CHAPTER IV
HOW TWO MEN BURIED A CHEST OF GOLD
THE battle of Fort Moultrie was of immense importance to all the confederated states. It happened before the Declaration of Independence was passed at Philadelphia. Because of the slowness of travel in those days the news did not become known in the capital city and other points of the north for a month or more afterward; but it served to strengthen the patriots in their cause, and that went for much in that dark hour of doubt.
For three years the British made no further attempt to invade Carolina.
During this time Tom Deering saw service against the Cherokees and Tories; but the greater part of his time was devoted to trying to find his father. He and Cole used every means in their power to find where the planter had been taken; more than once they assumed the characters of loyalists, when they saw a British ship standing in near shore, and with a boat-load of fresh vegetables they would pull or sail out to her under pretence of desiring to sell the things to the officers. But all their questioning upon these and other occasions went for nothing; no trace was to be had of his father. But Tom was not disheartened; the finding of his father was to be his task, and he persisted in it day after day, week after week; wherever there promised to be a shred of information, there he rode, sailed or walked. But not once in the entire three years did he gain a single clue.
Then, suddenly, came the surprise of General Howe at Savannah; the Americans were dispersed and the city fell into the hands of the British. Ten thousand picked troops under Sir Henry Clinton sailed from New York upon Charleston, bringing a train of heavy artillery. Six weeks after the city was invested it fell, and four thousand men were taken prisoners; the command of the British then was given to Lord Cornwallis, and at once the entire colony began to feel the gross abuse of power and wanton tyrannies with which that officer soiled his name.
Tom Deering, between his marches in the Cherokee and Tory countries had found much time to attend to the plantation. Nothing had been heard of his father since the day the boat’s crew of the brig-of-war took him from the wrecked sloop, so the whole care of the extensive estate now fell upon the boy.
Tom’s mother had died when he was but a child, and he had no brothers or sisters. The only relatives he knew of, in the wide world, other than Captain Deering were the Harwoods, and these, of course, he never saw, as they had not ventured into the neighborhood of Charleston since once taking arms against their neighbors. Tom was now a stalwart, bronzed youth of about nineteen; hard riding had developed him wonderfully in body and constant danger had given him that calm, steady, tried courage that is a soldier’s best gift.
The Deering mansion was crowded with many objects of value in the way of plate, pictures and antique carvings, of which his father had been a tireless collector. Upon looking over the books of the plantation one day, Tom discovered that there was also about four thousand pounds in gold in the house, his father having drawn all his money out of the banks at the first sign of trouble between the colony and Great Britain. This was a very large sum and its possession troubled the boy not a little. The money was locked up in a heavy oaken chest in his father’s private room; and when the news reached him that Sir Henry Clinton was in the outer roadstead, he set about finding a hiding-place for it, his judgment telling him that the city was in danger.
He and Cole opened the chest one night; the broad gold pieces, mostly Spanish, were tied up in stout bags.
“If the enemy storm and demolish Fort Moultrie,” said Tom, as he looked reflectively at the bags, “they will be very keen after hard money to pay off their men and obtain fresh supplies. So they would not hesitate a moment in seizing upon this if they chanced upon it.”
The hiding-place must be a secret known only to themselves; the slaves upon the plantation could be trusted to the last one; but if the dragoons of Tarleton suspected the presence of treasure upon the place, they would terrorize the negroes by threats of torture and compel them to tell where it was hidden.
Some distance from the house, in the middle of an orchard, was an old well, the waters of which were used in dry weather to keep the young trees in good condition. As a small boy Tom had often lowered himself into its dark depths in a spirit of exploration; and now, as he cast his mind about for a safe place to conceal the gold, the well occurred to him.
“I have it, Cole,” exclaimed he, cheerfully. “The old well in the orchard is the place; about half-way down, a large stone fell out a long time ago, and behind the bed where the stone lay we can dig out a hole large enough to contain all the money.”
Cole nodded delightedly; in his opinion it was just the thing. So out they went, at a side door at the upper end of the house to prepare the hiding-place. Cole carried a long rope, for Tom decided not to trust his weight to the well rope, which was old and very likely rotten; they also had a masked lantern, a short iron bar and a small spade.
“We must be careful and not be seen,” said Tom, as they picked their way through the garden. “The Tories are drawing in close, at the expectation of a British victory; and if one of them saw us prowling about in the darkness he would suspect something at once.”
They reached the well in a very few minutes, and he at once set to work to descend. Cole formed a sling at one end of the rope and passed it about Tom’s body. The boy had the masked lantern fastened to his belt; the spade and bar were lying upon the low curb of the well; he was just about to swing himself down into the black hole when suddenly there came a low, sullen shock as of distant thunder, followed by another and another. The eyes of the boy and the giant went instantly in the direction of the harbor; a flare of light ran along the sky, and immediately vanished.
“The British!” said Tom. “That was their big guns that spoke; and they are firing rockets, too. They mean to attack the fort in the darkness. We are none too soon, Cole; for there is no knowing what will happen now.”
