The three stones swung round, as on a pivot, revealing a space only large enough to crawl through with considerable squeezing.
“Hurrah! hurrah!” she shouted. “What did I tell you, Doris? There’s something else behind here,—another cave, I guess. I’m going through. Are you going to follow?” Handing her candle to Doris, she scrambled through the narrow opening. And Doris, now determined to stick at nothing, set both candles on the ground, and pushed the struggling and resisting Genevieve in next. After that, she passed in the candles to Sally, who held them while she clambered in herself.
And, once safely within, they stood and stared about them.
“Why, Sally,” suddenly breathed Doris, “this isn’t a cave. It’s acellar! Don’t you see all the household things lying around? Garden tools, and vegetables and—and allthat? Where in the world can we be?” A great light suddenly dawned on her.
“Sally Carter, what did I tell you? This cellar is Miss Camilla’s. I know it. I’mcertainof it. There’s no other house anywhere near Slipper Point. Itoldyou she knew about that cave!”
Sally listened, open-mouthed. “It can’t be,” she faltered. “I’m sure we didn’t come in that direction at all.”
“You can’t tell how you’re going—underground,” retorted Doris. “Remember, the tunnel made a turn, too. Oh, Sally! Let’s go back at once, before anything is discovered, and never, never let Miss Camilla or any one know what we’ve discovered. It’s none of our business.”
Sally, now convinced, was about to assent, when Genevieve suddenly broke into a loud howl.
“I won’t go back! I won’t go back—in that nas’y place!” she announced, at the top of her lungs.
“Oh, stop her!” whispered Doris. “Do stop
She led the others up the cellar stepsShe led the others up the cellar steps
her, or Miss Camilla may hear!” Sally stifled her resisting sister by the simple process of placing her hand forcibly over her mouth,—but it was too late. A door opened at the top of a flight of steps, and Miss Camilla’s astounded face appeared in the opening.
“What is it? Who is it?” she called, obviously frightened to death herself at this unprecedented intrusion. Huddled in a corner, they all shrank back for a moment, then Doris stepped boldly forward.
“It’s only ourselves, Miss Camilla,” she announced. “We have done a very dreadful thing, and we hadn’t any right to do it. But, if you’ll let us come upstairs, we’ll explain it all, and beg your pardon, and promise never to speak of it or even think of it again.” She led the others up the cellar steps, and into Miss Camilla’s tiny, tidy kitchen. Here, still standing, she explained the whole situation to that lady, who was still too overcome with astonishment to utter a word. And she ended her explanation thus:
“So you see, we didn’t have the slightestidea we were going to end at this house. But, all the same, we sort of felt that this cave was a secret of yours and that we really hadn’t any right to be interfering with it. But won’t you please forgive us, this time, Miss Camilla? And we’ll really try to forget that it ever existed.”
And then Miss Camilla suddenly found words. “My dear children,” she stuttered, “I—I really don’t know what you’re talking about. I haven’t the faintest idea what this all means.I never knew till this minute that there was anything like a cave or a tunnel connected with this house!”
And in the astounded silence that followed, the three stood gaping, open-mouthed, at each other.
“BUTcome into the sitting-room,” at length commanded Miss Camilla, “and let us talk this strange thing over. You must be tired and hungry, too, after this awful adventure of coming through that dreadful tunnel. You must have some of this hot gingerbread and a glass of lemonade.” And while she bustled about, on hospitable thoughts intent, they heard her muttering to herself:
“A cave—and a tunnel—and connected withthishouse!—Whatcanit all mean?”
They sat in restful silence for a time, munching the delicious hot gingerbread and sipping cool lemonade. Never did a repast taste more welcome, coming as it did after the adventures and uncertainties of that eventful day. And while they ate, Miss Camilla sat wiping her glasses and putting them on and taking themoff again and shaking her head over the perplexing news that had been so unexpectedly thrust upon her.
“I simply cannot understand it all,” she began at last. “As I told you, I’ve never had the slightest idea of such a strange affair, nor can I imagine how it came there. When did you say thatAnne Arundelvessel was wrecked?”
“Grandfather said in 1850,” answered Sally.
“Eighteen hundred and fifty,” mused Miss Camilla. “Well, I couldn’t have been more than four or five years old, so of course I would scarcely remember it. Besides, I was not at home here a great deal. I used to spend most of my time with my aunt who lived in New York. She used to take me there for long visits, months on a stretch. If this cave and tunnel were made at that time, it was probably done while I was away, or else I would have known of it. My father and brother and one or two colored servants were the only ones in the house, most of the time. I had a nurse, an old Southern colored ‘mammy’ who alwayswent about with me. She died about the time the Civil War broke out.”
There was no light on the matter here. Miss Camilla relapsed again into puzzled silence, which the girls hesitated to intrude upon by so much as a single word, lest Miss Camilla should consider that they were prying into her past history.
“Wait a moment!” she suddenly exclaimed, sitting up very straight and wiping her glasses again in great excitement. “I believe I have the explanation.” She looked about at her audience a minute, hesitantly. “I shall have to ask you girls please to keep what I am going to tell you entirely to yourselves. Few if any have ever known of it, and, though it would do no harm now, I have other reasons for not wishing it discussed publicly. Since you have discovered what you have, however, I feel it only right that you should know.”
“You may rely on us, Miss Camilla,” said Doris, speaking for them both, “to keep anything you may tell us a strict secret.”
“Thank you,” replied their hostess. “I feelsure of it. Well, I learned the fact, very early in my girlhood, that my father and also my brother, who was several years older than I, were both very strict and enthusiastic abolitionists. While slavery was still a national institution in this country, they were firm advocates of the freedom of the colored people. And, so earnest were they in the cause, that they became members of the great ‘Underground Railway’ system.”
“What was that?” interrupted both girls at a breath.
“Did you never hear of it?” exclaimed Miss Camilla in surprise. “Why, it was a great secret system of assisting runaway slaves from the Southern States to escape from their bondage and get to Canada where they could no longer be considered any one’s property. There were many people in all the Northern States, who, believing in freedom for the slaves, joined this secret league, and in their houses runaways would be sheltered, hidden and quietly passed on to the next house of refuge, or ‘station,’ as they were called, till at lengththe fugitives had passed the boundary of the country. It was, however, a severe legal offense to be caught assisting these fugitives, and the penalty was heavy fines and often imprisonment. But that did not daunt those whose hearts were in the cause. And so very secret was the whole organization that few were ever detected in it.
“It was in a rather singular way that I discovered my father to be concerned in this matter. I happened to be at home here, and came downstairs one morning, rather earlier than usual, to find our kitchen filled with a number of strange colored folk, in various stages of rags and hunger and evident excitement. I was a girl of ten or eleven at the time. Rushing to my father’s study, I demanded an explanation of the strange spectacle. He took me aside and explained the situation to me, acknowledging that he was concerned in the ‘Underground Railway’ and warning me to maintain the utmost secrecy in the matter or it would imperil his safety.
