Adventure stories; Love stories; Treasure troves -- Fiction
When the day's work was over, Drew dined hastily and then shut himself
in his room where he worked busily until midnight, filling in the
vacant spaces in the rough draft of the confession. He was critical of
his efforts, recasting and revising again and again until he was
satisfied that he had caught the full meaning of the old document as
far as it was humanly possible. Only then did he lay it aside--to
dream of Ruth.
Drew was at the shop before his usual time the next morning, and Tyke
and Captain Hamilton came in soon afterward. The three went at once
into secret session, leaving the entire conduct of the chandlery
business to Winters, much to the mystification of that youth.
All three were fresh and cool this morning as they buckled down to the
problem they had to solve, and the wisdom of the previous night's
adjournment was clearly evident.
"I got to talking this thing over with my daughter last night," said
Captain Hamilton. "You'd forgotten I had a daughter, Tyke? Wait till
you see her! Well, she was aboard the schooner for dinner with me, and
she said: 'Daddy, if there is a real pirate's treasure, please go after
it. Then you can stay ashore and not go sailing away from me any
more.' So, I've a double incentive for pursuing this thing," and the
captain laughed.
"Yes, that's like the women-folk," observed Grimshaw. "They're always
for a man's leaving the sea."
"That isn't what made you leave it, Tyke," Captain Hamilton said slyly.
"An' it won't be women-folk that sends me back to it, neither," growled
the older man. "An' now, Allen," he added, as they settled comfortably
into their chairs, "how did you git along with the paper? Have you got
it so that it makes sense?"
"I'll let you judge of that for yourselves," replied Drew, taking the
revised draft from his pocket. "Of course, I can't say that it's
exactly right. Some of the missing words and sentences I had to guess
at. But it's as nearly right as I know how to make it."
He waited while Grimshaw and Captain Hamilton lighted their cigars, and
then proceeded to read:
"Trinidad, March 18, 17 .....
"In the name of God, amen.
"I, Ramon Alvarez, unworthy sinner that I am and not fit to take the
name of God upon my lips, and well knowing that I deserve no mercy who
have ever shown none, expecting to be plunged into the deepest hell,
yet basing my only hope on the Virgin Mary and the blessed saints and
the shriving of Holy Church, do hereby confess the misdeeds of my life.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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