. “Why, look how it’s clouding up!” she exclaimed. “It was as clear as a bell a few minutes ago, and now the blue sky is disappearing rapidly.”
“I knew to-day was a weather-breeder,” averred Miss Marcia. “I felt in my bones that a storm was coming. We’ll probably get it to-night. I do hope the roof won’t leak. We haven’t had a real bad storm since we came, and I dread the experience.”
At eight o’clock that evening it became apparent that they were in for a wild night. The wind had whipped around to the northeast and was blowing a gale. There was a persistent crash of breakers on the beach. Toopen a door or window was to admit a small cyclone of wind and sand and rain. Miss Marcia sat for a while over the open fire, bemoaning the fact that the roofdidleak in spots, though fortunately not over the beds. She was depressed and nervous, and finally declared she would go to bed.
But Leslie, far from being nervous, was wildly excited and exhilarated by the conflict of the elements. When her aunt had finally retired, she hurried on a big mackinaw and cap and slipped out to the veranda to enjoy it better. Rags, whimpering, followed her. There was not much to see, for the night was pitch black, but she enjoyed the feel of the wind and rain in her face and the little occasional dashes of sand. Wet through at last, but happy, she crept noiselessly indoors and went to her own room on the opposite side of the big living-room from her aunt’s.
“I’m glad Aunt Marcia is on the other side,” she thought. “It’s quieter there on the southand west. I get the full force of things here. It would only worry her, but I like it. How lonesome Curlew’s Nest seems on a wild night like this!” She switched off her electric light, raised her shade, and looked over at the empty bungalow. Rags, who always slept in her room, jumped up on the window-seat beside her. The mingled sand and rain on the window prevented her from seeing anything clearly, so she slipped the sash quietly open, and, heedless for a moment of the drenching inrush, stood gazing out.
Only the wall of the house twenty feet away was visible, with two or three windows, all tightly shuttered—a deserted and lonely sight. She was just about to close her window when a curious thing happened. The dog beside her uttered a rumbling, half-suppressed growl and moved restlessly.
“What is it, Rags?” she whispered. “Do you see or hear anything? I’m sure there’s no one around.” The dog grumbled again,half audibly, and the hair along his spine lifted a little.
“Hush, Rags! For gracious sake don’t let Aunt Marcia hear you, whatever happens! It would upset her terribly,” breathed Leslie, distractedly. The dog obediently lay quiet, but he continued to tremble with some obscure excitement, and Leslie remained stock still, gazing at the empty house.
At length, neither seeing nor hearing anything unusual, she was about to close the window and turn away, when something caused her to lean out, regardless of the rain, and stare fixedly at a window in the opposite wall. Was she mistaken? Did her eyes deceive her? Was it possibly some freak of the darkness or the storm? It had been only for an instant, and it did not happen again. But in that instant she was almost certain that she had seen a faint streak of light from a crack at the side of one of the heavily shuttered windows!
CHAPTER IIFOUND ON THE BEACH
The next morning dawned windy and wet. A heavy northeast gale had whipped the sea into gray, mountainous waves. A fine drizzle beat in one’s face through the slightest opening of door or window. Leslie loved the soft, salt tang of the air, and in spite of her aunt’s rather horrified protests, prepared for a long excursion out of doors.
“Don’t worry about me, Auntie dear!” she laughed gaily. “One can’t possibly catch cold in this mild, beautiful air; and if I get wet, I can always get dry again before any damage is done. Besides, we need some more wood for the fires very, very badly and they say you can simply find heaps of it on the beach after a storm like this. I want some nice fat logsfor our open fire, and I see at least a half dozen right down in front of this house. And last but not least, Rags needs some exercise!”
She found a wealth of driftwood at the water’s edge that surpassed her wildest dreams. Again and again she filled her basket and hauled it up to the bungalow, and three times she carried up a large, water-soaked log balanced on her shoulder. But when the supply at last appeared ample, she returned to the beach on another quest. Rather to her surprise, she found that the stormy ocean had cast up many things beside driftwood—articles that in size and variety suggested that there must have been a wreck in the night.