“When I returned to the kitchen, to my astonishment,the whole crowd had mysteriously disappeared, though I had not been gone fifteen minutes. And I could not learn from any one a satisfactory explanation of their lightning disappearance. I should certainly have seen them, had they gone away above ground. I believe now that the cave and tunnel must have been the means of secreting them, and I haven’t a doubt that my father and brother had had it constructed for that very purpose. A runaway, or even a number of them, could evidently be kept in the cave several days and then spirited away at night, probably by way of the river and some vessel out at sea that could take them straight to New York or even to Canada itself. Yes, it is all as clear as daylight to me now.”
“But how do you suppose they were able to build the cave and tunnel and bring all the wood from the wreck on the beach without being discovered?” questioned Sally.
“That probably was not so difficult then as it would seem now,” answered Miss Camilla. “To begin with, there were not so many peopleliving about here then, and so there was less danger of being discovered. If my father and brother could manage to get men enough to help and a number of teams of oxen or horses such as he had, they could have brought the wreckage from the beach here, over what must then have been a very lonely and deserted road, without much danger of discovery. If it happened that at the time they were sheltering a number of escaped slaves, it would have been no difficult matter to press them into assisting on dark nights when they could be so well concealed. Yes, I think that was undoubtedly the situation.”
They all sat quietly for a moment, thinking it over. Miss Camilla’s solution of the cave and tunnel mystery was clear beyond all doubting, and it seemed as if there was nothing further for them to wonder about. Suddenly, however, Sally leaned forward eagerly.
“But did we tell you about the strange piece of paper we found under the old mattress, Miss Camilla? I’ve really forgotten what we did say.”
Miss Camilla looked perplexed. “Why, no. I don’t remember your mentioning it. Everything was so confused, at first, that I’ve forgotten it if you did. What about a piece of paper?”
“Here is a copy of what was on it,” said Sally. “We never take the real piece away from where we first found it, but we made this copy. Perhaps you can tell what it all means.” She handed the paper to Miss Camilla, who stared at it for several moments in blank bewilderment. Then she shook her head.
“I can’t make anything of it at all,” she acknowledged. “It must have been something left there by one of the fugitives. I don’t believe it concerns me at all.” She handed the paper back, but as she did so, a sudden idea occurred to Doris.
“Mightn’t it have been some secret directions to the slaves left there for them by your father or brother?” she suggested. “Maybe it was to tell them where to go next, or something like that.”
“I think it very unlikely,” said Miss Camilla.“Most of them could neither read nor write, and they would hardly have understood an explanation so complex. No, it must be something else. I wonder—” She stopped short and stood thinking intently a moment while her visitors watched her anxiously. A pained and troubled expression had crept into her usually peaceful face, and she seemed to be reviewing memories that caused her sorrow.
“Can you get the original paper for me?” she suddenly exclaimed in great excitement. “Now—at once? I have just thought of something.”
“I’ll get it!” cried Sally, and she was out of the house in an instant, flying swift-footed over the ground that separated them from the entrance of the cave by the river. While she was gone Miss Camilla sat silent, inwardly reviewing her painful memories.
In ten minutes Sally was back, breathless, with the precious, rusty tin box clasped in her hand. Opening it, she gave the contents to Miss Camilla, who stared at it for three long minutes in silence.
When she looked up her eyes were tragic. But she only said very quietly:
“It is my brother’s writing!”
“WHATdo you make of it all, Sally?”
The two girls were sitting in the pine grove on the heights of Slipper Point. They sat each with her back against a tree and with the enchanting view of the upper river spread out panoramically before them. Each of them was knitting,—an accomplishment they had both recently acquired.
“I can’t make anything of it at all, and I’ve thought of it day and night ever since,” was Sally’s reply. “It’s three weeks now since the day we came through that tunnel and discovered where it ended. And except what Miss Camilla told us that day, she’s never mentioned a thing about it since.”
“It’s strange, how she stopped short, just after she’d said the writing was her brother’s,” mused Doris. “And then asked us in the next breath not to question her about it any more,and to forgive her silence in the matter because it probably concerned something that was painful to her.”
“Yes, and kept the paper we found in the cave,” went on Sally. “I believe she wanted to study it out and see what she could make of it. If she’s sure it was written by her brother, she will probably be able to puzzle it out better than we would. One thing, I guess, is certain, though. It isn’t any secret directions where to find treasure. All our little hopes about that turned out very differently, didn’t they?”
“Sally, are you glad or sorry we’ve discovered what we did about that cave?” demanded Doris suddenly.
“Oh, glad, of course,” was Sally’s reply. “At first, I was awfully disgusted to think all my plans and hopes about it and finding buried treasure and all that had come to nothing. But, do you know what has made me feel differently about it?” She looked up quickly at Doris.
“No, what?” asked her companion curiously.
“It’s Miss Camilla herself,” answered Sally. “I used to think you were rather silly to be so crazy about her and admire her so much. I’d never thought anything about her and I’d known her ‘most all my life. But since she asked us that day to come and see her as often as we liked and stop at her house whenever we were up this way, and consider her as our friend, I’ve somehow come to feel differently. I’m glad we took her at her word and did it. I don’t think I would have, if it hadn’t been for you. But you’ve insisted on our stopping at her house so frequently, and we’ve become so well acquainted with her that I really think I—I almost—love her.”
It pleased Doris beyond words to hear Sally make this admission. She wanted Sally to appreciate all that was fine and admirable and lovely in Miss Camilla, even if she were poor and lonely and deaf. She felt that the friendship would be good for Sally, and she knew that she herself was profiting by the increased acquaintance with this friend they had so strangely made.
“Wasn’t it nice of her to teach us to knit?” went on Sally. “She said we all ought to be doing it now to help out our soldiers, since the country is at war.”
“She’s taught me lots beside that,” said Doris. “I just love to hear her talk about old potteries and porcelains and that sort of thing. I do believe she knows more about them than even grandfather does. She’s making me crazy to begin a collection myself some day when I’m old enough. She must have had a fine collection once. I do wonder what became of it.”
“Well, I don’t understand much about all that talk,” admitted Sally. “I never saw any porcelains worth while in all my life, except that little thing she has on her mantel. And I don’t see anything to get so crazy about in that. It’s kind of pretty, of course, but why get excited about it? What puzzles me more is why she never has said what became of all her other things.”
“That’s a part of the mystery,” said Doris. “And her brother’s mixed up in it somehow,and perhaps her father. That much I’m sure of. She talks freely enough about everything else except those things, so that must be it. Do you know what I’m almost tempted to think? That her brotherdidcommit some crime, and her father hid him away in the cave to escape from justice, but she couldn’t have known about it, that’s plain. Because she did not know about the cave and tunnel at all till just lately. Perhaps she wondered what became of him. And maybe they sold all her lovely porcelains to make up for what he’d done somehow.”
“Yes,” cried Sally in sudden excitement. “And another idea has just come to me. Maybe that queer paper was a note her brother left for her and she can’t make out how to read it. Did you ever think of that?”
