To the lawyer's question I could only reply that I had often seen the box and had once caught a glimpse of the interior, that it was full of papers, and I had noticed it must have contained some money, for I saw my mother take some gold pieces from a heavy leather bag that she had afterwards replaced.
"Never mind; we will solve it all," continued the man of law, "so soon as we get there. I have the keys. Come, doctor, press ahead!"
The horses lurched forward into a trot—we had now reached the top of the hill—and tired and sleepy, I leaned back on my kind friend's shoulder and fell asleep.
When I awakened the sun was high, but the chill was yet in the air, and a damp breeze had sprung up from the eastward that presaged rain. Aloft against the heavy clouds a V-shaped line of wild-geese were winging their way to the south; their coarse honking fell down to us. The sound caused me to look upward, and I followed the steady flight. I have always been well versed in the signs of nature, and there is nothing so sure to judge by as the flight of wild-fowl.
"We are going to have cold weather," I remarked to the doctor.
"Yes, the old gander is setting a pace for them as if the snow were after him," he replied.
To my surprise, as I gazed about near to hand, I saw that we were almost at the cross-roads, where it was our intention to stop and procure something to eat, as we had had nothing since the gray of morning.
Two or three new houses had been added to the group that lined the road-side, and a new sign-post waved its arms at the corner. A number of negroes hurried out and took the horses.
As we entered the low-ceilinged front room of the tavern I overheard the talk that the doctor and lawyer were having together. "It was certainly most careless to leave such property unguarded," the latter was saying. This made me listen.
"But no one would suspect anything in the way of treasure, and they are honest people hereabouts," returned the doctor reassuringly.