Mark had stolen off around a corner of the house, and his footsteps had died away. Tom unlocked the door at which they were standing, opened it wide and suddenly clapped it shut with a resounding slam. Cole started in surprise, but Tom reassured him. “Take hold of the handle of the chest,” whispered the lad, “and act as though it were very heavy. We’ll lug it to the maize field just below the quarters.” Cole took hold of the chest, and they bore it along through the garden, around the house, over a low wall and through the silent street of the negro quarters. As they went, Tom glanced over his shoulder now and then, while they passed through a deep shadow, and at last he was rewarded by seeing the skulking figure of Mark Harwood, creeping along in the shadow of a fence, behind them. As Tom had expected, the loud closing of the door had attracted him; and when he saw the young patriot and his servant carrying a chest in a secretive fashion, and in the dark of the very early morning, he eagerly followed them. When Tom and Cole reached the maize field they put the chest down at a fence corner. The crown of Mark Harwood’s wide wool hat was plainly visible to Tom’s watchful eyes, sticking above a bush behind which he was crouching. Tom was careful not to let the spying Tory know that he was observed; and in a voice that he knew would reach the listener, he said to Cole: “This will be a good place to bury it. It won’t do to let all this gold lie around now when there is danger of the enemy coming. We’ll bury it here and make a note of the spot; when everything is quiet again, and the Tories gone, we can dig it up once more.” Cole greeted these words with a long stare of surprise; Tom was afraid that he did not understand his words; but, no, it was the situation that puzzled Cole. But he had heard the skulking footsteps behind them as they had lugged the empty chest down to the maize field, and putting one thing and another together, the whole thing suddenly dawned upon him; and he burst into a ringing laugh that split the silence like a knife. Tom grasped his arm in pretended alarm, and covered his mouth with his hand. “Hush!” warned he, for the benefit of the crouching Tory. “Somebody may hear you. And it won’t do to have what we are about to do, overseen. Keep quiet, now, and go to work.” Cole took up the spade which they had brought with them, and set to work in the fence corner, turning up the ground. Tom found a mattock which a careless hand had left in the field overnight, and proceeded to lend vigorous aid. The Tory crouched behind the bush, eagerly watching; Cole, as he worked, was so convulsed that his great shoulders shook, and his eyes gleamed with enjoyment in the moonlight. At length they had the hole sufficiently large; with much burlesque effort they dragged the chest into it, and proceeded to throw back and stamp down the earth. Tom wiped his brow after the job was finished, and Cole followed suit.