“The people moved about away from danger, and I could see they were shocked at my foolhardiness. But the Conjure Man was too adroit.
“‘Brother Jenkins,’ he said, in a pitying tone, ‘I have the greatest ambiguity for you—I really has. You will be given a while for acceleration, and if you don’t submit to the tergiversation of the spheroids, you will be struck dead—next year.’
“At the dreadful malediction the brothers shuddered, and looked appealingly at me. I saw they firmly believed it was directly due to Doctor Jones’ magnanimity that the witches didn’t come sailing down on their broomsticks instantly and bear me away. The incident strengthened the humbug’s influence with them.”
Obeying the Lure of Buried Treasure.
Searching for Pirate Lafitte’s buried treasure has been one of the industries of Abbeville, La., for the past twenty-five years, perhaps longer. Parties come at intervals, each claiming to have a sure “tip” as to the location, and each returns empty-handed. But others do not learn from their experience. The lure of gold does not listen to reason.
These periodical searches are based upon the existence of supposed charts—one of which was drawn by the pirate himself, and two others by one Felton, said to be his secretary. The whereabouts of the original is not known, nor is it known that there ever was one, this being only the supposition of “Joe the Cattleman.” As to the other two, they are in existence and are signed by “Felton, Secretary.”
For several weeks a party of treasure hunters have been digging and surveying on “Outer Island” in White Lake, down in Vermillion Parish, for the supposed buried treasure. The party is composed of J.F. Stratton, capitalist, and M. Pearson, civil engineer, both of Houston, Texas, and others whose names are kept in the background. The Stratton-Pearson party have what they claim is a map of White Lake, but it is worn and the lines are indistinct. They dredged on a line which was supposed to mark the channel of a creek, and there, across the channel, they found the rotted timbers of an old vessel. They reason that Lafitte buried the gold on “Outer Island,” sunk the boat across a channel to blockade searchers, and in a little boat steered his course into Southwest Pass, and thence in to the Gulf of Mexico.
This rotted hulk furnished a “clew,” and the gold could not be far off, Engineer Pearson reasoned. It must be on the near-by Outer Island. He took longitudes and latitudes from a giant oak. From the rings on its trunk he estimated it was about five hundred years old. Perhaps, he reasoned, Lafitte would select this as the best landmark. He sank steel rods into the earth to a depth of six and eight feet, but struck nothing harder than dirt. After burrowing on every side, he changed his prospecting to another large tree, two hundred feet farther inland.
Pearson cut away the grass, and his hopes were somewhat shattered when he discovered at the base of this tree the outlines of a trench. The lines were traced to a length of twelve feet, and four feet in width. He excavated to a depth of four feet, when his shovel struck a few pieces of brick. The excavation continued until the entire trench was scooped out. Nothing was found but dirt. However, Pearson still believed he was on the right trail.
He returned to his camp, and next day went to the mainland and hunted up “Joe,” a cattle driver, who had lived in that section half a century. Joe stated that about seventeen years ago, while driving his cattle in the marsh for grass, he saw where some men were digging. In about a week he returned and the hole was six feet deep, and the men were gone. He did not know who they were, nor whence they came, but thought that they were Frenchmen “from a long distance,” and that they had Lafitte’s map—one made by Lafitte himself. Whether or not they got the money, he could not say.