BY LIEUT. NOEL SAINSBURY, JR.
Chapter I
THE FIRST FIND
“You and I, Bill,” said Osceola, “are on top of the world and throwing rocks at rainbows!” The young Seminole chief, stooping quickly, picked something out of the short grass at the side of the Bolton driveway. “A couple of months ago I was a slave in a cypress swamp without a dollar to my name. Now I stumble over them!”
“That’s queer,” said Bill, staring at the silver disk in his friend’s hand. “It’s one of those cartwheels they hurl at you out west instead of dollar bills.”
“Nobody,” declared Osceola, “ever hurled dollar bills at me!”
“I mean,” said Bill, “it’s queer finding one here. Wake up—don’t let this new-found wealth cramp your usual technic. You’re in New Canaan, Connecticut, now—not far away on the western pl—”
“There’s something queerer than that about this cartwheel—look!”
Bill took the extended silver piece and examined it. The coin seemed genuine enough. Minted in 1897, the head of Liberty was portrayed on one side and backed by the well-known National Bird, who flaunted a streamer of E Pluribus Unum in his beak. But this particular silver dollar was no longer good as “coin of the realm.” Across Liberty’s face a pair of spread wings was cut deep into the metal, while the American eagle was defaced by two numerals, 1 and 3.
“Somebody’s pocket-piece, don’t you think?” suggested Osceola.
Bill nodded. “That design and the numerals are diecut. Those wings over poor old Liberty’s pan look like an aviator’s device.”