Chapter 3

THE DUCK CREEK TREASURE

Sundays always dragged in the Morton household. Dr. and Mrs. Morton, like many other excellent people of their day, believed in the saving grace of "Thou shalt not!" The list of things the children couldn't do on Sunday was much longer than the list of coulds.

On this particular Sunday Ernest was specially aggrieved because his mother had sternly deprived him of "The Last of the Mohicans" as being unsuitable for Sabbath reading, offering him a painfully instructive volume from the Sunday School library in its place.

He relieved his feelings to Chicken Little.

"I bet if I ever grow up I'll do what I please on Sunday! I think when a fellow goes to their old church and Sunday School he might be let alone for the rest of the day. Think I'm going to read that dope?--all the chaps with any life in them get expelled or go to the penitentiary and the rest are old goody-goody tattle-tales you wouldn't be caught dead with! Guess they're 'fraid if they got a real live boy in a book he'd bust the covers off!"

Ernest's disgust was so real it was painful. Jane sympathized acutely.

"The 'Elsie Books' aren't so bad only I guess Mother'd spank me if I talked to her the way Elsie does to her father."

"Can't play with the boys--can't read--can't go for a tramp--can't even get my lessons for tomorrow."

Ernest flung himself on the old haircloth sofa and groaned.

Chicken Little looked out of the window wistfully. It was a glorious September day. The fragrance of ripening grapes from the long arbor outside floated in temptingly; the maples were already showing gleams of red and yellow and the soft air was fairly calling to a frolic. Beyond the two high board fences that bounded the Alley separating their yard from the Halford place, she knew her two small playmates were happy out in the sunshine. Mrs. Halford's views on Sunday keeping were not so rigid.

Chicken Little sighed, then suddenly brightened. "Katy and Gertie haven't got a brother anyhow!" she said half aloud, balancing advantages.

"Who you talking to?" Ernest raised himself on his elbow to find out.

"Nobody--I was just a thinking."

"Must be hard work. Say, Sis, I know something you don't know. No, I'm not going to tell--it's a secret. Bet you'll be tickled to death when you find out--here, look out!"

Ernest flung his arm up in defense as Jane threw herself joyfully upon him.

"Ernest Morton, you mean thing--tell me this minute or I'll tickle you."

"Pooh, you couldn't tickle a fly. Think you're smart, don't you? I'm going to tell you next Saturday and not one second sooner so you don't need to tease."

"Next Saturday? Is it a picnic? Am I going?"

"Sha'n't tell you what it is, but you're going."

"Goody! Are Katy and Gertie going?"

Ernest saw that she was getting perilously near the facts and considered.

"Tell you next Saturday," he replied tantalizingly.

"Please, Ernest, just tell me that."

"Nope, little girls shouldn't be so curious."

"Say, Ernest, if I'll get you a cooky will you?"

"You can't. Mother said if we didn't leave that cooky jar alone she'd punish us--besides Alice hid them."

"I don't care. I've got six."

"Where in--how'd you get them?--hook them?"

"I did not, Ernest Morton. Mother says we can eat all we want when Alice bakes, and I didn't want very many 'cause my throat was sore so I just put some away."

"Cricky, wouldn't Mother be mad if she caught you? Where did you put them? Well, I'll tell you about Katy and Gertie for four cookies."

"Old Greedy, I'll give you three if you'll tell all about it."

"No you don't, you promised you'd bring me two if I told about the girls. Get them quick, I'm hungry."

"All right, if you'll promise to stay right there till I come back."

"All right."

"You're grinning. Promise honor bright."

"Honor bright."

"Hope to die?"

"Oh, yep, trot along."

Chicken Little, relenting, was back in three minutes with the entire cache of cookies, which she religiously divided and the children munched contentedly while Chicken Little speculated as to what the wonderful excursion could be. With feminine persistence she wormed a few more facts from Ernest.

"Carol and Sherm going?"

The cookies had limbered up Ernest's tongue.

"Yep," he answered, but suddenly remembered himself when his small sister began to giggle.

"Bet we're going hazel-nutting. Ernest, tell me."

"Sha'n't tell you another thing and you might as well let up."

"If I can get you off the sofa will you?"

The old haircloth sofa had been a famous battle ground between the children for the past two years, and many a frolic they had had on its slippery length. Ernest would entrench himself firmly in its depths and Chicken Little would tug at arms or legs or head indiscriminately in an effort to dislodge him. She not infrequently succeeded, for while he was much the stronger, the old sofa was so slippery it was difficult to cling to it.

