Glad to escape the whip with which the overseer constantly threatened him while he was talking, Julius lost no time in making his way to the great house; but he did not go near Mrs. Gray till she summoned him into her presence to ask him if he had been in her room that day. Of course he hadn't been upstairs at all, not even to "tote up de wash-watah, kase dat was de gals' work and not his'n."
"I never heard that mother lost a breastpin," said Marcy, when Jack had got this far with his narrative. "Did she find it again? Did Hanson give it up?"
Instead of replying in words, Jack took hold of a small cord that encircled his neck, and pulled his ditty-bag from beneath the bosom of his flannel shirt. This he opened with great deliberation, taking from it a small vial and a package wrapped in a piece of newspaper.
"What have those things to do with mother's breastpin?" demanded Marcy.
"What's in that bottle?"
"That vial contains my charm; and a most potent one it is," said the sailor gravely.
"If you don't quit your nonsense and come to the point, I will leave you and go into the house," said Marcy angrily.
"I'll bet you won't. This thing is getting interesting now, and it will not be long before it will be more so," answered Jack. "Look at that!"
He had been unwrapping the newspaper while he was talking, and Marcy was struck dumb with astonishment when he saw him bring the lost breastpin to light.
"Jack," he faltered, "where did you get it?"
"The charm brought it. Hold on, now," exclaimed Jack, when his brother turned away with an ejaculation indicative of the greatest annoyance and vexation. "It helped bring it, and a little common sense, backed by an insight into darkey nature, did the rest. Now, don't break in on me any more. Mother will begin to wonder what's keeping us."