Yet she knew that there had been no wreck, else the coast-guard station, less than a mile away, would have been very busy, and she herself must surely have heard some of the disturbance. No, there had been no wreck, yet all about her lay the wave-sodden flotsam and jetsam of many past disasters. A broken maststump was imbedded upright in the sand at one spot. In another, a ladder-like pair of stairs, suggesting a ship’s companionway, lay half out of the water. Sundry casks and barrels dotted the beach, some empty, some still untouched. Rusty tins of canned goods, oil, and paint, often intact, intermingled with the debris. Bottles, either empty or full of every conceivable liquid, added to the list; and sprinkled through and around all the rest were broken dishes, shoe-brushes, combs, and other household and personal articles in surprising quantities.
Leslie roamed about among this varied collection, the salt spray in her face, the surging breakers sometimes unexpectedly curling around her rubber boots. There was a new and wonderful fascination to her in examining this ancient wreckage, speculating on the contents of unopened tins, and searching ever farther and farther along the shore for possible treasure-trove of even greater interest or value.
“Whyshouldn’tI find a chest of jewels or a barrel full of golden coins or a pocket-book crammed with bills, Rags?” she demanded whimsically of the jubilant dog. “I’m sure something of that kind must go down with every ship, as well as all the rest of this stuff, and why shouldn’t we be lucky enough to find it?”
But Rags was busy investigating the contents of some doubtful-looking tin, and had neither time nor inclination to respond, his own particular quests being quite in another line and far more interesting to him!
So Leslie continued on her own way, absorbed in her own investigations and thoughts. The affair of the previous night was still occupying a large place in her mind. Nothing further had occurred, though she had watched at her window for nearly an hour. Even Rags at length ceased to exhibit signs of uneasiness, and she had gone to bed at last, feelingthat she must have been mistaken in imagining anything unusual.
The first thing she had done this morning after leaving the house was to walk around Curlew’s Nest, examining it carefully for any sign of occupation. It was closed and shuttered, as tight as a drum, and she could discern no slightest sign of a human being having been near it for days. But still she could not rid her mind of the impression that there had beensomethinglast night out of the ordinary, or Rags would not have behaved as he did. He was not the kind of dog that unnecessarily excited himself about nothing. It was a little bit strange.
“Oh, dear! I beg your pardon! I’m awfully sorry!” exclaimed Leslie, reeling backward from the shock of collision with some one she had unseeingly bumped into as she plowed her way along, her head bent to the wind, her eyes only on the beach at her feet. The person with whom she had collided also recovereda lost balance and turned to looked at her.
Leslie beheld a figure slightly taller than herself, clothed in yellow “slickers” and long rubber boots, a “sou’wester” pulled closely over plump, rosy cheeks and big, inquiring blue eyes. For a moment she could not for the life of her tell whether the figure was man or woman, boy or girl. Then a sudden gust of wind tore the sou’wester aside and a long brown curl escaped and whipped into the blue eyes. It was a girl—very little older than Leslie herself.
“Don’t mention it!” laughed the girl. “I didn’t know there was another soul on the beach beside Father and Ted and myself.”
And then, for the first time, Leslie noticed two other figures standing just beyond, each clad similarly to the girl, and each with fishing-rod in hand and a long line running out into the boiling surf. The girl too held a rod in her hand.
“You just spoiled the loveliest bite I’vehad this morning,” the girl laughed again, “but I’ll forgive you if you’ll tell me who you are and how you come to be out here in this bad weather. It’s quite unusual to see any one on the beach at this season.”
“I’m Leslie Crane, and I’m staying at Rest Haven with my aunt, Miss Crane, who is not well and is trying to recuperate here, according to the doctor’s orders,” responded Leslie, feeling somewhat like an information bureau as she said it.
“Oh, so you’re staying here, are you? How jolly! I’ve never met any one staying here at this season before. I’m Phyllis Kelvin and this is my father and my brother Ted. Father—Miss Leslie Crane! Ted—”
She made the introductions at the top of her voice as the wind and roar of the ocean almost drowned it, and each of the two figures responded politely, keeping one eye all the while on his line.
“We always come down here for three weeksin October, Father and Ted and I, for the fishing,” Phyllis went on to explain. “Father adores fishing and always takes his vacation late down here, so that he can have the fishing in peace and at its best. And Ted and I come to keep him company and keep house for him, incidentally. That’s our bungalow right back there,—‘Fisherman’s Luck.’”
“Oh, I’m so glad you’re going to be here!” sighed Leslie, happily. “I’ve been horribly lonesome! Aunt Marcia does not go out very often and sleeps a great deal, and I absolutelylongto talk to some one at times. I don’t know anything much about fishing, but I hope you’ll let me be with you some, if I promise not to talk too much and spoil things!”