“Why, no!” exclaimed Doris, struck with the new idea. “I never thought of it as anything he might have left forher. Do you remember, she said once they were awfully fond of each other, more even than most brothers and sisters? It would be perfectly natural if hedidwant to leave her a note, if he had to go away and perhaps never come back. And of course he wouldn’t want any one else to understand what it said. Oh, wait!—I have an idea we’ve never thought of before. Why on earth have we been sostupid!—”
She sprang up and began to walk about excitedly, while Sally watched her, consumed with curiosity. At length she could bear the suspense no longer.
“Well, for pity’s sake tell me what you’ve thought of!” she demanded. “I’ll go wild if you keep it to yourself much longer.”
“Where’s that copy?” was all Doris would reply. “I want to study it a moment.” Sally drew it from her pocket and handed it to her, and Doris spent another five minutes regarding it absorbedly.
“It is. It surely is!” she muttered, half to herself. “But how are we ever going to think out how to work it?” At last she turned to the impatient Sally.
“I’m a fool not to have thought of this before, Sally. I read a book once,—I can’t thinkwhat it was now, but it was some detective story,—where there was something just a little like this. Not that it looked like this, but the idea was the same. If it is what I think, it isn’t the note itself at all. The note, if there is one, must be somewhere else. This is only a secretcode, or arrangement of the letters, so that one can read the note by it. Probably the real note is written in such a way that it could never be understood at all without this. Do you understand?”
Sally had indeed grasped the idea and was wildly excited by it.
“Oh, Doris,” she cried admiringly. “You certainlyarea wonder to have thought all this out! It’s ten times as interesting as what we first thought it was. But how do you work this code? I can’t make anything out of it at all.”
“Well, neither can I, I’ll have to admit. But here’s what Ithink. If we could see what that note itself looks like, we could perhaps manage to puzzle out just how this code works.”
“But how are we going to do that?” demanded Doris. “Only Miss Camilla has the note, if thereisanote; and certainly we couldn’t very well ask her to let us see it, especially after what she said to us that day.”
“No, we couldn’t, I suppose,” said Doris, thoughtfully. “And yet—” she hesitated. “I somehow feel perfectly certain that Miss Camilla doesn’t know the meaning of all this yet, hasn’t even guessed what we have, about this paper. She doesn’t act so. Maybe she doesn’t even know thereisa note,—you can’t tell. If she hasn’t guessed, it would be a mercy to tell her, wouldn’t it?”
“Yes, I suppose so,” admitted Sally dubiously. “But I wouldn’t know how to go about it. Would you?”
“I could only try and do my best, and beg her to forgive me if I were intruding,” said Doris. “Yes, I believe she ought to be told. You can’t tell how she may be worrying about all this. She acts awfully worried, seems to me. Not at all like she did when we first knewher. I believe we ought to tell her right now. Call Genevieve and we’ll go over.”
Sally called to Genevieve, who was playing in the boat on the beach below, and that young lady soon came scrambling up the bank. Hand in hand, all three started to the home of Miss Camilla and when they had reached it, found her sitting on her tiny porch knitting in apparently placid content. But, true to Doris’s observation, there were anxious lines in her face that had not been seen a month ago. She greeted them, however, with real pleasure, and with her usual hospitality proffered refreshments, this time in the shape of some early peaches she had gathered only that morning.
But Doris who, with Sally’s consent, had constituted herself spokesman, before accepting the refreshment, began:
“Miss Camilla, I wonder if you’ll forgive us for speaking of something to you? It may seem as if we were intruding, but we really don’t intend to.”
“Why, speak right on,” exclaimed that ladyin surprise. “You are too well-bred to be intrusive, that I know. If you feel you must speak of something to me, I know it is because you think it wise or necessary.”
Much relieved by this assurance, Doris went on, explaining how she had suddenly had a new idea concerning the mysterious paper and detailing what she thought it might be. As she proceeded, a new light of comprehension seemed to creep into the face of Miss Camilla, who had been listening intently.
“So we think it must be a code,—a secret code,—Miss Camilla. And if you happen to have any queer sort of note or communication that you’ve never been able to make out, why this may explain it,” she added.
When she had finished, Miss Camilla sat perfectly still—thinking. She thought so long and so intently that it seemed as if she must have forgotten completely the presence of the three on the porch with her. And after what seemed an interminable period, she did a strange thing. Instead of replying with so much as a word, she got up and went into thehouse, leaving them open-mouthed and wondering.
“Do you suppose she’s angry with us?” whispered Sally. “Do you think we ought to stay?”
“No, I don’t think she’s angry,” replied Doris in a low voice. “I think she’s so—so absorbed that she hardly realizes what she’s doing or that we are here. We’d better stay.”
They stayed. But so long was Miss Camilla gone that even Doris began to doubt the wisdom of remaining any longer.
But presently she came back. Her recently neat dress was grimy and dishevelled. There was a streak of dust across her face and a cobweb lay on her hair. Doris guessed at once that she had been in the old, unused portion of her house. But in her hand she carried something, and resuming her seat, she laid it carefully on her knee. It was a little book about four inches wide and six or seven long, with an old-fashioned brown cover, and it was coated with what seemed to be the dust of years. The two girls gazed at it curiously, and whenMiss Camilla had got her breath, she explained:
“I can never thank you enough for what you have told me today. It throws light on something that has never been clear to me,—something that I have even forgotten for long years. If what you surmise is true, then a mystery that has surrounded my life for more than fifty years will be at last explained. It is strange that the idea did not occur to me when first you girls discovered the cave and the tunnel, but even then it remained unconnected in my mind with—this.” She pointed to the little book in her lap. Then she went on:
“But, now, under the circumstances, I feel that I must explain it all to you, relying still on your discretion and secrecy. For I have come to know that you are both unusually trustworthy young folks. There has been a dark shadow over my life,—a darker shadow than you can perhaps imagine. I told you before of my father’s opinions and leanings during the years preceding the Civil War. When that terrible conflict broke out, he insisted thatI go away to Europe with my aunt and stay there as long as it lasted, providing me with ample funds to do so. I think that he did not believe at first that the struggle would be so long.
“I went with considerable reluctance, but I was accustomed to obeying his wishes implicitly. I was gone two years, and in all that time I received the most loving and affectionate letters constantly, both from him and also my brother. They assured me that everything was well with them. My brother had enlisted at once in the Union Army and had fought through a number of campaigns. My father remained here, but was doing his utmost, so he said, in a private capacity, to further the interests of the country. Altogether, their reports were glowing. And though I was often worried as to the outcome, and apprehensive for my brother’s safety, I spent the two years abroad very happily.
“Then, in May of 1863, my first calamity happened. My aunt died very suddenly and unexpectedly, while we were in Switzerland,and, as we had been alone, it was my sad duty to bring her back to New York. After her funeral, I hurried home here, wondering very much that my father had not come on to be with me, for I had sent him word immediately upon my arrival. My brother, I suspected, was away with the army.
“I was completely astounded and dismayed, on arriving home, at the condition of affairs I found here. To begin with, there were no servants about. Where they had gone, or why they had been dismissed, I could not discover. My father was alone in his study when I arrived, which was rather late in the evening. He was reserved and rather taciturn in his greeting to me, and did not act very much pleased to welcome me back. This grieved me greatly, after my long absence. But I could see that he was worried and preoccupied and in trouble of some kind. I thought that perhaps he had had bad news about my brother Roland, but he assured me that Roland was all right.
