“Stopped a great hole. It’s stopped still; I can put my hand down, and you feel nothing but wood.”
“Could you get the hole open, Wyn? Was it a hole that things could be hidden in?”
“I suppose so. Whatever is the matter, Florrie? You look downright scared!”
The hole was wide and shallow. Wyn took the knife with which he had meant to cut the honeysuckle, scraped and cut, and, the soft decayed wood giving way, the piece of putty yielded to his pull and came out.
“There’s a hole, but I can’t feel the bottom of it,” he said.
“Put in my sunshade; feel with the hook.”
“My stars, Florrie, there’ll be nothing alive in there!” said Wyn; but, boy like, to fish in a hole with a hook was delightful to him. “There’s—there’s something down at the bottom. I can just reach. It’s hard—it’s loose. Hi! I’ve got it; it’s coming up. Oh, my eyes! Oh, my stars! It’s—it’s diamonds!”
“It’s them!” cried Florence, clasping her hands as a long band of flashing stones came up into the sunlight on the hook of her parasol, and Wyn tumbled right out of the tree in his amazement, dropping his treasure-trove most appropriately at the feet of Lady Carleton, who, unseen by Wyn and Florence, had come up, and was watching them under the tree.
“Found!” she exclaimed; “found at last!”