“Not very likely, as you say, shipmate. No, not likely. Jevon Murch would never be bammed by a simple little dodge like that, would he? So he don’t believe in it?”
“No, he don’t,” answered Pomfrett, wondering what the old rogue might mean by this persistency.
“Why, then, if he don’t—and I reckon he don’t—that’s a good thing for you and me, shipmate,” Dawkins went on, with great deliberation. “And why, says you? Why is this same old Dawkins, this poor old broken-down forsaken buccaneer on his beam-ends, a-talking like this here? That’s what you’re a-thinking, shipmate, at this blessed minute. Has he took leave of his senses, owing to hunger and disapp’intment, and the blessed sun, or what not, you’re asking of yourself.” Dawkins paused in this singular adjuration, his little eyes glowing under his penthouse brows, took a step forward, laid his hand on Pomfrett’s breast, and spoke low. “It’s true,” says he. “The bottle’s true. So far as I know, mind ye, that is. So far as I know, and I’ll swear it on the Book. I didn’t find that there same bottle, nor that message, mind ye, but I found another bottle and another message, and then I lost ’em ashore in a island port. Drunk, I reckon. But not before I’d a-learned the writing by heart. Gamaliel wrote it out from what I rec’lected, so he did, and Gamaliel, he supplied the bottle. And Gamaliel, he thought it was all a bam. But,” said Mr Dawkins, with indescribable emphasis, “it ain’t!”
He fell back a step, and Pomfrett stood regarding him with amazement.
“Now, by your leave, commander, we’ll lay that pretty little ship o’ yours for Catoche Bay on the coast of Yucatan—all as we was, commander, all as we was at the start, and on the way home, too,” Dawkins ended.
And so we did. But the ship had to be provisioned for the long voyage to England; and, taking advantage of the safe anchorage and the traffic of the friendly Indians, we spent a week in Caratasca Lagoon, getting wood, water, and victuals. After all, there was no hurry. Murch had sailed for England by this time, in all likelihood; his course lay north and east of the islands, while ours lay west and north of them; and we might consider ourselves secure from Murch, who, moreover, was doubtless glad to be rid of us. But, with him went Morgan Leroux; and although the agent, in reward of his fidelity, saw a chance of retrieving a great part of his owners’ losses, he went about heavy-eyed and silent. He was never quiet, working doggedly all day at this and that; nor did he sleep much. He would walk about the camp, along the shore and back again, or, if he were on shipboard, up and down the deck at night; then he would sit down where he was and fall asleep for a little while; and then he would wake again, and again take to his restless wandering. But when we were fairly at sea his melancholy lightened a little, and when we dropped anchor in Catoche Bay, on a fine night of moonlight, he nearly forgot his woes. The glimmering surf ran about us in a half-circle, thundering upon a zone of silver beach; on either hand rose tall cliffs, all black and silver in the moonlight, and beyond, the familiar dark barrier of forest, rising upon dim hills. Here, then, was the haven we had come so far to find. On one side of the bay the forest was cleft in a black notch; a few pines straggled thence upon the beach, bordering a gleam of running water. “At a point on nothe mainland Yucatan two leagues due south from the hed of Catoche Bay, having the red rocke where the stream flows out in line with the extreemest projection of cliffe on west horn of bay.” Dawkins had the marks by heart, as he had said. Now, the crew had been told nothing of the matter; no one aboard knew of the treasure save Dawkins and Pomfrett and I; so that, if by any evil chance we found ourselves deceived, there would be the less discontent.
We three, then, had a boat ashore at dawn, with a cargo of empty water-barrels, which were to be filled. This made the ostensible object of our landing. There were the marks, sure enough,—a square lump of red, glistening rock standing alone on the stony beach; and, aligning the rock with the extreme point of the west horn of the bay, we took bearings, and found the line to run nearly due south. Leaving the men to fill the barrels, the three explorers struck through the forest. Dawkins trotted forward like a hound on the trail, panting and pounding, his big face shining with sweat, a humming cloud of flies hovering about him and clustering unheeded in patches upon his skin. There was a curious fixed purpose in his face; he kept glancing at us, where we ran on either side of him, with little, quick, ugly glances; and I could not but remember that, were we out of the way, the whole of the prize would fall to Mr Dawkins. He carried a brace of pistols and a sword; but so did we, though it’s true we were no great hands at the use of these weapons. We had travelled thus, with scarce a word spoken, for about a couple of leagues, when the little river, running in a deep gorge, curved to meet us; and there we were, in a grove of acajou trees, as the message had described.
“‘The felled tree,’” quoted Dawkins, “‘bridging the stream between two groves of acajou trees.’” And there it was; we could see a piece of the trunk, as we hurried forward through the trees. I’ll not deny that, in the few moments during which we traversed the grove, the agent, and I suppose myself, betrayed as much excitement as Dawkins. This elusive hoard of silver, this will-o’-the-wisp treasure, for which we had come so far and suffered so much—did it lie under our hand at last? The next moment we pulled up short, as though struck by a bullet, and stood staring and dismayed.
XVII
The Luck is Fairly Out
It was not much we saw: only a litter of white, fresh chips, pieces of bark, and the new-cut butt end of the felled tree, facing us; but a thunderbolt crashing at our feet would not have stunned the party more effectually. That tree had been felled by white men’s axes but a few days since; so much we perceived at the first glance; the next, showed us a small object standing upright on the middle of the great trunk, giving back the strong sunlight with a glitter that dazzled the eye. Dawkins, with an incoherent mutter of speech, in which we could distinguish the word “Murch,” pointed towards it. The hand he lifted held a pistol, whose muzzle wavered in the air. What was Mr Dawkins doing with a pistol? The other hand held a pistol, too; he had drawn them from his sash as he ran. His eyes were fixed in his head, his jaw was a little dropped, the veins in his neck stood out like cords, and his face was of a purplish colour. The next moment he fell forward on his face and lay motionless. The poor old buccaneer was stricken with a fit. We opened a vein in his huge arm with the point of a clasp-knife, and presently his eyelids fluttered and he seemed to revive. So, having bound up the wound, we took away his pistols—for fear of accidents—propped him up, and turned to business.