“Thousands of dollars worth,” Jimmie whispered. “If those men knew where we were at this moment!”
“But they don’t. Thank God for that!” Mary sighed.
“Listen!” Jimmie whispered. “What’s that?”
A low, strange sound had reached his ears. For a full minute they stood at breathless attention. Then, as the sound, much nearer and louder now burst on their ears, they laughed.
“Some old hoot-owl talking to his mate in the night,” Jimmie murmured. After that for sometime there was silence.
Through the cracks in John’s stove lids the light of the fire gleamed cheerily. From time to time the dry wood popped and crackled. Other than these, no light, no sound disturbed the night. And the moments, waiting there as Jimmie did for the next move in this strange drama, were long.
“We’ll bury them,” said John, rousing at last. “Bury them out under the pines.”
It took no great stretch of imagination on Jimmie’s part to know that he spoke of the diamonds.
Emptying his sugar bowl, John poured the handful of sparkling gems into it, replaced the lid, then led the way into the night.
Without a light and with only the owl as a witness, they buried the bowl beneath a tree, and, after carefully rearranging the fallen pine-needles, stole silently back into the hideout.