Chapter I: Engage the Enemy (4)

Perhaps because of the secret excitement under which I was laboring, I seemed that evening unusually aware of the emotional fluctuations of those about me. Violet looked grimmer than ever, so that I judged her struggles with her mundane consciousness to have been exceptionally severe. Captain Magnus seemed even beyond his wont restless, loose-jointed and wandering-eyed, and performed extraordinary feats of sword-swallowing. Mr. Shaw was very silent, and his forehead knitted now and then into a reflective frown. As for myself, I had much ado to hide my abstraction, and turned cold from head to foot with alarm when I heard my own voice addressing Crusoe as Benjy.

A faint ripple of surprise passed round the table.

"Named your dog over again, Miss Jinny?" inquired Mr. Tubbs. Mr. Tubbs had adopted a facetiously paternal manner toward me. I knew in anticipation of the moment when he would invite me to call him Uncle Ham.

"I say, you know," expostulated Cuthbert Vane, "I thought Crusoe rather a nice name. Never heard of any chap named Benjy that lived on an island."

"When I was a little girl, Virginia," remarked Aunt Jane, with the air of immense age and wisdom which she occasionally assumed, "my grandmother--your great-grandmother, of course, my love--would never allow me to name my dolls a second time. She did not approve of changeableness. And I am sure it must be partly due to your great-grandmother's teaching that I always know my own mind directly about everything. She was quite a remarkable woman, and very firm. Firmness has been considered a family trait with us. When her husband died--your great-grandfather, you know, dear--she rose above her grief and made him take some very disagreeable medicine to the very last, long after the doctors had given up hope. As some relation or other said, I think your Great-Aunt Susan's father-in-law, anybody else would have allowed poor John Harding to die in peace, but trust Eliza to be firm to the end."

Under cover of this bit of family history I tried to rally from my confusion, but I knew my cheeks were burning. Looks of deepening surprise greeted the scarlet emblems of discomfiture that I hung out.

"By heck, bet there's a feller at home named Benjy!" cackled Mr. Tubbs shrilly, and for once I blessed him.

Aunt Jane turned upon him her round innocent eyes.

"Oh, no, Mr. Tubbs," she assured him, "I don't think a single one of them was named Benjy!"

The laughter which followed this gave me time to get myself in hand again.

"Crusoe it is and will be," I asserted. "Like Great-Grandmother Harding, I don't approve of changeableness. It happens that a girl I know at home has a dog named Benjy." Which happened fortunately to be true, for otherwise I should have been obliged to invent it. But the girl is a cat, and the dog a miserable little high-bred something, all shivers and no hair. I should never have thought of him in the same breath with Crusoe.

That evening Mr. Shaw addressed the gathering at the camp-fire--which we made small and bright, and then sat well away from because of the heat--and in a few words gave it as his opinion that any further search in the cave under the point was useless. (If he had known the strange confirmatory echo which this awoke in my mind!) He proposed that the shore of the island to a reasonable distance on either side of the bay-entrance should be surveyed, with a view to discover whether some other cave did not exist which would answer the description given by the dying Hopperdown as well as that first explored.

Mr. Shaw's words were addressed to the ladies, the organizer and financier, respectively, of the expedition, to the very deliberate exclusion of Mr. Tubbs. But he might as well have made up his mind to recognize the triumvirate. Enthroned on a camp-chair sat Aunt Jane, like a little goddess of the Dollar Sign, and on one hand Mr. Tubbs smiled blandly, and on the other Violet gloomed. You saw that in secret council Mr. Shaw's announcement had been foreseen and deliberated upon.

Mr. Tubbs, who understood very well the role of power behind the throne, left it to Violet to reply. And Miss Browne, who carried an invisible rostrum with her wherever she went, now alertly mounted it.

"My friends," she began, "those dwelling on a plane where the Material is all may fail to grasp the thought which I shall put before you this evening. They may not understand that if a different psychic atmosphere had existed on this island from the first we should not now be gazing into a blank wall of Doubt. My friends, this expedition was, so to speak, called from the Void by Thought. Thought it was, as realized in steamships and other ephemeral forms, which bore us thither over rolling seas. How then can it be otherwise than that Thought should influence our fortunes--that success should be unable to materialize before a persistent attitude of Negation? My friends, you will perceive that there is no break in this sequence of ideas; all is remorseless logic.

