“After cutting our boat loose, they came ashore to prepare a meal and eat it. It was this feast that Jeanne’s bear interrupted. They fled.”
“And all this,” said Petite Jeanne, coming out from among pillows in a dark corner, “goes to prove that we owe a most humble apology to my beloved Green Eyes and to her friends of the Erie cottage. We suspected you of pranks which were quite impossible for you to perform.” She spoke the last to Miss Erie.
“Oh, that’s quite all right!” The rich girl’s tone was friendly. “We do not expect to be entirely understood. We were taught by my father when we were very young that to take advantage of others because of wealth or power is the act of a coward. That there are such rich cowards, one can’t deny. We hope they are very few.”
Jeanne beamed her thanks for this speech. “But, Florence!” she cried suddenly. “This does not explain the green eyes I saw in the deserted lumber camp that night.”
“You must work out your own solution for that.” Again Florence smiled. “Some wild creature was hiding there, or you were having a case of nerves. Our gypsy friend knew a surprising lot. She did not know everything. No more could she tell what caused the fire on Gamblers’ Island.”
“But—but the rubies!” exclaimed Miss Erie, as the story seemed about to end.
“That,” said Florence, true to Jeanne’s dramatic conception, “is to be the last touch. According to our gypsy friend’s story the three rubies are supposed to have been hidden in some secret pocket of this ancient trunk, and there they should be still.”
“The trunk!” “The trunk!” “Trunk!” came from the lips of Tillie, the lady cop and the Erie girl all at once.
“We will now proceed to find out.” Florence’s voice took on a business-like tone. “Jeanne, a blanket. We’ll dump these balsam tips in it and tie up the corners.”
When the trunk seemed empty, all crowded around.