66“He must have, if the smugglers really came this way,” answered Lester. “That was only about nine years ago, you remember Ross said, and the lighthouse has stood for twenty years.”
“Has your father had charge of it all that time?” asked Bill.
“No, he was appointed about twelve years ago.”
“Then he must have been here at the time the gold was stolen,” said Teddy eagerly. “I wonder if he heard anything about the matter.”
“I never heard him speak about it, but I shouldn’t be a bit surprised if he had. There are so many old salts that run over to spin yarns with him, that there’s very little sea gossip going around that he doesn’t hear at one time or another.”
“Let’s ask him,” suggested Bill.
“Surely we will. He may be able to tell us something that Ross himself doesn’t know.”
“In that case, the next time we meet Ross it will be our turn to look wise and mysterious,” laughed Fred.
“Or we can bargain with him. We’ll tell him what we know in return for what he was going to tell us but didn’t,” added his brother.
“We’ll have to come to something like that sooner or later,” said Lester decidedly. “It’s all nonsense our going round blindly, when each might be able to help the other. A sick man ought to tell everything to his doctor, and a prisoner oughtn’t to keep 67 anything back from his lawyer. When he does, he has no one to blame but himself if things don’t go right. I’m going to put it up to Ross, full and plain, the next time I see him.”