Cole’s strong arms lowered him slowly into the well, and he soon found the place he sought. A large and almost square stone had fallen out and behind where it had lain in the lining of the shaft the earth could be seen. Tom carefully pried out some few other and smaller stones with the bar; these he passed up to Cole, after which he set to work with the spade to dig an aperture sufficiently large to hold the sacks of gold.
As he worked he could hear the steady growl of the distant guns; above his head he could see but a small, round spot in the sky through the shaft of the well; and every little while this small, round spot would be lit up by a sudden glare of rockets sent hissing into the heavens as signals to the captains of the attacking fleet.
In about half an hour Tom’s task was completed. Cole was signaled and hauled him out of the well.
“Now,” said Tom, “let’s get the bags down. It will be daybreak, almost, when we finish with this matter; and we want to be done with it before any of the hands are stirring.”
When they reached Mr. Deering’s office, Tom was about to open the chest once more and take the bags out for transportation to the orchard. But a gesture from Cole stopped him. With an ease that made even Tom’s eyes open in wonder, and the lad was accustomed to Cole’s exhibitions of tremendous strength, the giant slave hoisted the chest upon his back, and motioned to his master to go before him and open the doors. It was a dead weight and sufficient to crush an ordinary man; but Cole carried it downstairs, through the wide hall, out into the garden, and thence to the orchard, where he lowered it to the ground with scarcely a labored breath.
“Cole,” said Tom Deering in astonishment, “I believe you are a second cousin to an elephant! You’re growing stronger every day!”
The great slave grinned; he took a childish pleasure in his enormous power, and it made him happy when notice was taken of it by Tom, or his father. The sacks were now taken out of the chest, and once more the lad was swung down into the well, carrying several of them in his arms. Quite a number of trips were necessary before the gold was all stored in the hollow behind the stones.
“Now,” said Tom, “we must block up the opening. It will not do to allow it to remain as it is.”
Some lime was procured from a barrel in the negro quarters, slacked and quickly mixed with sand and water.
“It’s not very good mortar,” remarked Tom, “but it will have to answer, as it’s the best we can do.”
The stones that had been removed were replaced in the side of the well, and another was procured to replace the one that had fallen out; then all were cemented firmly in place, and all trace of the work destroyed. After they had finished, Tom breathed a sigh of relief.
“Good,” said he. “It will take a sharp eye to discover that, I fancy. It is secure there until the times grow settled and father is released on parole or exchanged.”
They had reached the side door, at the upper end of the house, carrying the chest between them, and were just about to go in, when Tom suddenly laid his hand warningly upon the big slave’s shoulder.
“Don’t move,” whispered he. “Listen!”
They stood as silent as graven images. The soft “pit-pat” of cautious footsteps was approaching, down a narrow path between two high screens of hedge. The shadows by the doorway lay deep and black, but the path leading to it was flooded by moonlight. A night bird flew by, overhead, crying harshly and sharply in the stillness. The footfalls had now ceased, but there immediately followed a rustling in the hedge. The next moment the stiff growth parted and a face was thrust through—a pale, sly looking face with narrow eyes and a crafty expression. It was that of Mark Harwood!
The shadow was too deep about the doorway for the prowling Tory to see our friends, however; he remained glancing here and there for a moment, then his head was withdrawn and his soft footfalls once more fell upon the listener’s ears.
For a moment Tom had been startled; he had thought that the Tory had been watching their labors, and that the whereabouts of the treasure was known. But a moment’s reflection convinced him that this could not be so. Mark had approached the house from an entirely different direction, and was apparently endeavoring to find out if any one was astir.
Assured that the hiding-place of his father’s money was not known to Mark, Tom at once conceived the notion of playing the Tory a trick.
“Cole,” he whispered, “did you hear any other footsteps than his?”
Cole shook his head.
“He must be alone,” said Tom. “Perhaps he has come out ahead of his father’s band of thieving loyalists to look the ground over. They always did envy my father his prosperity, Cole, and now they think they’ll have a chance to rob him, seeing that the British are near at hand.”
While he spoke, Tom was thinking of another matter; suddenly he clapped the negro on the back and laughed low and gleefully.
“I have a plan,” said he, eagerly. “We’ll fool them; we’ll let them think they have the matter in their own hands. Now, do just what I tell you, and don’t hesitate.”
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.
“There we are,” said the boy. “Nobody will ever know that is there. The maize will soon grow over the spot, and it will never be noticed.”
They took up spade and mattock, and silently set off for the house; behind them still crouched Mark Harwood, an expression of malignant triumph upon his cold, sly face.
“It’s safe, is it, Tom Deering?” he muttered, below his breath. “That’s all you know about it. Sir Henry Clinton will soon be master of all about here, and father and I will be masters of the Deering plantation. Then we shall see if your chest of gold is safe, or no.” And with a low laugh, he shook his fist after the two retreating forms; then he turned and cut swiftly across the fields, for day was coming fast and it would not do for him to be observed.