"In order to withdraw myself from this atmosphere of Negation, for these several days past I have sought seclusion. There in silence I have asserted the power of Positive over Negative Thought, gazing meanwhile into the profound depths of the All. My friends, an answer has been vouchsafed us; I have had a vision of that for which we seek. Now at last, in a spirit of glad confidence, we may advance. For, my friends, the chest is buried--in sand."

With this triumphant announcement Miss Higglesby-Browne sat down. A heavy silence succeeded. It was broken by a murmur from Mr. Tubbs.

"Wonderful--that's what I call wonderful! Talk about the eloquence of the ancients--I believe, by gum, this is on a par with Congressional oratory!"

"A vision, Miss Browne," said Mr. Shaw gravely, "must be an interesting thing. I have never seen one myself, having no talents that way, but in the little Scotch town of Dumbiedykes where I was born there was an old lady with a remarkable gift of the second sight. Simple folk, not being acquainted with the proper terms to fit the case, called her the Wise Woman. Well, one day my aunt had been to the neighboring town of Micklestane, five miles off, and on the way back to Dumbiedykes she lost her purse. It had three sovereigns in it--a great sum to my aunt. In her trouble of mind she hurried to the Wise Woman--a thing to make her pious father turn in his grave. The Wise Woman--gazed into the All, I suppose, and told my aunt not to fret herself, for she had had a vision of the purse and _it lay somewhere on the food between Micklestane and Dumbiedykes_.

"Now, Miss Browne, I'll take the liberty of drawing a moral from this Story to fit the present instance: _where on the road between Micklestane and Dumbiedykes is the chest_?"

Though startled at the audacity of Mr. Shaw, I was unprepared for the spasm of absolute fury that convulsed Miss Browne's countenance.

"Mr. Shaw," she thundered, "if you intend to draw a parallel between me and an ignorant Scotch peasant--!"

"Not at all," said Mr. Shaw calmly, "forebye the Wise Woman was a most respectable person and had a grandson in the kirk. The point is, can you indicate with any degree of exactness the whereabouts of the chest? For there is a good deal of sand on the shores of this island."

"Oh, but Mr. Shaw!" interposed Aunt Jane tremulously. "In the sand--why, I am sure that is such a helpful thought! It shows quite plainly that the chest is not buried in--in a rock, you know." She gave the effect of a person trying to deflect a thunderstorm with a palm-leaf fan.

"Dynamite---dynamite--blow the lid off the island!" mumbled Captain Magnus.

"If any one has a definite plan to propose," said Mr. Shaw, "I am very ready to consider it. I have understood myself from the first to be acting under the directions of the ladies who planned this expedition. As a mere matter of honesty to my employers, I should feel bound to spare no effort to find the treasure, even if my own interests were not so vitally concerned. Considering its importance to myself, no one can well suppose that I am not doing all in my power to bring the chest to light. Tomorrow, if the sea is favorable, it is my intention to set out in the boat to determine the character of such other caves as exist on the island. I'll want you with me, lad, and you too, Magnus."

Captain Magnus looked more ill at ease than usual. "Did you think o' rowin' the whole way round the dinged chunk o' rock?" he inquired.

"Certainly not," said Mr. Shaw with an impatient frown. So the man, in addition to his other unattractive qualities, was turning out a shirk! Hitherto, with his strength and feverish if intermittent energy, plus an almost uncanny skill with boats, he had been of value. "Certainly not. We are going to make a careful survey of the cliffs, and explore every likely opening as thoroughly as possible. It will be slow work and hard. As to circumnavigating the island, I see no point in it, for I don't believe the chest can have been carried any great distance from the cove."

"Oh--all right," said Captain Magnus.

Mr. Tubbs, who had been whispering with Aunt Jane and Miss Browne, now with a very made-to-order casualness proposed to the two ladies that they take a stroll on the beach. This meant that the triumvirate were to withdraw for discussion, and amounted to notice that henceforth the counsels of the company would be divided.

