It was lucky for Nat that the storekeeper had come in there without a light, for the way these words were spoken fairly took his breath away. This was something that he had not bargained for. He settled back on his box trying to find something to lean against, and could not say anything to save his life.
“What do you say to that, my boy?” asked the man. “You did not know that we could find that money without asking you, did you?”
“Where—where did you find it?” stammered Nat, suppressing his excitement, and it was all he could do to utter the words.
“Oh, we found it under a tree where the old man had left it,” said the storekeeper, carelessly. “I tell you he must have gone down deep, for we dug a trench there that was as deep as we were.”
Nat straightened up again and drew a long breath. If the storekeeper told the truth, he had not yet found the money. He had not dug in the place where it was concealed in the first instance, because he did not say anything about the stone which needed a lever to pry it out of its bed.
“Well, you have done more than I could do,” said he, after thinking a moment. “You have the money—How much did you get?”
“Oh, about fifteen or twenty thousand dollars,” replied the man. “We were in such a hurry that we didn’t stop to count it. But we have enough to keep us without work as long as we live.”
“Now what is to hinder you from turning me loose?” asked Nat “I can’t do you any more good by staying here.”
“I forgot to speak about that to my pardner,” said the man, who was taken all aback by this proposition. “And he has gone away and I shan’t see him for a week.”
“And are you going to keep me here all that time?”