“Then I asked him why the house was in such disorder and where the servants were, buthe only begged me not to make inquiries about that matter at present, but to go to my room and make myself as comfortable as I could, and he would explain it all later. I did as he asked me and went to my room. I had been there about an hour, busying myself with unpacking my bag, when there was a hurried knock at my door. I went to open it, and gave a cry of joy, for there stood my brother Roland.
“Instead of greeting me, however, he seized my hand and cried: ‘Father is very ill. He has had some sort of a stroke. Hurry downstairs to him at once. I must leave immediately. I can’t even wait to see how he is. It is imperative!’
“ ‘But, Roland,’ I cried, ‘surely you won’t go leaving Father like this!’ But he only answered, ‘I must. I must! It’s my duty!’ He seized me in his arms and kissed me, and was gone without another word. But before he went, I had seen—a dreadful thing! He was enveloped from head to foot in a long, dark military cape of some kind, reaching almost to his feet. But as he embraced me under thelight of the hall lamp, the cloak was thrown aside for an instant and I had that terrible glimpse. Under the concealing cloak my brother was wearing a uniform ofConfederate gray.
“I almost fainted at the sight, but he was gone before I could utter a word, without probably even knowing that Ihadseen. This, then, was the explanation of the mysterious way they had treated me. They had gone over to the enemy. They were traitors to their country and their faith, and they did not want me to know. For this they had even sent me away out of the country!...
“But I had no time to think about that then. I hurried to my father and found him on the couch in his study, inert in the grip of a paralytic stroke that had deprived him of the use of his limbs and also of coherent speech. I spent the rest of the night trying to make him easier, but the task was difficult. I had no one to send for a doctor and could not leave him to go myself, and of course the nearest doctor was several miles away. There was not evena neighbor who could be called upon for assistance.
“All that night, however, my father tried to tell me something. His speech was almost absolutely incoherent, but several times I caught the sound of words like ‘notebook’ and ‘explain.’ But I could make nothing of it. In the early morning another stroke took him, and he passed away very quietly in my arms.
“I can scarcely bear, even now, to recall the days that followed. After the funeral, I retired very much into myself and saw almost no one. I felt cut off and abandoned by all humanity. I did not know where my brother was, could not even communicate with him about the death of our father. Had he been in the Union Army I would have inquired. But the glimpse I had had that night of his rebel uniform was sufficient to seal my lips forever. There was no one in the village whom I knew well enough to discuss any such matters with, nor any remaining relative with whom I was in sympathy. I could only wait for my brother’s return to solve the mystery.
“But my brother never returned. In all these years I have neither seen him nor heard of him, and I know beyond doubt that he is long since dead. And I have remained here by myself like a hermit, because I feel that the shame of it all has hung about me and enveloped me, and I cannot get away from it. Once, a number of years ago, an old village gossip here, now long since gone, said to me, ‘There was something queer about your father and brother, now wasn’t there, Miss Camilla? I’ve heard tell as how they were “Rebs” on the quiet, during the big war awhile back. Is that so?’ Of course, the chance remark only served to confirm the suspicions in my mind, though I denied it firmly to her when she said it.
“I also found to my amazement, when I went over the house after all was over, that many things I had loved and valued had strangely disappeared. All the family silver, of which we had had a valuable set inherited from Revolutionary forefathers, was gone. Some antique jewelry that I had picked up abroad andprized highly was also missing. But chief of all, my whole collection of precious porcelains and pottery was nowhere to be found. I searched in every conceivable nook and cranny in vain. And at last the disagreeable truth was forced on me that my father and brother had sold or disposed of them, for what ends I could not guess. But it only added to my bitterness to think they could do such a despicable thing without so much as consulting me.
“But now, at last, I come to the notebook. I found it among some papers in my father’s study desk, a while after his death, and I frankly confess I could make nothing of it whatever. It seemed to be filled with figures, added and subtracted, and, as my father had always been rather fond of dabbling with figures and mathematics, I put it down as being some quiet calculations of his own that had no bearing on anything concerning me. I laid it carefully away with his other papers, however, and there it has been, in an old trunk in the attic of the unused part all these years. When you spoke of a ‘secret code,’ however, it suddenlyoccurred to me that the notebook might be concerned in the matter. Here it is.”
She held it out to them and they crowded about her eagerly. But as she laid it open and they examined its pages, a disappointed look crept into Sally’s eyes.
“Why, there’s nothing here butnumbers!” she exclaimed, and it was even so. The first few lines were as follows:
56 + 14 - 63 + 43 + 34 + 54 + 64 + 43 +16 - 52 + 66 + 52 + 15 + 23 - 66 + 24 -15 + 44 + 43 - 43 + 64 + 43 + 24 + 15 -61 + 53 - 36 + 24 + 14 - 51 + 15 + 53 +54 + 43 + 52 + 43 + 43 + 15 - 16 + 66 +52 + 36 + 52 + 15 + 43 + 23 -
56 + 14 - 63 + 43 + 34 + 54 + 64 + 43 +16 - 52 + 66 + 52 + 15 + 23 - 66 + 24 -15 + 44 + 43 - 43 + 64 + 43 + 24 + 15 -61 + 53 - 36 + 24 + 14 - 51 + 15 + 53 +54 + 43 + 52 + 43 + 43 + 15 - 16 + 66 +52 + 36 + 52 + 15 + 43 + 23 -
And all the rest were exactly like them in character.
But Doris, who had been quietly examining it, with a copy of the code in her other hand, suddenly uttered a delighted cry:
“I have it! At least, IthinkI’m on the right track. Just examine this code a moment, Miss Camilla. If you notice, leaving out the line of figures at the top and right of the whole square, the rest is just the letters of
“Why, there’s nothing there but numbers”“Why, there’s nothing there but numbers”
the alphabet and the figures one to nine and another ‘o’ that probably stands for ‘naught.’ There are six squares across and six squares down, and those numbers on the outside are just one to six, only all mixed up. Don’t you see how it could be worked? Suppose one wanted to write the letter ‘t.’ It could be indicated by the number ‘5’ (meaning the square it comes under according to the top line of figures) and ‘1’ (the number according to the side line). Then ‘51’ would stand for letter ‘T,’ wouldn’t it?”
“Great!” interrupted Sally, enthusiastically, who had seen the method even quicker than Miss Camilla. “But suppose it worked the other way, reading the side line first? Then ‘T’ would be ‘15.’ ”
“Of course, that’s true,” admitted Doris. “I suppose there must have been some understanding between those who invented this code about which line to read first. The only way we can discover it is to puzzle it out both ways, and see which makes sense. One will and the other won’t.”
It all seemed as simple as rolling off a log, now that Doris had discovered the explanation. Even Miss Camilla was impressed with the value of the discovery.
“But what is the meaning of these plus and minus signs?” she queried. “I suppose they stand for something.”
“I think that’s easy,” answered Doris. “In looking over it, I see there are a great many more plus than minus signs. Now, I think the plus signs must be intended to divide the numbers in groups of two, so that each group stands for a letter. Otherwise they’d be all hopelessly mixed up. And the minus signs divide the words. And every once in a while, if you notice, there’s a multiplication sign. I imagine those as the periods at the end of sentences.”