Captain Magnus, after an uneasy wriggle or two, said he guessed he'd turn in. Cookie's snores were already audible between splashes of the waves on the sands. The Scotchman, Cuthbert Vane and I continued to sit by the dying fire. Mr. Shaw had got out his pipe and sat silently puffing at it. He might have been sitting in solitude on the topmost crag of the island, so remote seemed that impassive presence. Was it possible that ever, except in the sweet madness of a dream, I had been in his arms, pillowed and cherished there, that he had called me _lassie_--

I lifted my eyes to the kind honest gaze of Cuthbert Vane. It was as faithful as Crusoe's and no more embarrassing. A great impulse of affection moved me. I was near putting out a hand to pat his splendid head. Oh, how easy, comfortable, and calm would be a life with Cuthbert Vane! I wasn't thinking about the title now--Cuthbert would be quite worth while for himself. For a moment I almost saw with Aunt Jane's eyes. _Fancy trotting him out before the girls_! stole insidiously into my mind. How much more dazzling than a plain Scotch sailor--

I turned in bitterness and yearning from the silent figure by the fire.

I think in an earlier lifetime I must have been a huntress and loved to pursue the game that fled.

XII

THE ISLAND QUEEN'S FREIGHT

I woke next morning with a great thrill of exhilaration. Perhaps before the sun went down again I should know the secret of the island.

The two divisions of our party, which were designated by me privately the Land and Sea Forces, went their separate ways directly after breakfast, which we ate in the cool of earliest morning, I could retire to the perusal of the journal which I had recovered from the wrecked sloop without fear of interruption.

I resumed my reading with the entry of February 10.

This morning, having grown very tired of fish, of which I get plenty every time I go out in the boat by dragging a line behind, I decided to stay ashore and hunt pig. I set out across the base of the point, nearly due south--whereas I had been working along the coast to the north of the cove. On my right the slope of the mountain rose steeply, and as I approached the south shore the rise of the peak became more abrupt, and great jutting crags leaned out over the tree-tops below.

I reached the edge of the cliffs and found that on my right hand the mountain dropped in a sheer precipice from hundreds of feet above me straight into the sea. I considered, and made up my mind that by striking back some distance one might by a very rough climb gain the top of the precipice, and so swing around the shoulder of the mountain. I did not feel inclined to attempt it. The cliffs at this point offered no means of descent, and the few yards of sand which the receding tide had left bare at their foot led nowhere.

So far I had seen no pig, and I began to think they must all be feeding on the other side of the island. I turned to go back, and at that moment I heard an outcry in the bushes and Benjy came tearing out at the heels of a fine young porker. I threw up my gun to fire, but the evolutions of Benjy and the pig were such that I was as likely to hit one as the other. The pig, of course, made desperate efforts to escape from the cul-de-sac in which he found himself. His only hope was to get back into the woods on the point. Benjy kept him headed off successfully, and I began to edge up, watching my chance for a shot. Suddenly the pig came dashing straight toward me--oblivious, I suppose, to everything but the white snapping terror at his heels. Taken by surprise, I fired--and missed. The pig shot between my knees, Benjy after him. I withstood the shock of the pig, but not of Benjy. I fell, clawing wildly, into a matted mass of creepers that covered the ground beside me.

I got to my feet quickly, dragging the whole mass of vines up with me. Then I saw that they had covered a curiously regular little patch of ground, outlined at intervals with small stones. At one end was a larger stone.

The patch was narrow, about six feet long--instantly suggestive of a grave. But swift beyond all process of reason was the certainty that flashed into my mind. I fell on my knees beside the stone at the head and pulled away the torn vine-tendrils. I saw the letters B. H. and an attempt at cross-bones rudely cut into the surface of the stone.

I closed my eyes and tried to steady myself. I thought, I am seeing things. _This is the mere projection of the vision which has been in my mind so long_.

I opened my eyes, and lo, the fantasy, if fantasy it were, remained. I smote with my fist upon the stone. The stone was solid--it bruised the flesh. And as I saw the blood run, I screamed aloud like a madman, "_It's real, real, real_!"

Under the stone lay the guardian of the treasure of the _Bonny Lass_--And his secret was within my grasp.

I don't know how long I crouched beside the stone, as drunk with joy as any hasheesh toper with his drug. I roused at last to find Benjy at my shoulder, thrusting his cool nose against my feverish cheek. I suppose he didn't understand my ignoring him so, or thought I scorned him for losing out in his race with the pig. Yet when I think of what I owe that pig I could swear never to taste pork again.

