“We may as well look into the Cap’n’s room, an’ get it done with,” she said. “It’s only nat’ral as I should want to know if I’m goin’ to get the money back I’ve spent on your keepin’.”
“Very well,” said I.
She went to a drawer of a tall bureau and drew out a small ivory box. Within this I knew were the keys belonging to my father. Never before had Mrs. Ranck dared to meddle with them, for the Captain had always forbidden her and everyone else to enter his room during his absence. Even now, when he was dead, it seemed like disobedience of his wishes for the woman to seize the keys and march over to the door of the sacred room. In a moment she had turned the lock and thrown open the door.
Shy and half startled at our presumption, I approached and peered over her shoulder. Occasionally, indeed, I had had a glimpse of the interior of this little place, half chamber and half office; and, once or twice, when a little child, I had entered it to seek my father. Now, as I glanced within, it seemed to be in perfect order; but it struck me as more bare and unfurnished than I had ever seen it before. Father must have secretly removed many of the boxes that used to line the walls, for they were all gone except his big sea-chest.
The sight of the chest, however, reassured me, for it was in this that he had told me to look for my fortune, in case anything should happen to him.
The old woman at once walked over to the chest, and taking a smaller key from the ivory box, fitted it to the lock and threw back the lid with a bang.
“There’s your fortune!” she said, with a sneer; “see if you can find it.”
I bent over the chest, gazing eagerly into its depths. There was an old Bible in one end, and a broken compass in the other. But that was all.
Standing at one side, the woman looked into my astonished face and laughed mockingly.
“This was another o’ the Cap’n’s lies,” she said. “He lied to you about ownin’ the house; he lied to you about takin’ me out o’ charity; an’ he lied to you about the fortune in this chest. An easy liar was Cap’n Steele, I must say!”