"Here," he said, plucking a dead grass stem and tracing the Causeway on the map, "here lie my lots—including, as you see, the spot marked by Valdez with a Maltese cross.... I'm sorry; but how in the world could you have made your mistake?"
He turned to glance at the girl and saw her amazement and misunderstood it.
"It's too bad," he added, feeling profoundly sorry for her.
"Do you know," she said in a voice quivering with emotion, "that a very terrible thing has happened to us?"
"To us?"[283]
"To both of us. I—we—oh, please look at my map! It is—it is different from yours!"
With nervous fingers she opened the book, spread out the map, and held it under his horrified eyes.
"Do you see!" she exclaimed. "According to this map, my lots include the Maltese cross of Valdez! I—I—p-please excuse me——" She turned abruptly and entered her tent; but he had caught the glimmer of sudden tears in her eyes and had seen the pitiful lips trembling.
On his own account he was sufficiently scared; now it flashed upon him that this plucky young thing had probably spent her last penny on the chance that Bangs had told the truth about "The Journal of Pedro Valdez."
That the two maps differed was a staggering blow to him; and his knees seemed rather weak at the moment, so he sat down on his unpacked tent and dropped his face in his palms.