Brought back to earth and sanity, I rose and began to consider my surroundings. Somewhere close at hand was the mouth of the cave--but where? The cliffs, as I have already said, were too steep for descent. Nothing but a fly could have crawled down them. I turned to the craggy face of the mountain. There, surely, must be the entrance to the cave! For hours I clambered among the rocks, risking mangled limbs and sunstroke--and found no cave. I came back at last, wearily, to the grave. There lay the dust of the brain that had known all--and a wild impulse came to me to tear away the earth with my bare hands, to dig deep, deep--and then with listening ear wait for a whispered word.

I put the delirious fancy from me and moved away to the edge of the cliffs. Looking down, I saw a narrow sloping shelf which dropped from the brink to a distance of ten or twelve feet below, where it met a slight projection of the rock. I had seen it before, of course, but it had carried no significance for my mind. Now I stepped down upon the ledge and followed it to its end in the angle of the rock.

Snugly hidden in the angle was a low doorway leading into blackness.

Now of course I ought in prudence to have gone back to the hut and got matches and a lantern and a rope before I set foot in the darkness of that unknown place. But what had I to do to-day with prudence--Fortune had me by the hand! In I went boldly, Benjy at my heels. The passage turned sharply, and for a little way we walked in blackness. Then it veered again, and a faint and far-off light seemed to filter its way to us through a web woven of the very stuff of night. The floor sloped a little downward. I felt my way with my feet, and came to a step--another. I was going along a descending passage, cut at its steepest into rough, irregular stairs. With either hand I could touch the walls. All the while the light grew clearer. Presently, by another sharp turn, I found myself in a cave, some thirty feet in depth by eighteen across, with an opening on the narrow strip of beach I had seen from the top of the cliffs.

The roof is high, with an effect of Gothic arches. Near the mouth is a tiny spring of ice-cold water, which has worn a clean rock-channel for itself to the sea. Otherwise the cave is perfectly dry. The shining white sand of its floor is above the highest watermark on the cliffs outside. There is no doubt in my mind that in the great buccaneering days of the seventeenth century, and probably much later, the place was the haunt of pirates. One fancies that Captain Sampson of the _Bonny Lass_ may have known of it before he brought the treasure to the island. There were queer folk to be met with in those days in the Western Ocean! The cave is cool at blazing midday, and secret, I fancy, even from the sea, because of the droop of great rock-eaves above its mouth. Either for the keeping of stores or as a hiding-place for men or treasure it would be admirable. Yes, the cave has seen many a fierce, sea-tanned face and tarry pigtail, and echoed to strange oaths and wild sea-songs. Men had carved those steps in the passage--thirty-two of them. In the sand of the floor, as I kicked it up with my feet, hoping rather childishly to strike the corner of the chest, I found the hilt and part of the blade of a rusty cutlass, and a chased silver shoe-buckle. I shall take the buckle home to Helen--and yet how trivial it will seem, with all else that I have to offer her! Nevertheless she will prize it as my gift, and because it comes from the place to which some kind angel led me for her sake.

I left the cave and hurried back to the cabin for a spade, walking on air, breaking with snatches of song the terrible stillness of the woods, where one hears only the high fitful sighing of the wind, or the eternal mutter of the sea. As I came out of the hut with the spade over my shoulder I waved my hand to the _Island Queen_ riding at anchor.

"You'll soon be showing a clean pair of heels to Leeward, old girl!" I cried. Back in the cave, I set to work feverishly, making the light sand fly. I began at the rear of the cavern, reasoning that there the sand would lie at greater depth, also that it would be above the wash of the heaviest storms. At the end of half an hour, at a point close to the angle of the wall my spade struck a hard surface. It lay, I should judge, under about two feet of sand. Soon I had laid bare a patch of dark wood which rang under my knuckles almost like iron. A little more, and I had cleared away the sand from the top of a large chest with a convex lid, heavily bound in brass.

Furiously I flung the sand aside until the chest stood free for half its depth--which is roughly three feet. It has handles at the ends, great hand-wrought loops of metal. I tugged my hardest, but the chest seemed fast in its place as the native rock. I laughed exultantly. The weight meant gold--gold! I had hammer and chisel with me, and with these I forced the massive ancient locks. There were three of them, one for each strip of brass which bound the chest. Then I flung up the lid.

No glittering treasure dazzled me. I saw only a surface of stained canvas, tucked in carefully around the edges. This I tore off and flung aside--eclipsing poor Benjy, who was a most interested spectator of my strange proceedings. Still no gleam of gold, merely demure rows of plump brown bags. With both hands I reached for them. Oh, to grasp them all! I had to be content with two, because they were so heavy, so blessedly heavy!

