“Having looked through a hempen collar by the way,” said Gervase. “Let me tell you, Captain Macpherson, it needs cool courage to look the hangman in the face.”
“And the rogues would have hanged you? I had not thought of that. But in truth I did not think of you at all. ´Twas the brave wench that I feared for; she that stood up before me in the oak wood, and with the look in her eyes that I never saw in a woman before--told me she trusted me. ´Twas like the handshake of a comrade before the battle. She hath a fearless spirit, and a heavy burden, I doubt not, with the doited old man on her hands, and I know not what trouble besides.”
“That burden has been taken away,” Gervase said soberly, “We buried him the next morning, hard by where you left him.”
“You do not mean they murdered him?”
“No, not that; the loss of the treasure broke his heart, and hardly had you left him when he was dead.”
Macpherson rose to his feet, his two hands resting on the back of his chair, and a look on his face as of one stricken by a great fear.
“You are jesting with me.”
“In truth, it is no matter for jest. Hardly had you gone than he gave a great cry and fell dead. The loss of what he loved better than life was more than he could bear, and he never moved again after he fell. Then the troopers came up, and had it not been that a gallant gentleman proved my friend, I should not have been here to tell you the tale.”
“I knew there was a curse on it,” said Macpherson. “A curse on it in his hands, and a curse on it in mine. A day and a night I carried it with me and all the while I felt like one pursued by a legion of spirits clamouring for a man´s soul. I could not rest; I could not sleep; and I felt that in the end it must drive me mad. As I lay through the night in the bramble by the river-side, as God is my witness, I could see through the lid the glint of the gold and the shimmer of the precious stones, and I, who never feared before, quaked like a schoolboy at the birch rod. I prayed for light, but I could find no comfort. Then I rose up with my load, for the girl had placed her trust in me, and come what might I was minded that she should find me faithful. A while after, I had some fighting to do which raised my spirits a little and let out some unwholesome blood. But I have come in empty-handed after all, and have but a pitiful story to tell for one who boasted so bravely of his skill and discretion.”
“And the treasure?”