“You’re not a bit happier to find some one thanIam!” echoed Phyllis. “I love fishing, too, but I’m not so crazy about it as they are, and I’ve often longed for some girl chum down here. We’re going to be the best of friends, I know, and I’ll call on you and your aunt thisvery afternoon, if you’ll come up to our bungalow now with me and help carry this basket of driftwood. Daddy and Ted won’t move from the beach for the rest of the morning, but I’d like to stop and talk with you. I get tired sooner than they do.”
Leslie agreed joyfully, and together they tugged a heavy basket of wood up to the one other bungalow on the beach beside the one Leslie and her aunt were stopping at—and Curlew’s Nest. She found Fisherman’s Luck a delightful abode, full of the pleasant, intimate touches that could only be imparted by owners who inhabited it themselves most of the time. A roaring fire blazed invitingly in the big open fireplace in the living-room.
“Come, take off your things and stay awhile!” urged Phyllis, and Leslie removed her mackinaw and cap. The two girls sank down in big easy chairs before the fire and laughingly agreeing to drop formality, proceeded as“Phyllis” and “Leslie,” to exchange confidences in true girl fashion.
“I mustn’t stay long,” remarked Leslie. “Aunt Marcia will be missing me and I must go back to see about lunch. But what a delightful bungalow you have! Are you here much of the time?”
“We’re here a good deal in the off seasons—April to June, and September through November. Father, Ted, and I,—but we don’t care for it so much in the summer season when the beach is more crowded with vacation folks and that big hotel farther up the beach is full. We have some cousins who usually take the bungalow for July and August.”
“I never was at the ocean in October before,” sighed Leslie, comfortably, “and it’s perfectly heavenly! We have that dear little bungalow, Rest Haven, but the one right next to it is not occupied.”
“No,” said Phyllis, “and it’s queer, too. I never knew either of them to be occupied atthis season before. They are both owned by the Danforths, and they usually shut them both up on September 30 and refuse to open them till the beginning of the next season. How did you come to get one of them, may I ask?”
“Oh, I think Aunt Marcia’s doctor managed it. He happened to know the Danforths personally, and got them to break their rule, as a great favor to him. We appreciate it very much. But do you know,” and here Leslie unconsciously sank her voice, “I saw such a queer thing about that other bungalow late yesterday evening!” And she recounted to her new friend a history of the previous night’s experience.
“Oh, how perfectly gorgeous!” sighed Phyllis, thrilled beyond description by the narrative. “Do you suppose it’shaunted?I’ve heard of haunted houses, but never of a hauntedbungalow!Now don’t laugh at me,—that’s what Ted and Father do when I speak of suchthings,” for Leslie could not repress a giggle at this suggestion.
“Phyllis, youknowthere are no such things as haunted houses—really!” she remonstrated.
“Well, I’m not so sure of it, and anyway, I’ve alwayslongedto come across one! And what other explanation can there be for this thing, anyway? But do me one favor, won’t you, Leslie? Let’s keep this thing to ourselves and do a little investigating on our own account. If I tell Father and Ted and let them know what I think, they’ll simply hoot at me and go and spoil it all by breaking the place open and tramping around it themselves and scaring away any possible ghost there might be. Let’s just see if we can make anything out of it ourselves, will you?”
“Why of course I will,” agreed Leslie heartily. “I wouldn’t dare to let Aunt Marcia know there was anything queer about the place. She’d be scared to death and it would upset all the doctor’s plans for her. I don’t believein the ghost theory, but Idothink there may have been something mysterious about it, and it will be no end of a lark to track it down if we can. But I must be going now.”
“I’m coming with you!” announced the impetuous Phyllis. “I want to go up there right away and do a little looking about myself. I simply can’t wait.”
So they set off together, trudging through the sand at the edge of the ocean, where the walking was easiest. All the way, Leslie was wondering what had become of Rags. It was not often that he deserted her even for five minutes, but she had not seen him since her encounter with Phyllis. It was not till their arrival at Curlew’s Nest that she discovered his whereabouts.
Directly in front of this bungalow’s veranda, and about fifty feet away from it, lay the remains of a huge old tree-trunk, half buried in the sand. Almost under this trunk, only his rear quarters visible, was the form of Rags,digging frantically at a great hole in the wet sand. So deep now was the hole that the dog was more than half buried.