Chicken Little did not wait for an answer now. She made a grab at his head which he defended vigorously. A sharp tussle ensued. She got his legs on the floor twice, but he still clung to the back with his hands.

"Huh, girls are no good!" he ejaculated breathlessly.

Chicken Little's only reply was a dash at the clinging hands.

"No you don't!"

But he spoke too soon. Chicken Little pried one hand loose and throwing her weight on the other arm before he could recover his hold, rolled him triumphantly off on the floor.

"Anyway, I didn't promise to tell," he crowed.

Saturday morning was a testimonial to the weather man's good nature. It was glorious with a little frosty tang to the air and a belt of blue haze over the distant woods.

Sister Sue couldn't go, but Mrs. Morton generously permitted Alice to supply her place, and Frank Morton was to take them out to Duck Creek some three miles away and call for them again after office hours in the afternoon. The children were wild with excitement. Alice had fried chicken before breakfast, and there had been such hunting for bags and baskets that Frank said if they filled half of them, the horses wouldn't be able to drag the crowd and their plunder home.

The old carriage fairly bristled with heads and waving arms as they drove off. Chicken Little sat squeezed in with Katy, Sherm and Carol on the back seat uncomfortable but happy. Even timid Gertie chattered in her excitement.

The youngsters had dressed up especially for the occasion. Sherm was resplendent in a scarlet and white baseball cap that set off his red hair to advantage. Ernest took his straw hat because he said it shaded his eyes, and much reading had made his eyes sensitive. Katy and Gertie, just alike, were trim in blue gingham with smart little blue bows on their flying pig-tails. And Jane was brown, hair, eyes, and tanned skin as well as her dress, with a red coat like a frosted sumach leaf on top. Carol felt quite grown up in an old hunting jacket of his father's. He had stuck two homemade arrows in his belt as a final touch.

Duck Creek was ablaze with autumn leaves and the hazel thickets were full of the tempting gray-brown clusters, though the nuts themselves when cracked seemed a trifle green.

"They don't taste like the hazel nuts you buy," said Katy.

"'Cause they're not dry yet, Goosie." This from Sherman.

"Bet you never picked a hazel nut before!" put in Ernest.

"Well, I've been hickory-nutting three times, and I guess you've never seen Niagara Falls and I have!" boasted Katy by way of keeping her self-respect.

The children worked busily all morning only stopping now and then to chase the squirrels who came scolding the intruders for taking their winter stores. By noon Alice declared they had more nuts than they could stow away in the old carriage, if they hoped to get in themselves.

Sherm and Gertie found a tempting persimmon tree and there were some wry-looking faces till Alice showed them how to find the fruit the frost had sweetened. After that the persimmons became immensely popular, and dresses and jackets alike were liberally stained with the mushy orange pulp to which samples of the picnic dinner were added later. They spread their feast out in the sunshine, using the sacks of nuts for seats, and waging war on intrusive ants and whole colonies of welcoming flies.

"I don't see what the Lord made so many flies for," said Sherm disgustedly fishing one daintily out of the butter by the tips of its wings.

"My, they are thick!" said Alice. "Cover up the cake, Chicken Little."

"What shall we do now?" inquired Carol relaxing after the hard labor of eating three pieces of chicken, two hard-boiled eggs, a generous wedge of pie, and two chunks of cake.

"Do?--I should think you'd need a rest, Carol," Alice replied slyly. She had been mentally thanking her stars she didn't have to cook for Carol very often.

"I say we hunt that old cave," suggested Sherm.

"Huh, Frank says he used to hunt for that confounded old cave when he was a boy till he wore out enough shoe leather to have one dug."

"I don't care--my father says there used to be one somewhere along here, but he guesses the mouth must have got covered up when Duck Creek changed its course. You know the creek used to flow on the other side of the island there. But when they had that tarnation big freshet about twenty years ago, it cut through this side too and made the island."

"Yes, I remember hearing my father tell about that flood--it was before the war," said Alice with interest. "A lot of people got drowned and they say some of the Seventh Day Adventists thought the end of the world had come."

"Maybe the cave got washed out," hazarded Carol who was beginning to feel that Alice's advice to rest sounded good. He felt sleepy.

"Couldn't have--Father said it was quite a ways up the bank. Said he explored it once when he was a boy. He talks about coming out to hunt for it himself, but he won't," explained Sherm.

