"There's a loose piece of flooring here, Mr Pamphlett. New, by the looks of it."
There was a sound of boards being shaken and thrown together in a heap.
"Queer old cache here below. . . . Steady, now . . . wait till I turn my bull's-eye on it! Lucky I brought the lantern, too!"
"You dare!" screamed Nicky-Nan, rushing to pull him backward by the collar.
The constable, his head in the bowels of the hiding-place, neither heard him nor saw Mr Pamphlett and Builder Gilbert interpose to hold Nicky-Nan back.
"But 'tis empty," announced Policeman Rat-it-all.
"Empty?"
EMPTY?
Nicky-Nan, bursting from the two men, gripped Rat-it-all by the collar, flung him back on the floor, snatched his bull's-eye, and diving as a rabbit into its burrow, plunged the lantern's ray into the gulf.
Rat-it-all had spoken truth. The treasure—every coin of it—had vanished!