They all sat silent a moment after this, marveling at the simplicity of it. But at length Doris suggested:
“Suppose we try to puzzle out a little of it and see if we are really on the right track? Have you a piece of paper and a pencil, MissCamilla?” Miss Camilla went indoors and brought them out, quivering with the excitement of the new discovery.
“Now, let’s see,” began Doris. “Suppose we try reading the top line first. ‘56’ would be ‘1’ and ‘14’ would be ‘2.’ Now ‘12’ may mean a word or it may not. It hardly seems as if a note would begin with that. Let’s try it the other way. Side line first. Then ‘56’ is ‘m,’ and ‘14’ is ‘y.’ ‘My’ is a word, anyway, so perhaps we’re on the right track. Let’s go on.”
From the next series of letters she spelled the word “beloved” and after that “sister.” It was plain beyond all doubting that at last they had stumbled on a wonderful discovery.
But she got no further than the words, “my beloved sister,” for, no sooner had Miss Camilla taken in their meaning than she huddled back in her chair and, very quietly, fainted away.
NONEof the three had ever seen any one unconscious before. Sally stood back, aghast and helpless. Genevieve expressed herself as she usually did in emergencies, with a loud and resounding howl. But Doris rushed into the house, fetched a dipper of cold water and dashed it into Miss Camilla’s face. Then she began to rub her hands and ordered Sally to fan her as hard as she could. The simple expedients worked in a short time, and Miss Camilla came to herself.
“I—I never did such a foolish thing before!” she gasped, when she realized what had happened. “But this is all so—so amazing and startling! It almost seemed like my brother’s own voice, speaking to me from the past.” Again she sat back in her chair and closed her eyes, but this time only to regain her poise.And then Doris did a very tactful thing.
“Miss Camilla,” she began, “we’ve discovered how to read the notebook, and I’m sure you won’t have any trouble with it. I think we had better be getting home now, for it is nearly five o’clock. So we’ll say good-bye for today, and hope you won’t feel faint any more.”
Miss Camilla gave her a grateful glance. Greatly as she wished to be alone with this message left her by a brother whose fate she did not dare to guess, yet she was too courteous to dismiss these two girls who had done so much toward helping her solve the problem. And she was more appreciative of Doris’s thoughtful suggestion of departure than she could have put into words.
“Thank you, dear,” she replied, “and come again tomorrow, all of you. Perhaps I shall have—something to tell you then!”
And with many a backward glance and much waving of hands, they took their departure across the fields.
. . . . . . . .
It was with the wildest impatience that they waited for the following afternoon to obey Miss Camilla’s behest and “come again.” But promptly at two o’clock they were trailing through the pine woods and the meadow that separated it from the Roundtree farmhouse.
“Do you know,” whispered Sally, “crazy as I am to hear all about it, I almost dread it, too. I’m so afraid it may have been bad news for her.”
“I feel just the same,” confided Doris, “and yet I’m bursting with impatience, too. Well, let’s go on and hear the worst. If it’s very bad, she probably won’t want to say much about it.”
But their first sight of Miss Camilla convinced them that the news was not, at least, “very bad.” She sat on the porch as usual, knitting serenely, but there was a new light in her face, a sweet, satisfied tranquillity that had never been there before.
“I’m glad you’ve come!” she greeted them. “I have much to tell you.”
“Was it—was it all right?” faltered Doris.
“It was more than ‘all right,’ ” she replied. “It was wonderful. But I am going to read the whole thing to you. I spent nearly all last night deciphering the letter,—for a letter it was,—and I think it is only right you should hear it, after what you have done for me.” She went inside the house and brought out several large sheets of paper on which she had transcribed the meaning of the mysterious message.
“Listen,” she said. “It is as wonderful as a fairy-tale. And how I have misjudged him!”
“ ‘My beloved sister,’ ” she read, “ ‘in the event of any disaster befalling us, I want you to know the danger and the difficulties of what we have undertaken. It is only right that you should, and I know of no other way to communicate it to you, than by the roundabout means of this military cipher which I am using. You are away in Europe now, and safe, and Father intentionally keeps you there because of the very dangerous enterprise in which weare involved. Lest any untoward thing should befall before your return, we leave this as an explanation.
“ ‘Contrary to any appearances, or anything you may hear said in the future, I am a loyal and devoted soldier of the Union. But I am serving it in the most dangerous capacity imaginable,—as a scout or spy in the Confederate Army, wearing its uniform, serving in its ranks, but in reality spying on every move and action and communicating all its secrets that I am capable of obtaining to the Government and our own commanders. I stand in hourly danger of being discovered—and for that there is but one end. You know what it is. Of course, I am not serving under my own name, so that if you never hear word of my fate, you may know it is the only one possible for those who are serving as I serve.
“ ‘Father is also carrying on the work, but in a slightly different capacity. There are a set of Confederate workers up here secretly engaged in raising funds and planning new campaigns for the South. Father has identifiedhimself with them, and they hold many meetings at our house to discuss plans and information. Apparently he is hand in glove with them, but in reality is all the while disclosing their plans to the Government. They could doubtless kill him without scruple, if they suspected it, and get away to the safety of their own lines unscathed, before anything was discovered. So you see, he also stands hourly on the brink of death.
“ ‘For two years we have carried on this work unharmed, but I suppose it cannot go on forever. Some day my disguise will be penetrated, and all will be over with me. Some day Father will meet with some violent end when he is alone and unprotected, and no one will be found to answer for the deed. But it will all be for the glory of the Union we delight to serve. Now do you understand the situation?
“ ‘I do not get home here often, and never except for the purpose of conveying some message that will best be sent to headquarters through this channel. My field of service is with the armies south of the Potomac. Butwhile I am here now, Father and I have consulted as to the best way of communicating this news to you and have decided on this means. We cannot tell how soon our end may come. Father tells me there are rumors about here that we are serving the Confederate side. Should you return unexpectedly and find us gone, and perhaps hear those rumors, you would certainly be justified in putting the worst construction on our actions.
“ ‘So we have decided to write and leave you this message. It will be left carelessly among Father’s papers, and without the cipher will, of course, be unreadable by any one. But we have not yet decided in what place to conceal the cipher where there is no danger of its being discovered. That is a military secret and, if it were disclosed, would be fatal and far-reaching in its consequences.’ ”
Miss Camilla stopped there, and her spellbound listeners drew a long breath.
“Isn’t it wonderful!” breathed Doris. “And they were loyal and devoted to the Unionall the time. How happy you must be, Miss Camilla.”
