“No,” said the skipper, not wanting to have the smack searched.
“Take a look through his clothes for a weapon,” the man with the pistol said to his companion.
No weapon was found. The man in the motor-boat came aboard, and two of the men went into the smack’s cabin, while the third guarded the skipper.
When the two returned from the cabin some time later, one of them went to the rail and shouted and waved his handkerchief toward shore. And presently Cotterell and Tom, David and Ben rowed out in the smack’s boat.
In the cabin were the hats and cloaks and the other things that Tom and Lanky had seen in the shack at the cove. Sampson set out at once in the motor-boat for Barmouth, and before the sun had touched the tops of the trees the four men on the beach and the skipper were in custody of the police, charged with having stolen certain valuables from the Gables.
“Well,” said Cotterell, when he and his guests were again on the island, “my treasure is still secure from the rebels, thanks to you,” and he bowed to the campers.
“Oh, is your famous dinner-set really in that chest?” asked Miss Penelope Boothby. She went to the chest and looked at its contents. “Why, it’s only clothes and bric-a-brac! There’s no silverware there.”
“No,” said Cotterell, smiling. “That is not my silver plate. I keep it better hid than that.”
“Oh, do let us dine off it to-night,” begged Miss Boothby. “I should dearly love to see it.”
Cotterell looked perplexed. “Why, I should like you to,” he answered. Then he glanced at the sun. “But the party waits. And it was my intention to dance a minuet on the lawn before my house while it was daylight. Come, friends, come along with me.”