“There’s Rags! He’s after another hermit-crab!” cried Leslie. “I was wondering where he could be.” They both raced up to him and reached him just as he had apparently attained the end of his quest and backed out of the hole.
“Why, what has he got?” exclaimed Phyllis. “That’s no hermit-crab!”
And in truth it was not. For out of the hole the dog was dragging a small burlap sack which plainly contained some heavy article in its folds!
CHAPTER IIITHE MYSTERIOUS CASKET
Both girls dashed forward to snatch the dog’s treasure-trove from him. But Rags had apparently made up his mind that, after his arduous labors, he was going to have the privilege of examining his find himself. At any rate, he would not be easily robbed. Seizing the burlap bag in his mouth, he raced to the water’s edge and stood there, guarding his treasure with mock fierceness. Phyllis, being a stranger, he would not even allow to approach him, but growled ominously if she came within ten feet of his vicinity. And when Rags growled, it behooved the stranger to have a care! Leslie he pretended to welcome, but no sooner had she approached near enough to lay her hand on the bag than he seizedit triumphantly and raced up the beach.
“Oh, do grab him, somehow!” cried Phyllis, in despair. “He’ll drop the thing in the water and the next breaker will wash it away, and we’ll never know what it was!”
Leslie herself was no less anxious to filch his treasure, but Rags had by now acquired a decidedly frolicsome spirit, and the chase he led them was long and weary. Three times he dropped the bag directly in the path of a breaker, and once it was actually washed out, and the girls groaned in chorus as they saw it flung into the boiling surf. But another wave washed it ashore, only to land it again in the custody of Rags before Leslie could seize it.
Finally, however, he wearied of the sport, and sensing the sad fact that his prize was in no wise edible, he dropped it suddenly to pursue an unsuspecting hermit-crab. The girls fell joyfully upon the long-sought treasure and bore it to the veranda of Curlew’s Nest for further examination.
“What under the sun can it be?” marveled the curious Phyllis. “Something heavy, and all sewed up in a coarse bag like that! It’s as good as a ghost story. Let’s get at it right away.”
They sat down on the wet steps while Leslie unrolled the bag,—not much larger than a big salt-bag,—and tried to tear an opening at the top. But her slender fingers were not equal to the task, so Phyllis undertook it.
“Let me try!” she urged. “I play the piano a great deal and my fingers are very strong.”
And sure enough, it did not take her more than a moment to make an opening and thrust her hand into it. What she found there she drew out and laid in Leslie’s lap, while the two girls gasped simultaneously at the singular object they had discovered.
To begin with, it was encrusted with sand and corroded by the contact of salt air and seawater. But when they had brushed off the sand and polished it as well as they could withthe burlap bag, it stood forth in something of its original appearance—a small box or casket of some heavy metal, either bronze or copper, completely covered with elaborate carving. It was about six inches long, three wide, and two in height. It stood on four legs, and, upon examination, the carving proved to be the body of a winged serpent of some kind, completely encircling the box, the head projecting over the front edge where the lock or fastening of the cover would be. The legs of the receptacle were the creature’s claws. The carving was remarkably fine and delicate in workmanship.
“My gracious!” breathed Phyllis. “Did you ever see anything so strange! What can it be?”
“And isn’t it beautiful!” added Leslie. “What can that queer creature be that’s carved on it? Looks to me like the pictures of dragons that we used to have in fairy-story books.”
“That’s just what it is! You’ve hit it! Icouldn’t think what it was at first—it’s so wound around the box!” cried Phyllis. “But this thing is certainly a box of some kind, and there must be some opening to it and probably something in it. Let’s try now to get it open.”
But that was easier said than done. Try as they would, they could find no way of opening the casket. The dragon’s head came down over the lock or clasp, and there was no vestige of keyhole or catch or spring. And so intricate was the carving, that there was not even any crack or crevice where the lid fitted down over the body of the box into which they could insert Phyllis’s penknife blade to pry it open by force. The casket and its contents was a baffling mystery, and the wicked looking little dragon seemed to guard the secret with positive glee, so malicious was its expression!
Phyllis at last threw down her knife in disgust and rattled the box impatiently. “Something bumps around in there!” she declared.“I can hear it distinctly, but I don’t believe we’ll ever be able to get at it. I never saw such a queer affair! Let’s try to break it with an ax. Have you one?”
