“Dark face, ugly eyes!” Florence recalled Jeanne’s description of the man who had hounded her footsteps.
“But I fooled him!” Meg chuckled. “I fooled him twice. And I laughed in his face, too.”
Rising, she pressed a second button in the wall to reveal still another secret compartment. “See that!” She pointed to a black packet. “That was his. It’s mine now.
“I wonder why he put it where he did?” she mused.
“Where?”
“In Snowball’s net.”
“What?”
“That’s just what he did. I was sitting alone among the rocks at night. He came out, acting mysterious. He poured two buckets of water on Snowball’s windlass so it wouldn’t creak and then he threw this package into the net and lowered away.
“It is heavy. Went right to the bottom. I slipped into the water and went after it. Got it, too. See! There it is!
“And do you know,” her voice fell to an excited whisper, “that’s to be my birthday present to myself. It’s to be my surprise.”