I spread the square of canvas on the sand, cut the strings from the bags, and poured out--gold, gold! All fair shining golden coins they were, not a paltry silver piece among them! And they made a soft golden music as they fell in a glorious yellow heap.

I don't know how long I sat there, playing with my gold, running it through my fingers, clinking the coins together in my palm. Benjy came and sniffed at them indifferently, unable to understand his master's preoccupation. He thrust his nose into my face and barked, and said as clearly as with words, _Come, hunt pig_!

"Benjy," I said, "we'll leave the pork alone just now. We have work enough to count our money. We're rich, old boy, rich, rich!"

Of course, I don't yet know exactly what the value of the treasure is. I have counted the bags in the chest; there are one hundred and forty-eight. Each, so far as I have determined, contains one thousand doubloons, which makes a total of one hundred and forty-eight thousand. Estimating each coin, for the sake of even figures, at a value of seven dollars--a safe minimum--you get one million, thirty-six thousand dollars. And as many of the coins are ancient, I ought to reap a harvest from collectors.

Besides the coin, I found, rather surprisingly, laid between the upper layers of bags, a silver crucifix about nine inches long. It is of very quaint old workmanship, and badly tarnished. Its money value must be very trifling, compared to the same bulk of golden coins. I think it must have had some special character of sacredness which led to its preservation here. It is strange to find such a relic among a treasure so stained by blood and crime.

And now I have to think about moving the gold. First of all I must get the chest itself aboard the _Island Queen_. This means that I shall have to empty it and leave the gold in the cave, while I get the chest out by sea. When the chest is safely in the cabin of the sloop--where it won't leave much room for Benjy and his master, I'm afraid--I will take the bags of coin out by the land entrance. I can't think of risking my precious doubloons in the voyage around the point.

Of course I should have liked to get to the task to-day, but after the first mad thrill of the great event was over, I found myself as weak and unnerved as a woman. So by a great effort I came away and left my glorious golden hoard. Now I dream and gloat, playing with the idea that to-morrow I shall find it all a fantasy. The pleasure of this is, of course, that all the while I _know_ this wildest of all Arabian fairy tales to be as real as the most drab and sober fact of my hitherto colorless life.

After all, on the way back from the cave Benjy brought down a pig. So he is as well pleased with the day as I am. Now I am sitting in the doorway of my cabin, writing up my journal, and trying to calm down enough to go to bed. If it were not for the swift fading of daylight, I would go back to the cave for another peep into the chest. But all round the island the sea is moaning with that peculiarly melancholy note that comes with the falling of night. The sea-birds have risen from the cove and gone wheeling off in troops to their nests on the cliffs. Somehow a curious dislike, almost fear, of this wild, sea-girt, solitary place has come over me. I long for the sound of human voices, the touch of human hands. I think of the dead man lying there at the door of the cave, its silent guardian for so long. I suppose he brooded once on the thought of the gold as I do--perhaps he has been brooding so these ninety years! I wonder if he is pleased that I, a stranger, have come into possession of his secret hoard at last?

Oh, Helen, turn your heavenly face on me--be my refuge from these shuddering unwholesome thoughts! The gold is for you--for you! Surely that must cleanse it of its stains, must loose the clutch of the dead hands that strive to hold it!

February 11. This morning I was early at the cave. Yes, there it was, the same wonder-chest that I had dreamed of all night long. It was absurd how the tightness in my breast relaxed.

I began at once the work of removing the bags from the chest and stacking them in the corner of the cave. It was a fatiguing job, I had to stoop so. At the bottom of the chest I found a small portfolio of very fine leather containing documents in Spanish. They bear an official seal. Although I should be interested to know their meaning, I think I shall destroy them. They weaken my feeling of ownership; I suppose there is a slight flavor of lawlessness in my carrying off the gold from the island like this. Very likely the little Spanish-American state which has some claim to overlordship here would dispute my right to the treasure-trove.

I spent so much time unloading the chest and poring over the papers, trying, by means of my ill-remembered Latin, to make out the sense of the kindred Spanish, that before I was ready to go for my boat the tide was up and pounding on the rocks below the cave. I find that only at certain stages of the tide is the cave approachable by sea. At the turn after high water, for instance, there is such a terrific undertow that it sets up a small maelstrom among the reefs lying off the island. At low tide is the time to come.

