By that time the seven pirate money-hunters had come up the creek and were climbing the bank to where we were. They looked mean, too. The one called Jim, who was the old land pirate’s great-grandson, came right up to us and said: “Look here! Are you the folks that blew up our stuff? We don’t stand for any business like that. You hadn’t any right to do it, and for half a cent we’d light into you and break you into pieces and chew you up. Now, we’ve got business here and we want you to get away from here and stay away.” “Yes, sir,” Jibby Jones said in his solemn way. “Maybe we will. We didn’t know you owned this farm. We thought Wampus Smale’s father owned it, and that Mr. Catlin here rented it. We thought that anybody that came on the farm without Mr. Catlin’s permission was trespassing and could be put in jail or something. Why, look at all the people!” The man named Jim climbed up the bank and looked. He swore. “What’s that crowd?” “They’re going to hunt for some old land pirate’s treasure, I guess,” Jibby said. “I guess they think there is some of it hidden around here somewhere. But Mr. Catlin thought we would charge them a dollar apiece for letting them hunt it. We didn’t know you owned this land.” “A dollar, hey?” said the land pirate’s great-grandson. “Well, we’ll give you a dollar apiece--seven dollars for the seven of us--if that’s what you want.” “Thank you,” Jibby said very politely, and, while the land pirate’s great-grandson was counting out the money, he told Wampus and Skippy and Tad and Mr. Catlin and me to go and stop the crowd and tell them it cost a dollar a day to hunt land pirate’s treasure on this farm. “And tell them to look out for the bumblebees,” he said. “We wouldn’t like the whole of Riverbank to get all stung up when all they are doing is trying to get the treasure before we get it.” So Bill Catlin and all us boys but Jibby ran toward the crowd to tell them, and one of the first men we saw was the sheriff. We boys did not know him very well, but Bill Catlin did, and he went up to him and warned him that coming on the farm was trespass and that he looked to the sheriff to warn everybody and to keep off himself. The sheriff hated it, but he had to do it, because it was his duty. He turned and held up both hands, to stop the crowd. “But you can tell them,” Bill Catlin said, just before the sheriff spoke up, “that they can come on the farm and hunt treasure for one dollar each per day.” CHAPTER XXIV THE TREASURE