When Bob left the hotel, he found Jerry Blossom anxiously pacing before the entrance awaiting him. The colored boy was so full of remarkable incidents and marvelous adventures that it was with difficulty that the white boy calmed him into a clear account of the cruise.
The Three Sisters had made a safe voyage to the island, which it reached early Tuesday morning. After a half day’s reconnoitering, it had found a sheltered bay on the land side of the north key, and there, in a grove of cabbage palmettoes, a landing had been made and a camp located.
The camp was immediately marked by stripping a tall palmetto and attaching to its barren summit, the schooner’s flag. The camp outfit having been disembarked, all had worked on the camp site during the day, and, leaving Mac in command, Captain Joe and Jerry had sailed for Tampa the next morning. On their way to the wharf and the schooner, Bob, in the midst of Jerry’s grandiloquent account of the beauties of Anclote Island, said to the colored boy:
“Well, Jerry, did you find it? Locate your buried treasure trees yet?”
“Look hyah, Mistah Bob,” answered Jerry, with sudden alarm, “yo’ know what Ah done gone an’ done? Ah’s had a piece o’ mighty bad luck. Ah cain’t fine mah papah no mo’.”
“You don’t mean to say you’ve lost the directions for finding ole Black Pirate’s treasure box?” asked Bob in pretended alarm.
“No, sah, Mistah Bob. Ah ain’t los’ it. Ah’s too keerful o’ dat writin’ to los’ it. No, sah, not me. Somepin done come in de night an’ tooken dat paper. Yas, sah. I ain’t los’ it.”
“Can’t you remember what you wrote?” asked Bob threateningly.
“Sure, I kin, mostly. But not prezactly. Pears to me now like it didn’t say no island at all. Mebbe if Ah has time to recomembah, Ah kin—”
“Look here, Jerry,” exclaimed Bob vigorously. “If you don’t recall those directions and take me where old Black Pirate told you he buried all his gold and silver and diamonds, you’re goin’ to walk back home—or swim. You’re lyin’ to me, Jerry.”