“Stop! Stop! Don’t do that!” These words were on her lips. She did not say them. Something appeared to hold her back.
A moment more and she was glad they had not been spoken, for after one powerful swing of the pick, a dark spot had appeared beneath the stump.
“A cavity!” she whispered breathlessly. “A hollow place beneath the stump.”
Then, like a flash it came to her. This tree had not grown there. The stump had been hauled there, probably on a stone-boat, for the purpose of concealing something. But what did it conceal?
Fascinated, the girl continued to stare as the woman picked untiringly at the base of the great stump. When at last the Russian woman seized a stout pole, and using it as a pry, tipped the stump on its side to uncover a broad, deep cavity, the girl’s curiosity got the better of her and she ran into the yard to exclaim:
“Madam! Madam! What are you doing?”
“See!” On the woman’s face was a glorious smile. “See! All my beautiful things! All safe after these long years.”
Florence did see and her astonishment grew. The great copper kettle was there and the seven golden—well, perhaps they were only gold plated—candlesticks, and many other things as well. A curious old copper teakettle, a set of beautiful blue dishes which, by instinct, the girl knew were very old and valuable, and many other things were there.
Slowly, carefully, they removed each piece. Then, quite overcome with emotion, the aged woman sat down upon the ground.
“This,” she said after a long silence, pointing a thumb at the hole in the ground, “was our cellar. The ground is always frozen there. It keeps everything cool, everything. Ivan, my husband, hauled down the stump to make a place for my flowers. When we left we said, ‘We will hide everything in the cellar,’ it was a secret cellar, no one knew. ‘Then we will put on the stump. No one will guess.’”