“How do you know that?” I asked.
“Why, it seems as if he had hidden it under the fireplace, for there’s a hole under it which would hold the box I’ve found down here; and that they who took it went off in a hurry—maybe saw a sail, and left him and the money behind.”
“Well, where is this money? Come along and let us see it.”
“Why, down in the biggest of them huts there, in a box tied up with cord; but it’s rotted, and the money tumbled out at the sides.”
“There was the box, tied together with string.” [Page 76].
We at once got over the fence, which we could easily see had been built to keep the pigs within bounds, and followed Bill to where there were standing the remains of some huts, which, as he said, had been cleared of what would give any clue as to who the occupants had been; but there, under one of the bed-places, was the box, as Seaman had described it, wrapped up in a piece of sail-cloth, tied together with island-made string, and the coverings being more than half rotten, the contents had burst out, and partly rolled, on the ground.
Curious, though the money was safe, and I am sure a roast sucking pig would have been of much more use to us than all the gold that ever was coined, it was to this money we first turned our attention, and agreed that nothing should be done until it was safely stowed away—money that had lain for years untouched and uncared for.