“I am happy,—beyond words!” she replied. “But that is not quite all of it. So far, it was evidently written at one sitting, calmly and coherently. There is a little more, but it is hasty and confused, and somewhat puzzling. It must have been added at another time, and I suspect now, probably just at the time of my return. There is a blank half-page, and then it goes on:
“ ‘In a great hurry. Most vital and urgent business has brought me back to see Father. Just learned you were here. There is grave, terrible danger. The rebels are invading. I am with them, of course. Not far away. Must return tonight, at once, to lines, if I ever get there alive. Have a task before me that will undoubtedly see the end of me. In this rig and in this place am open to danger from friend and foe alike. But there is no time to change. Hope for best. Forgive haste but there is not a moment to lose. Father seems illand unlike himself. He saw two or three Confederate spies at the house today. Always suspect something is wrong after such a meeting. Don’t be surprised at state of the house. Unavoidable but all right. Father will explain where I have hidden this cipher code. Always your loving brother,
“ ‘Roland.’
“And there is one more strange line,” ended Miss Camilla. “It is this:
“ ‘In case you should forget, or Father doesn’t tell you, right hand side from house, behind 27.’ ”
“That is all!” She folded up the paper and sat looking away over the meadow, as did the others, in the awed silence that followed naturally the receipt of this message of one whose fate could be only too well guessed.
“And he never came back?” half-whispered Doris, at last.
“No, he never came back,” answered Miss Camilla softly. “I haven’t a doubt but thathe met the fate he so surely predicted. I have been thinking back and reading back over the events of that period, and I can pretty well reconstruct what must have happened. It was in the month of June of 1863, when Lee suddenly invaded Pennsylvania. From that time until his defeat at Gettysburg, there was the greatest panic all through this region, and every one was certain that it spelt ruin for the entire North, especially Pennsylvania and New Jersey. I suppose my brother was with his army and had made his way over home here to get or communicate news. How he came or went, I cannot imagine, and never shall know. But I can easily see how his fate would be certain were he seen by any of the Federal authorities in a Confederate uniform. Probably no explanation would save him, with many of them. For that was the risk run by every scout, to be the prey of friend and foe alike, unless he could get hold of the highest authority in time. He doubtless lies in an unknown grave, either in this state or in Pennsylvania.”
“But—your father?” hesitated Sally. “Do you—do you think anything queer—happened to him?”
“That I shall never know either,” answered Miss Camilla. “His symptoms looked to me like apoplexy, at the time. Now that I think it over, they might possibly have been caused by some slow and subtle poison having a gradually paralyzing effect. You see, my brother says he had seen some of the Confederate spies that day. Perhaps they had begun to suspect him, and had taken this means to get him out of the way. I cannot tell. As I could not get a doctor at the time, the village doctor, who had known us all our lives, took my word for it next day that it was apoplexy. But, whatever it may have been, I know that they both died in the service of the country they loved, and that is enough for me. It has removed the burden of many years of grief and shame from my shoulders. I can once more lift up my head among my fellow-countrymen!”
And Miss Camilla did actually radiate happiness with her whole attractive personality.
“But I cannot make any meaning out of that queer last line,” mused Sally after a time. “Will you read it to us again, Miss Camilla, please?”
And Miss Camilla repeated the odd message,—“ ‘In case you should forget, or Father does not tell you, right hand side from house, behind twenty-seven.’ ”
“Now what in the world can that all mean?” she demanded. “At first I thought perhaps it might mean where they had hidden the code, but that couldn’t be because we found that under the old mattress in the cave. Your brother probably went out that way that night and left it there on the way.”
“Wait a minute,” suddenly interrupted Doris. “Do you remember just before the end he says, ‘do not be surprised at the state of the house. Unavoidable but all right.’ Now what could he mean bythat? Do you know what I think? I believe he was apologizing because things seemed so upset and—and many of the valuable things were missing, as Miss Camilla said. If there was such excitementabout, and fear of Lee’s invasion, why isn’t it possible that theyhidthose valuable things somewhere, so they would be safe, whatever happened, and this was to tell her, without speaking too plainly, that it was all right? The brother thought his father would explain, but in case he didn’t, or it was forgotten, he gave the clue where to find them.”
Miss Camilla sat forward in renewed excitement, her eye-glasses brushed awry. “Why, of course! Of course! I’ve never thought of it. Not once since I read this letter. The other was so much more important. But naturally that is what they must have done,—hidden them to keep them safe. They never, never would have disposed of them in any other way or for any other reason. But where in the world can that place be? ‘Right hand side from the house behind 27’ means nothing at all—to me!”
“Well, it does tome!” suddenly exclaimed Sally, the natural-born treasure-hunter of them all. “Where elsecouldthey hide anything so safely as in that cave or tunnel? Nobodywould ever suspect in the world. And I somehow don’t think it meant the cave. I believe it means somewhere in the tunnel, on the right hand side as you enter from the cellar.”
“But what about 27?” demanded Miss Camilla. “That doesn’t seem to mean anything, does it?”
“No, of course it doesn’t mean anything to you, because you haven’t been through the tunnel, and wouldn’t know. But every once in a while, along the sides, are planks from that old vessel, put there to keep the sides more firm, I guess. There must be seventy-five or a hundred on each side. Now I believe it means that if we look behind the twenty-seventh one from the cellar entrance, on the right hand side, we’ll find the—the things hidden there.”
Then Miss Camilla rose, the light of younger days shining adventurously in her eyes.
“If that’s the case, we’ll go and dig them out tomorrow!” she announced gaily.
IThad been a very dull day indeed for Genevieve. Had she been able to communicate her feelings adequately, she would have said she was heartily sick and tired of the program she had been obliged to follow. As she sat solitary on the porch of Miss Camilla’s tiny abode, thumb in mouth and tugging at the lock of hair with her other hand, she thought it all over resentfully.
Why should she be commanded to sit here all by herself, in a spot that offered no attractions whatever, told, nay,commandednot to move from the location, when she was bored beyond expression by the entire proceeding? True, they had left her eatables in generous quantities, but she had already disposed of these, and as for the picture-books of manyattractive descriptions, given her to while away the weary hours, they were an old story now, and the afternoon was growing late. She longed to go down to the shore and play in the rowboat, and dabble her bare toes in the water, and indulge in the eternally fascinating experiment of catching crabs with a piece of meat tied to a string and her father’s old crab-net. What was the use of living when one was doomed to drag out a wonderful afternoon on a tiny, hopelessly uninteresting porch out in the backwoods? Existence was nothing but a burden.
True, the morning had not been without its pleasant moments. They had rowed up the river to their usual landing-place, a trip she always enjoyed, though it had been somewhat marred by the fear that she might be again compelled to burrow into the earth like a mole, forsaking the glory of sunshine and sparkling water for the dismal dampness of that unspeakable hole in the ground. But, to her immense relief, this sacrifice was not required of her. Instead, they had made at once through thewoods and across the fields to Miss Camilla’s, albeit burdened with many strange and, to her mind, useless tools and other impedimenta.
Miss Camilla’s house offered attractions not a few, chiefly in the way of unlimited cookies and other eatables. But her enjoyment of the cookies was tempered by the fact that the whole party suddenly took it into their heads to proceed to the cellar and, what was even worse, to attempt again the loathsome undertaking of scrambling through the narrow place in the wall and the journey beyond. She herself accompanied them as far as the cellar, but further than that she refused to budge. So they left her in the cellar with a candle and a seat conveniently near a barrel of apples.
