IV
Then Tom Chist crept to bed, trembling, shuddering, bathed in sweat,
his heart beating like a trip-hammer, and his brain dizzy from that
long, terror-inspired race through the soft sand in which he had
striven to outstrip he knew not what pursuing horror.
For a long, long time he lay awake, trembling and chattering with
nervous chills, and when he did fall asleep it was only to drop into
monstrous dreams in which he once again saw ever enacted, with various
grotesque variations, the tragic drama which his waking eyes had beheld
the night before.
Then came the dawning of the broad, wet daylight, and before the rising
of the sun Tom was up and out-of-doors to find the young day dripping
with the rain of overnight.
His first act was to climb the nearest sandhill and to gaze out towards
the offing where the pirate ship had been the day before.
It was no longer there.
Soon afterwards Matt Abrahamson came out of the cabin and he called to
Tom to go get a bite to eat, for it was time for them to be away
fishing.
All that morning the recollection of the night before hung over Tom
Chist like a great cloud of boding trouble. It filled the confined area
of the little boat and spread over the entire wide spaces of sky and
sea that surrounded them. Not for a moment was it lifted. Even when he
was hauling in his wet and dripping line with a struggling fish at the
end of it a recurrent memory of what he had seen would suddenly come
upon him, and he would groan in spirit at the recollection. He looked
at Matt Abrahamson's leathery face, at his lantern jaws cavernously and
stolidly chewing at a tobacco leaf, and it seemed monstrous to him that
the old man should be so unconscious of the black cloud that wrapped
them all about.
When the boat reached the shore again he leaped scrambling to the
beach, and as soon as his dinner was eaten he hurried away to find the
Dominie Jones.
He ran all the way from Abrahamson's hut to the Parson's house, hardly
stopping once, and when he knocked at the door he was panting and
sobbing for breath.
The good man was sitting on the back-kitchen door-step smoking his long
pipe of tobacco out into the sunlight, while his wife within was
rattling about among the pans and dishes in preparation of their
supper, of which a strong, porky smell already filled the air.
Then Tom Chist told his story, panting, hurrying, tumbling one word
over another in his haste, and Parson Jones listened, breaking every
now and then into an ejaculation of wonder. The light in his pipe went
out and the bowl turned cold.
"And I don't see why they should have killed the poor black man," said
Tom, as he finished his narrative.
"Why, that is very easy enough to understand," said the good reverend
man. "'Twas a treasure-box they buried!"
In his agitation Mr. Jones had risen from his seat and was now stumping
up and down, puffing at his empty tobacco-pipe as though it were still
alight.
"A treasure-box!" cried out Tom.
"Aye, a treasure-box! And that was why they killed the poor black man.
He was the only one, d'ye see, besides they two who knew the place
where 'twas hid, and now that they've killed him out of the way,
there's nobody but themselves knows. The villains--Tut, tut, look at
that now!" In his excitement the dominie had snapped the stem of his
tobacco-pipe in two.
"Why, then," said Tom, "if that is so, 'tis indeed a wicked, bloody
treasure, and fit to bring a curse upon anybody who finds it!"
"'Tis more like to bring a curse upon the soul who buried it," said
Parson Jones, "and it may be a blessing to him who finds it. But tell
me, Tom, do you think you could find the place again where 'twas hid?"
"I can't tell that," said Tom, "'twas all in among the sand-humps, d'ye
see, and it was at night into the bargain. Maybe we could find the
marks of their feet in the sand," he added.
"'Tis not likely," said the reverend gentleman, "for the storm last
night would have washed all that away."
"I could find the place," said Tom, "where the boat was drawn up on the
beach."
"Why, then, that's something to start from, Tom," said his friend. "If
we can find that, then maybe we can find whither they went from there."
"If I was certain it was a treasure-box," cried out Tom Chist, "I would
rake over every foot of sand betwixt here and Henlopen to find it."
"'Twould be like hunting for a pin in a haystack," said the Rev. Hilary
Jones.
As Tom walked away home, it seemed as though a ton's weight of gloom
had been rolled away from his soul. The next day he and Parson Jones
were to go treasure-hunting together; it seemed to Tom as though he
could hardly wait for the time to come.