February 12. Got the chest out of the cave, though it was a difficult job. I don't know of what wood the thing is built--some South American hardwood, I fancy--but it weighs like metal. The heavy brass clampings count for something, of course. Luckily there was no sea, and I had a smooth passage around the point, I laughed rather ruefully as I passed the Cave of the Two Arches. To think of the toil I wasted there! I wish Benjy had encountered the fateful pig a little sooner.

Got the chest aboard the _Island Queen_ and stowed in the cabin. Not room left to swing a kitten. Contrived an elaborate arrangement of ropes and spikes to keep it in place in a heavy sea.

In the afternoon began moving the gold. It's the deuce of a job.

February 15. Been hard at it for three days. Most of the gold moved. Have to think too of provisions and water for the trip. I am making rather a liberal allowance, in case of being blown out of my course by a tropical gale.

February 16. On board the _Island Queen_. Have moved my traps from the hut and am sleeping on the sloop. Want to be near the gold. "Where the treasure is, there will the heart be also," and in this case the body as well. To-morrow I have only to bring the last of the gold aboard--a trifling matter--and then go out with the ebb. I would have got all the bags on board to-day, but I noticed a worn stretch in the cable holding the sloop and stopped to repair it. I can't have the sloop going on the rocks in case a blow comes up to-night. There are only about a load and a half of bags left in the cave.

A queer notion seized me to-day about the crucifix, when I was bringing it from the cave. It seemed to float into my brain--I can't say from what quarter--_that I had better leave the crucifix for Bill_. It wasn't more than he had a right to, really--and there is no virtue in a cross-bones to make a man sleep well.

Of course I put the absurd idea from me, and brought the crucifix aboard along with the rest of the gold. I shall be glad when I know that the vines have again covered that lonely-looking gravestone from sight. I can't help feeling my own glorious good fortune to be somehow an affront to poor unlucky Bill.

To-morrow one last trip to the cave, and then hey, for home and Helen!

The diary ended here.

I closed the book, and stared with unseeing eyes into the green shadows of the encompassing woods. What happened to the writer of the diary on that last trip to the cave? For he had never left the island. Crusoe was here to prove it, as well as the wreck of the Island Queen. And, in all human probability, under the sand which choked the cabin of the derelict was the long-sought chest of Spanish doubloons.

But what was the mysterious fate of Peter? Had he fallen, overboard from the sloop and been drowned? Had he returned to the cave--and was he there still? It was all a mystery--but a mystery which I burned to solve.

Of course I might have solved it, very quickly, merely by communicating the extraordinary knowledge which had come to me to my companions. But for the present at least I meant to keep this astounding secret for my own. Somehow or other, by guile or lucky circumstance, I must bring it about that the document I had signed at Miss Browne's behest was canceled. Was I, who all unaided had discovered, or as good as discovered, the vainly-sought-for treasure, to disclose its whereabouts to those who would deny me the smallest claim upon its contents? Was I to see all those "fair, shining golden coins," parceled out between Miss Browne, and Mr. Tubbs, and Captain Magnus (the three who loomed large in my indignant thoughts), and not possess a single one myself? Or perhaps accept a little stingy present of a few? I really wasn't very covetous about the money, taken just as money; but considered as buried treasure it made my mouth water.

Then besides, while I kept my secret I had power; everybody's destiny was in my hands. This was a sweet thought. I felt that I should enjoy going about with a deceptive meekness, and taking the severest snubs from Miss Browne, knowing that at any moment I could blossom forth into the most exalted and thrilling importance. Also, not only did I want a share in the treasure myself, but I wanted, if possible, to divide it up on a different basis from the present. I wanted Cuthbert Vane to have a lot of it--and I should have been much better pleased not to let Mr. Tubbs or Captain Magnus have any. I did not crave to enrich Violet, and I thought Aunt Jane had already more money than was good for her. Give her another half-million, and Mr. Tubbs would commit bigamy, if necessary, for her sake.

And then there was Dugald Shaw, who had saved my life, and who seemed to have forgotten it, and that I had ever had my arms about his neck--and who was poor--and brave--

Yes, decidedly, I should keep my secret yet while, till I saw how the cards were going to fall.

XIII