It amazed her, moreover, that a person of Miss Camilla’s years and sense should engage in this foolish escapade. She had learned to expect nothing better of Sally and “Dowis,” but that Miss Camilla herself should descend enthusiastically to so senseless a performance, caused her somewhat of a shock. She had not expected it of Miss Camilla.
It transpired, however, that they did not proceed far into the tunnel. She could hear them talking and exclaiming excitedly, and discussing whether “this was really twenty-seven,” and “hadn’t we better count again,” and “shall we saw it out,” and other equally pointless remarks of a similar nature. Wearying of listening to such idle chatter, and replete with cookies and russet apples, she had finally put her head down on the edge of the barrel and had fallen fast asleep.
When she had awakened, it was to find them all back in the cellar, and Miss Camilla making the pleasant announcement that “they would have luncheon now and get to work in earnest afterward.” A soul-satisfying interval followed, the only really bright spot in the day for Genevieve. But gloom had settled down upon her once more when they had risen from the table. Solemnly they had taken her on their laps (at least Miss Camilla had!) and ominously Sally had warned her:
“Now, Genevieve, we’ve got something awfully important to do this afternoon. Youdon’t like to go down in that dark place, so we’ve decided not to take you with us. You’d rather stay up here in the sunshine, wouldn’t you?” And she had nodded vigorously an unqualified assent to that proposition. “Well, then,” Sally had continued, “you stay right on this porch or in the sitting-room, and don’t you dare venture a foot away from it. Will you promise?” Again Genevieve had nodded. “Nothing will hurt you if you mind what we say, and by and by we’ll come back and show you something awfully nice.” Genevieve had seriously doubted the possibility of this latter statement, but she was helpless in their hands.
“And here’s plenty of cookies and a glass of jam,” Miss Camilla had supplemented, “and we’ll come back to you soon, you blessed baby!” Then they had all hugged and kissed her and departed.
Well, they had not kept their word. She had heard the little clock in the room within, strike and strike and strike, sometimes just one bell-like tone, sometimes two and three and four. She could not yet “tell the time” butshe knew enough about a clock to realize that this indicated the passing of the moments. And still there had been no sign of return on the part of the exploring three.
Genevieve whimpered a little and wiped her eyes, sad to say, on her sleeve. Then she thrust her hand, for the fortieth time into the cooky-jar. But it was empty. And then, in sheer boredom and despair, she put her head down on the arm of her chair, tucked her thumb into her mouth and closed her eyes to shut out the tiresome scene before her. In this position she had remained what seemed a long, long time, and the clock had sounded another bell-like stroke, when she was suddenly aroused by a sound quite different.
At first she did not give it much thought, but it came again louder this time, and she sat up with a jerk. Was some one calling her? It was a strange, muffled sound, and it seemed as if it were like a voice trying to pronounce her name.
“Genev—! Genev—!” That was all she could distinguish. Did they want her, possiblyto go down into the horrible cellar and hole? She went to the door giving on the cellar steps and listened. But, though she stood there fully five minutes, she heard not so much as a breath. No, it could not be that. She would go out doors again.
But, no sooner had she stepped onto the porch than she heard it again, fainter this time, but undeniable. Wherecouldit come from? They had commanded her not to venture a step from the porch but surely, if they were calling her she ought to try and find them. So she stepped down from the veranda and ran around to the back of the house. This time she was rewarded. The sound came clearer and more forcefully:
“Genevieve!—Genev—ieve!” But where, still, could it come from? There was not a soul in sight. The garden (for it was Miss Camilla’s vegetable garden) was absolutely deserted of human occupation. But Genevieve wisely decided to follow the sound, so she began to pick her way gingerly between the rows of beans, climbing on quite a forest oftall poles. It was when she had passed these that she came upon something that caused her a veritable shock.
The ground in Miss Camilla’s cucumber patch, for the space of ten or twelve feet square, had sunk down into a strange hole, as if in a sudden earthquake. What did it all mean? And, as Genevieve hesitated on its brink, she was startled almost out of her little shoes to hear her name called faintly and in a muffled voice from its depths.
“Genev—ieve!” It was the voice of Doris, though she could see not the slightest vestige of her.
“Here I am!” answered Genevieve quaveringly. “What do you want, Dowis?”
“Oh, thank God!” came the reply. “Go get—some one. Quick. We’re—buried alive! It—caved in. Hurry—baby!”
“Who s’all I get?” demanded Genevieve. And well she might ask, for as far as any one knew, there was not a soul within a mile of them.
“Oh—I don’t—know!” came the answeringvoice. “Go find—some one. Any one. We’ll die—here—if you—don’t!” Genevieve was not sure she knew just what that last remark meant, but it evidently indicated something serious.
“All right!” she responded. “I will twy!” And she trotted off to the front of the house.
Here, however, she stopped to consider. Wherewasshe to go to find any one? She could not go back home,—she did not know the way. She could not go back to the river,—the way was full of pitfalls in the shape of thorny vines that scratched her face and tripped her feet, and besides, Sally had particularly warned her not to venture in that direction—ever. After all, the most likely place to find any one was surely along the road, for she had, very rarely when sitting on Miss Camilla’s porch, observed a wagon driven past. She would walk along the road and see if she could find anybody.
Had Genevieve been older and with a little more understanding, she would have comprehended the desperate plight that had befallenher sister and Doris and Miss Camilla. And she would have lent wings to her feet and scurried to the nearest dwelling as fast as those feet would carry her. But she was scarcely more than a baby. The situation, though peculiar, did not strike her as so much a matter for haste as for patient waiting till the person required should happen along. As she didn’t see any one approaching in either direction, she decided to return to the house and keep a strict eye on the road.
And so she returned, seated herself on the porch steps, tucked her thumb in her mouth—and waited. There was no further calling from the curious hole in the back garden and nothing happened for a long, long time. Genevieve had just about decided to go back and inquire of Doris what else to do, when suddenly the afternoon stillness was broken by the “chug-chug” of a motor car and the honking of its horn. And before Genevieve could jump to her feet, a big automobile had come plowing down the sandy road and stopped right in front of the gate.
“Here’s the place!” called out the chauffeur, and jumping down, walked around to open the door at the side for its occupants to get out. A pleasant-looking man descended and gave his hand to the lady beside him. And, to Genevieve’s great astonishment, the lady proved to be none other than the mother of “Dowis.”
“Well, where’s every one?” inquired the gentleman. “I don’t see a soul but this wee tot sitting on the steps.”
“Why, there’s Genevieve!” cried Mrs. Craig, who had seen the baby many times before. “How are you, dear? Where are the others? Inside?”
“No,” answered Genevieve. “In de garden. Dowis she said come. Find some one.”
“Oh, they’re in the garden, are they? Well, we’ll go around there and give them a surprise, Henry. Doris will simply be bowled over to see her ‘daddy’ here so unexpectedly! And I’m very anxious to meet this Miss Camilla she has talked so much about. Come and show us the way, Genevieve.”
The baby obediently took her hand and led her around to the back of the house, the gentleman following.
“But I don’t see any one here!” he exclaimed when they had reached the back. “Aren’t you mistaken, honey?” This to Genevieve.
