“Trouble? There wasn’t any trouble!” laughed Ned.
“We’ve had a lot of fun out of it,” added Harry. “But maybe, after all, there won’t be any treasure.”
“No treasure! What do you mean?” cried Hiram.
“Well, that fellow Rod, or whatever his name was—going off in such a hurry with that hook-armed man—they may have found out where the stuff was buried and have dug it up ahead of you. Their going off in such a hurry and secretly in the night looks bad.”
“No, I don’t believe so,” spoke Bob. “Rod had an idea where the treasure was, I’ll say that, though how he got the hint is more than I can figure out. He just must have reasoned that Hank would bury it somewhere on his own premises, and the bramble patch looked like a good place to hide gold.”
“He made up a good story about it—wanting to plant monkey nuts!” laughed Harry.
“He sure did,” agreed Bob. “He had me fooled for a time. And when I saw Jolly Bill digging for worms, I thought he was on the right track. Though it didn’t seem reasonable to suppose that Hank would bury the stuff on Mr. Beegle’s land.”
Thus talking and speculating on the mystery, they reached the pasture lot spoken of as the buttercup pasture. But the field was now sear and brown, the buttercups of summer long since having died.
They had brought with them spades and shovels, and also a tape line. This was necessary to measure off the distance from the red gate post.
“But is there a red post?” asked Harry, as they approached the lot. “I don’t seem to remember one.”