“Oh, don’t dothat!” cried Leslie, horrified. “It would surely spoil this beautiful box and might even injure what’s in it. There must besomeother way of getting it open if only we take our time and go at it carefully.”
They both sat for several moments regarding their find with resentful curiosity. Suddenly Leslie’s thoughts took a new tack, “How in the world did it ever come there—buried in the sand like that?”
“Thrown up on the beach by the waves, of course,” declared Phyllis, positively; “no doubt from some wreck, and buried in the sand after a while, just naturally, as lots of things are.”
The explanation was a very probable one. “But it’s rather far from the water’s edge,” objected Leslie.
“Oh, no, indeed! Why in winter the surf often comes up right under the bungalows!” remarked Phyllis, in quite an offhanded way.
“Mercy! Don’t ever tell Aunt Marcia that, or she’d go straight home!” exclaimed Leslie. “But isn’t it queer that it just happened to be right in front of Curlew’s Nest! Everything queer seems to happen right around that place.”
“That’s so! I’d almost forgotten the other thing. But whatIcan’t understand is how your dog happened to dig the thing up.”
“Oh, that’s simple! He’s always chasing hermit-crabs—it’s a great sport of his. And I suppose it just happened that one dug itself down in the sand right here, and he dug after it and then came across this.”
Phyllis had a sudden brilliant idea. “Let’s go and examine the hole! Perhaps there’s something else in it.”
They both raced over to the stump and Leslie thrust her hand into the hole. “There’snothing else in there,” she averred, “but perhaps it might be worth while to dig around here and see if there might be some other article buried near it. I’ll get a shovel.”
She disappeared behind her own bungalow for a moment and returned with a shovel. They dug furiously for ten minutes and turned up the sand all about the original hole. Nothing of the slightest interest came to light, however, and they presently abandoned the attempt and filled in the hole again.
“This is all there was—that’s plain,” declared Phyllis, “and all we can think is that it was cast up from some wreck and got buried here.”
But Leslie had been thinking. “Has it occurred to you, Phyllis, that itmighthave something to do with Curlew’s Nest and the queer thing that happened here? I wonder how long it has been lying in that hole?”
They examined the find again. “I can tell you one thing,” said Phyllis, “if it had beenin that sand alongtime, I think it would look rather different. To begin with, the burlap bag is in very good condition, whole and strong. It wouldn’t takeverylong in there for it to become ragged and go to pieces. And besides that, the box would look different. You know that metal like this gets badly corroded and tarnished in a very little while when it’s exposed even to this salt air, not to speak of the water too. I know, because we have some copper trays at the bungalow and they’re always asight! I have to keep polishing and polishing them to make them look nice. Now this box is very little tarnished since we rubbed it up. It makes me sure it hasn’t been buried long.”
“Well, has there been a wreck, then, very lately?” demanded Leslie.
“Not since last July—and that was only a fishing schooner. No chance in the world that such asthiswould be aboard of her!”
“Then, as far as I can see, this box musthave been buried here—deliberately—and very recently, too!” declared Leslie, solemnly. “Can you think of any other explanation?”
“Leslie, could it have been done last night?” demanded Phyllis, in an awed whisper.
“Oh—I never thought of that. Perhaps it was. Perhaps that was the meaning of the light and all. Phyllis, there’s some queer mystery here! I wonder if we ought to tell folks about it?”
“Ohdon’t!” implored Phyllis. “Not for a while, at least. It would be so wonderful to have this as a secret of our own and see what we can make of it. Just suppose we could work it out for ourselves!”
“Well—itwouldbe a lark, and I only hope it’s all right. But I’m going to ask you one favor, Phyllis. Please take the little box and keep it at your house, for I don’t want Aunt Marcia to be worried about the matter, and she might come across it if I kept it here. And I must be going in now, or she’ll be worried.”And she thrust the box into Phyllis’s hand.
“Indeed, I’ll keep it gladly and hide it safely, too. This is one secret I won’t have Ted meddling in!” declared Phyllis. “Let’s call the box ‘The Dragon’s Secret.’ He seems to be guarding very successfully! I’ll come back this afternoon and call, and we can talk this over some more. Good-by!”
And she turned away toward the direction of her own bungalow, with “The Dragon’s Secret” carefully concealed beneath her rainproof coat.