“It’s certainly a woman’s trunk,” exclaimed Tom, “a big cypress chest.”
“Must have belonged to this same Madame Ducroix,” suggested Hal.
“Then, it wasn’t buried intentionally,” declared Bob. “I’ll bet there was a shipwreck. Like as not Marie Ducroix was on her way to Europe from New Orleans. This box must have been washed up here by the sea. The ship may be out yonder beyond the Keys.”
The possessions of Marie Ducroix came to light in two layers. The bottom of the box was filled with discolored and rotted garments, not one of which was worth preservation, although all gave signs of one-time richness. These included silk dresses, gossamer shawls and veils, silk slippers and hose, dainty handkerchiefs (all enclosed in what had been tissue paper until the dampness had resolved it into a gray coating) and a package of laces, a few inches of which now and then showed the pattern.
On top of these, were other articles, each covered with a thin shell of dissolved paper:
A hand beaten silver sugar urn and a tall hot-milk pitcher of the same material; a silver coffee pot with a rotted ebony handle; a long handled silver dipper (the handle eighteen inches long); two dozen each of small silver coffee and dessert spoons; one dozen each of silver fruit knives with ivory handles and forks. Each of these pieces was marked with an engraved “D”.
Packed carefully in what had been a pasteboard box, were thirty crystal pendants, and in fairly well preserved linen cloth, a crystal and silver epergne and a crystal compote or fruit dish. The latter was broken. Alongside these articles was a thin Malacca cane with a gold head, marked “J. D”.
But beneath these articles, came the prize that set each youngster on edge—gold money—the only real valuable that a boy wants to dig out of the sand. Secreted in a corner of the chest, was a small leather bag, heavy as lead and intact.
“Here she is!” yelled Mac, as his greedy fingers fell on this article. “If it ain’t gold, I’m a goat.”
With one stroke of a knife, the leather thong tied about the mouth of the sack was cut away and out on the sand, rolled the jingling climax of the great discovery—nearly a thousand dollars in yellow gold coins. Silks and laces might crumble into dust; silver might coat itself with a leaden pall, but the royal metal had held its sunny sheen through its long entombment. Not until Pensacola was reached again, did the club members know just what they had found, but in time the values were set down as: