第103章

silver and treasure (three times tried in the fire, as the Scripture expresses it), that might hae made yoursell and ony twa or three honest bodies beside, as happy and content as the day was lang.''

``Indeed, Edie, mine honest friends, dat is very true; only I did not know, dat is, I was not sure, where to find the gelt myself.''

``What! was it not by your honours advice and counsel that Monkbarns and the Knight of Knockwinnock came here then?''

``Aha--yes; but it was by another circumstance.I did not know dat dey would have found de treasure, mine friend; though I did guess, by such a tintamarre, and cough, and sneeze, and groan, among de spirit one other night here, dat there might be treasure and bullion hereabout.Ach, mein himmel! the spirit will hone and groan over his gelt, as if he were a Dutch Burgomaster counting his dollars after a great dinner at the Stadthaus.''

``And do you really believe the like o' that, Mr.Dusterdeevil !

--a skeelfu' man like you--hout fie!''

``Mein friend,'' answered the adept, foreed by circumstances to speak something nearer the truth than he generally used to do, ``I believed it no more than you and no man at all, till Idid hear them hone and moan and groan myself on de oder night, and till I did this day see de cause, which was an great chest all full of de pure silver from Mexico--and what would you ave nae think den?''

``And what wad ye gie to ony ane,'' said Edie, ``that wad help ye to sic another kistfu' o' silver!''

``Give?--mein himmel!--one great big quarter of it.''

``Now if the secret were mine,'' said the mendicant, ``I wad stand out for a half; for you see, though I am but a puir ragged body, and couldna carry silver or gowd to sell for fear o' being taen up, yet I could find mony folk would pass it awa for me at unco muckle easier profit than ye're thinking on.''

``Ach, himmel!--Mein goot friend, what was it I said?--Idid mean to say you should have de tree quarter for your half, and de one quarter to be my fair half.''

``No, no, Mr.Dusterdeevil, we will divide equally what we find, like brother and brother.Now, look at this board that Ijust flung into the dark aisle out o' the way, while Monkbarns was glowering ower a' the silver yonder.He's a sharp chiel Monkbarns--I was glad to keep the like o' this out o' his sight.

Ye'll maybe can read the character better than me--I am nae that book learned, at least I'm no that muckle in practice.''

With this modest declaration of ignorance, Ochiltree brought forth from behind a pillar the cover of the box or chest of treasure, which, when forced from its hinges, had been carelessly flung aside during the ardour of curiosity to ascertain the contents which it concealed, and had been afterwards, as it seems, secreted by the mendicant.There was a word and a number upon the plank, and the beggar made them more distinct by spitting upon his ragged blue handkerchief, and rubbing off the clay by which the inscription was obscured.It was in the ordinary black letter.

``Can ye mak ought o't?'' said Edie to the adept.

``S,'' said the philosopher, like a child getting his lesson in the primer--``S, T, A, R, C, H,--_Starch!_--dat is what de woman-washers put into de neckerchers, and de shirt collar.''

``Search!'' echoed Ochiltree; ``na, na, Mr.Dusterdeevil, ye are mair of a conjuror than a clerk--it's _search,_ man, _search_--See, there's the _Ye_ clear and distinct.''

``Aha! I see it now--it is _search--number one._ Mein himmel! then there must be a _number two,_ mein goot friend:

for _search_ is what you call to seek and dig, and this is but _number one!_ Mine wort, there is one great big prize in de wheel for us, goot Maister Ochiltree.''

``Aweel, it may be sae; but we canna howk fort enow--we hae nae shules, for they hae taen them a' awa--and it's like some o'

them will be sent back to fling the earth into the hole, and mak a' things trig again.But an ye'll sit down wi' me a while in the wood, I'se satisfy your honour that ye hae just lighted on the only man in the country that could hae tauld about Malcolm Misticot and his hidden treasure--But first we'll rub out the letters on this board, for fear it tell tales.''

And, by the assistance of his knife, the beggar erased and defaced the characters so as to make them quite unintelligible, and then daubed the board with clay so as to obliterate all traces of the erasure.

Dousterswivel stared at him in ambiguous silence.There was an intelligence and alacrity about all the old man's movements, which indicated a person that could not be easily overreached, and yet (for even rogues acknowledge in some degree the spirit of precedence) our adept felt the disgrace of playing a secondary part, and dividing winnings with so mean an associate.His appetite for gain, however, was sufficiently sharp to overpower his offended pride, and though far more an impostor than a dupe, he was not without a certain degree of personal faith even in the gross superstitions by means of which he imposed upon others.

Still, being accustomed to act as a leader on such occasions, he felt humiliated at feeling himself in the situation of a vulture marshalled to his prey by a carrion-crow.--``Let me, however, hear this story to an end,'' thought Dousterswivel, ``and it will be hard if I do not make mine account in it better as Maister Edie Ochiltrees makes proposes.''

The adept, thus transformed into a pupil from a teacher of the mystic art, followed Ochiltree in passive acquiescence to the Prior's Oak--a spot, as the reader may remember, at a short distance from the ruins, where the German sat down, and silence waited the old man's communication.