“They won’t kill Job Seal, you can bet your sea-boots on that,” remarked the skipper with a grin upon his great furrowed face.
But my mind was running upon the tragedy at Kilburn, and I was trying to devise some means by which we might denounce the whole gang, and hand them over to the police.
There was, alas! one fact which would ever prevent us taking such an action. If we boldly charged them with murder, Dorothy must be implicated. To arrest them would mean arrest for her. She had acted as decoy, and could not deny it!
So I was compelled to abandon all hope in that direction. By sheer force we would be compelled to combat this quartette of unscrupulous adventurers, and to that end we awaited their coming.
So thoroughly and carefully had we examined every hole and corner of the house that all three of us were beginning to despair of ever discovering the hidden hoard. In an old-fashioned mansion of that character there were a thousand and one places where gold might be stored. In chimneys, under stairs, beneath the flags of the big, vaulted cellars, behind the large, open fireplaces—some of which still had their quaint iron dogs of ancient days—all these places we had investigated in vain. Not a single room was there but bore traces of our chisels, picks and crowbars. The result of our search consisted in two or three copper coins, an old letter dated in 1796, a skeleton with rings upon the fingers, an old leathern mug, and two or three articles not worth enumeration.
We were sorely disappointed. We could not conceal from ourselves the bare fact that at any rate in the Manor House the treasure of Bartholomew da Schorno was non-existent, and, furthermore, we feared that some one in generations past had been before us and secured it in secret.
Nevertheless, the careful and ingenious actions of our enemies in order to gain entry into the place puzzled us. From what my love had told me, they were evidently in possession of some information of which we were in ignorance—information which made it plain that, after all, the treasure was actually there.
They meant mischief; we had no doubt about that. But, being forewarned, we calmly awaited their coming, Seal chuckling to himself at the reception they would receive.
The church clock struck midnight. We had moved into the room from which the secret way opened, and, Reilly having produced a pack of cards, we played nap in under-tones, our weapons lying at hand in case of need.
Now and then—indeed, after every game—one or other of us rose and listened within the secret chamber for the approach of the invaders. One o’clock passed, two o’clock, yet no sound save the familiar thumping and squealing of the rats and the dismal howling of the wind in the wide, old-fashioned chimney.