“The ignition was bad, and the water that I shipped made things worse. I was tinkering away at it and had almost got it to working right, when that big wave came aboard and carried me over the side. I can just remember its hitting me, and after 29 that everything was blank until I came to my senses on the deck of the boat.”
“I’ve seen that motor boat of yours cruising up and down the coast a good deal this last year or so,” remarked Lester. “You seem to be pretty fond of the water.”
The stranger shot a swift glance at the last speaker, as if he thought some hidden meaning might lurk behind the words.
“Yes,” he said, “I’m never happier than when I’m out on the open sea. Some of my ancestors must have been sailors I guess, and I have it in the blood. But that isn’t the only reason I’ve been cruising along this coast.”
“What is the reason then?” asked Teddy curiously. “That is,” he went on hastily, “if you care to tell us. We don’t want to pry into your affairs.”
The other seemed to debate with himself. It was as if a habit of secrecy were battling with a sudden desire for expression.
“I’ll tell you,” he burst out. “It’s a thing I’ve never told any one else. But you fellows have been so white to me, to say nothing of one of you having risked his life for mine, that I’m going to take a chance. Perhaps it will be a relief anyway. Brooding over it so long and not confiding in any one, I’ve been afraid some time I might go crazy over it.”
The boys were startled, but they gave no sign and the speaker went on:
30“My name is Ross Montgomery. I’m looking for a chest of gold.”
The effect was electric. The thrilling phrase appealed to all that was most romantic in the listeners. Visions floated before their eyes of hidden treasures, of pirate hoards, of sunken galleons with their doubloons and “pieces of eight.” These things had seemed to belong to the misty past, to distant seas. Yet here in the prosaic twentieth century, in a civilized country, on a quiet beach along the coast of Maine, this boy of their own age was talking of a quest that might well stir the most sluggish blood.