“No, they in big hole,” she announced gravely. The remark aroused considerable surprise and amused curiosity.
“Well, lead us to the ‘big hole,’ ” commanded Mrs. Craig laughingly. “Big hole, indeed! I’ve been wondering what in the world Doris was up to lately, but I never dreamed she was excavating!”
Genevieve still gravely led the way through the forest of bean-poles to the edge of the newly sunk depression.
“What’s all this?” suddenly demanded Mr. Craig. “It looks as if there had been a landslide here. Where are the others, little girl? They’ve probably forsaken this and gone elsewhere.”
But Genevieve was not to be moved from her original statement. “They in dere!” sheinsisted, pointing downward. “Dowis called. She say ‘Go find some one.’ ” The baby’s persistence was not to be questioned.
Mr. Craig looked grave and his wife grew pale and frightened. “Oh, Henry, what do you suppose can be the matter?” she quavered. “I do believe Genevieve is telling the truth.”
“There’s something mighty queer about it,” he answered hastily. “I can’t understand how in the world it has come about, but if that child is right, there’s been a landslide or a cave-in of some sort here and Doris and the rest are caught in it. Good heavens! If that’s so, we can’t act too quickly!” and he ran round to the front of the house shouting to the chauffeur, who had remained in the car:
“There’s been an accident. Drive like mad to the nearest house and get men and ropes and spades,—anything to help dig out some people from a cave-in!” The car had shot down the road almost before he had ceased speaking, and he hurried back to the garden.
The next hour was a period of indescribablesuspense and terror to all concerned,—all, at least, save Genevieve, who sat placidly on Mrs. Craig’s lap (Mr. Craig had brought out a chair from Miss Camilla’s kitchen) and, thumb in mouth, watched the men furiously hurling the soil in great shovelfuls from the curious “hole.” She could not understand why Mrs. Craig should sob softly, at intervals, under her breath, nor why the strange gentleman should pace back and forth so restlessly and give such sharp, hurried orders. And when he jumped into the hole, with a startled exclamation, and seized the end of a heavy plank, she wondered at the unnecessary excitement.
It took the united efforts of every man present to move that plank, and when they had forced it aside, Mr. Craig stooped down with a smothered cry.
And the next thing Genevieve knew, they had lifted out some one and laid her on the ground, inert, lifeless and so covered with dirt and sand as to be scarcely recognizable. But from the light, golden hair, Genevieve knew it to be Doris. Before she knew where she was,Genevieve found herself cascaded from Mrs. Craig’s lap, and that lady bending distractedly over the prostrate form.
Again the men emerged from the pit, carrying between them another form which they laid beside Doris. And, with a howl of anguish, Genevieve recognized the red-bronze pig-tail of her sister, Sally.
By the time Miss Camilla had been extricated from the débris as lifeless and inert as the other two, the chauffeur had returned at mad speed from the village, bringing with him a doctor and many strange appliances for resuscitation. A pulmotor was put into immediate action, and another period of heartbreaking suspense ensued.
It was Doris who first moaned her way back to life and at the physician’s orders was carried back into the house for further ministrations. Sally was the next to show signs of recovery, but over poor Miss Camilla they had to work hard and long, for, in addition to having been almost smothered, her foot had been caught by the falling plank and badly injured. Butshe came back to consciousness at last, and her first words on opening her eyes were:
“Do you think we can get that Spode dinner-set out all right?” A remark which greatly bewildered Mr. Craig, who happened to be the only one to hear it!
. . . . . . . .
“But how on earth did you and Mother happen to be there, Father, just in the nick of time?” marveled Doris from the depths of several pillows with which she was propped up in bed.
She had been detailing to her parents, at great length, the whole story of Sally and the cave and the tunnel and Miss Camilla and the hazardous treasure-hunt that had ended her adventure. And now it was her turn to be enlightened.
“Well,” returned her father, smiling whimsically, “it was a good deal like what they call ‘the long arm of coincidence’ in story-books, and yet it was very simple, after all! I’d been disappointed so many times in my plans to get down here to see you and your mother, and atlast the chance came, the other day, when I could make at least a flying trip, but I hadn’t even time to let you know I was coming. I arrived at the hotel about lunch-time and gave your mother the surprise of her life by walking in on her unexpectedly. But I was quite disgusted not to find you anywhere about. Your mother told me how you had gone off for the day with your bosom pal, Sally, to visit a mysterious Miss Camilla, and I suggested that we take the car and go to hunt you up. As she was agreeable to the excursion we started forth, inquiring our way as we went. It was a merciful providence that got us there not a moment too soon, and if it hadn’t been for that little cherubic Genevieve we would have been many minutes too late. If it hadn’t been that two or three old planks had been bent over you and protected you from the worst of the earth and débris on top, and also gave you a slight space for air, I don’t believe any of you would have been alive now to tell the tale! So the next time you go treasure-hunting, young lady, kindly allow your useless and insignificant dadto accompany you!” And he gave her ear a playful tweak.
“Daddy, it was awful,—simply awful when that old plank gave way and the earth came sliding down on us!” she confided to him, snuggling down in the arm he had placed around her. “At first we didn’t think it would amount to much. But more and more earth came pouring down and then another plank loosened and Miss Camilla lost her footing and fell, and we couldn’t make our way out past it, either direction, and still the dirt poured in all around us, and Sally and I tried to struggle up through the top, but we couldn’t make any progress. And at last that third plank bent over and shut us in so we couldn’t budge, and Sally and Miss Camilla didn’t answer when I spoke to them, and I knew they’d fainted, and I felt as if I was going to faint too. But I called and called Genevieve and at last she answered me. And after that I didn’t remember anything more!” She shuddered and hid her face in her father’s sleeve. It had been a very horrible experience.
“Don’t think of it any more, honey. It turned out all right, in the end. Do you know that Sally is around as well as ever, now, and came up to the hotel to inquire for you this morning? She’s as strong as a little ox, that child!”
“But where is Miss Camilla?” suddenly inquired Doris. “She hurt her foot, didn’t she?”
“She certainly did, but she insisted on remaining in her own home, and Sally begged her mother to be allowed to stay also with the un-detachable Genevieve, of course, and take care of her and wait on her. So there they are, and there you will proceed in the automobile, this afternoon, if you feel well enough to make the visit.”
“But what about the treasure?” demanded Doris, her eyes beginning to sparkle.
“If you refer to the trunks and chests full of articles that Miss Camilla insisted that we continue to excavate from that interesting hole in her garden, you do well to speak of it as ‘treasure’!” answered her father laughingly.“For beside some valuable old family silver and quite rare articles of antique jewelry, she had there a collection of china and porcelain that would send a specialist on that subject into an absolute spasm of joy. I really would not care to predict what it would be worth to any one interested in the subject.
“And you can tell your friend, Sally, of the adventurous spirit, that she’s got ‘Treasure Island’ licked a mile (to use a very inelegant expression) and right here on her own native territory, too. I take off my hat to you both. You’ve done better than a couple of boys who have been playing at and hunting for pirates all their youthful days. Henceforth, when I yearn for blood-curdling adventures and hair-breadth escapes, I’ll come to you two to lead the way!”