Cameron County press. [volume] (Emporium, Cameron County, Pa.) 1866-1922, 1898-11-10

powers, I'll face him dead. There's
6 100000 not a quarter of mile from
here. When did ever a gentleman o
fortune show his stern to that much
dollars, for a boozy old seaman with a
blue mug-and him dead, too?"
But there was no sign of reawakening
courage in his followers; rather, in
deed, of growing terror at the irrever-
ence of his words.
Delay there, John!" said Merry.
Don't you cross a sperrit."
And the rest were all too terrified to
reply. They would have run away
severally had they dared, but fear kept
them together, and kept them close by
John, as if his daring helped them.
He, on his part, had pretty well fought
his weakness down.
"Sperrit? Well, maybe" he said.
"But there's one thing not clear to me.
There was an echo. Now, no man ever
seen a sperrit with a shadow; well,
then, what's he doing with an echo to
him, should like to know? That amt
in natur', surely?"
This argument seemed weak enough
w my IDhN NOh bdll IiNNCl lCll VIVA y W III
affect the superstitious, and, to my
wonder, George Merry was greatly re-
lieved.
"Well, that's So" he said "You've a
head upon your shoulders, John, and
no mistake. Bout ship, mates! This
here crew is on the wrong tack, | do be-
lieve. And come to think on it, it was
like Flint's voice, I grant you, but not
just so clear away like it, after all. 1t
was liker somebody else's voice now
il was like"
"By the powers, Ben Gunn!" roared
Silver.
GAY, and so it were," cried Morgan
springing on his knees. ben Gum it
were!"
"It don't make much odds, do it,
now?" asked Dick. Ben Gums not
here in the body, any more'n Flint"
But the older hands greeted this re-
mark with scorn. "Why, nobody minds
Ben Gunn," cried Merry; dead or alive,
nobody minds him"
1t was extraordinary how their spir-
its had returned, and how the natural
color had revived in their faces. Soon
they were chatting together, with in
tervals of listening; and not long after,
hearing no further sound, they shoul-
dered the tools and set forth again,
Merry walking first with Silver's com
pass to keep them on the right line
with Skeleton island. He had said the
truth; dead or alive, nobody minded
Ben Gum.
Dick alone still held his Bible, and
looked around him as he went, with
fearful glances; but he found no SYM
pathy, and Silver even joked him on his
precautions.
~ told you," said he-'I told you, you
had spilled your Bible. If it amt no
good to swear by, what do you suppose
a sperrit would give for it? Not that"
and he snapped his big fingers, hating
a moment on his crutch.
But Dick was not to be comforted;
indeed, it was soon plain to me that
the lad was falling sick; hastened by
heat, exhaustion, and the shock of his
alarm, the fever, predicted by DR.. Live
sey, was evidently growing swiftly
higher.
1t was fine open walking here, upon
the summit; our way lay little down
hill, for, as 1 have said, the plateau
tilted toward the west. The pines
great and small, grew wide apart; and
even between the clumps of nutmeg
and azalea, wide open spaces baked in
the hot sunshine. Striking, as we did,
pretty near northwest across the
Island, we drew, on the one hand, ever
nearer under the shoulders of the Spy
glass, and on the other, looked ever
wider over that western bay where I
had once tossed and trembled in the
coracle.
The first of the tall trees was reached,
and by the bearing, proved the wrong
one. So with the second. The third rose
nearly 200 feet into the air above
clump of underwood; giant of veg
etable, with red column as big as
cottage, and a wide shadow around in
which a company could have man
euvered. 1t was conspicuous far to sea
both on the east and west, and might
have been entered as a sailing mark
upon the chart.
But it was not it's size that now i'm
pressed my companions; IL was the
knowledge that c e7OO,oO in gold lay
somewhere buried below its spread
ing shadow. The thought of the
money, as they drew nearer, swallowed
up their previous terrors. Their eyes
burned in their heads; their feet grew
speedier and lighter; their whole soul
was bound up in that fortune, that
whole lifetime of extravaganza and
pleasure, that lay waiting there for
each of them.
Silver hobbled, grunting, on his
crutch, his nostrils stood out and quiv-
cred; he cursed like a mailman when
the flies settled on his hot and shiny
countenance; he plucked furiously at
the line that held me to him, and, from
time to time, turned his eyes upon me
with deadly look. Certainly he took
no pains to hide his thoughts; and GER
tainly | read them like print. In the
immediate nearness of the gold, all
else had been forgotten; his promise
and the doctors warning were both