"There's a lot about a big cave in Kentucky in our Geography," put in Katy who hated to be left out of anything.

"Yep--the Mammoth," said Ernest. "Well, come on, Sherm, let's us have a try at it."

"Let us go, too, Ern," piped Chicken Little.

"No you don't--you'd get all tired out and want to come back."

Chicken Little opened her mouth to protest but Alice interposed.

"We will think up something nice to do here. We might hunt for it over on that wooded bank. Nobody seems to know where it was--it's just as likely to be one place as another."

"We might find some bitter-sweet berries. Mother said she wished we'd bring her some if we saw any." Gertie was getting to her feet stiffly, her legs cramped from being doubled under her.

"Yes," added Katy, "she wants some sumach leaves, too. You boys can just go off by yourselves. I bet we have the most fun."

Carol had pillowed his curly head on a bag of nuts and was deaf to the other boy's urging to "Come Along." He was fast asleep before they were fairly out of sight.

Alice said they'd leave him as a guard for the nuts and wraps. She set off with the little girls in the opposite direction from that taken by the boys.

"Wouldn't it be fun if we could find the cave?" exclaimed Chicken Little, who had been studying over the glorious possibility for several minutes.

"Why, yes, you might find an Aladdin's lamp there," replied Alice teasingly.

Jane was not to be discouraged. "We might find something. Let's play we do anyway. What'd you like to find, Katy?"

Katy considered.

"I'd like to find all those silver spoons and watches the burglars stole from the Jones' and Gassetts' last month. Then we'd get the twenty-five dollars reward and I could buy a lot of things."

Alice laughed.

"Those things are probably up in Chicago in some pawn shop long before this, Katy. It's only in stories that burglars hide things in caves."

"Well, they might," insisted Katy.

"Yes, the moon might be made of green cheese--but it isn't," returned Alice.

"Well, anyway, we can play we find the things," said Chicken Little.

Gertie surprised them all by saying: "I'd like to find a weenty teenty bear cub."

"Gertie Halford, whatever would you do with a bear cub? You'd be scared to death of it." Katy looked at her sister in scornful amazement.

"I'd like to find those stock certificates Father lost," said Alice. "Perhaps we'll find them tied round your bear's neck, Gertie."

This absurdity made the children laugh as they toiled through the underbrush, which was getting dense, planning merrily. They wandered and explored for about half an hour up and down the bank, finding nothing but a few haw-berries, some sumach leaves, and a pocket full of acorns which Gertie was taking back to Carol to carve into dishes, for her. Carol was an expert with his knife.

Chicken Little had a big scratch on her arm from a thorn bush, and Katy a long tear in her blue gingham dress, which greatly annoyed her.

"Let's go back to Carol--this isn't any fun," she complained.

But Alice had just spied something that interested her.

"I bet I know what we can find that you'll all like," she said. "Wild grapes! I see a big vine over on that tree by the rocks. It's in a perfect thicket and there may be some left."

It was difficult forcing their way through the bushes. They were almost tempted to give up but Alice was sure she smelled grapes and Chicken Little and Katy were eager to carry back some booty to make the boys curious.

So they plodded on getting so many scratches and slaps from overhanging branches and interlacing bushes that they made a joke of them.

"Mr. Bush, if you catch my hair again, I'll break a piece out of you," and Chicken Little gave the offending bush such a shove that it promptly rebounded, grazing her cheek.

"Never mind," said Alice. "I've got my thirteenth scratch and my hair's almost down. I won't have a hair-pin left by the time we get out of this."

"I guess Mother will feel bad about my dress, but maybe she won't mind so much if we take her some wild grapes. She hasn't had any this year. Oh, bother these burrs!" and Katy stooped down to pick a bunch from her shoe strings and several scattered ones from her white stockings already profusely streaked with green and brown stains.

Gertie bringing up the rear of the little procession was too busy defending her head and face against briars and brush to say anything.

Alice crashed through a particularly matted growth of bushes and gave a shout of triumph. "Here we are, children, and there are grapes--scads of them!"

They found themselves under a low spreading oak that was fairly canopied with huge wild grape vines that hung almost to the ground on three sides, forming a big tent. The grapes were plentiful and the fragrance delicious. But, alas, these were like the grapes the fox found sour, most of them hung high above their reach.

"What a shame--if only the boys were here they might climb!" said Alice disgusted.

"I can climb if you'll boost me, Alice," Chicken Little volunteered quickly.

Alice was surveying the tempting fruit thoughtfully.

"I don't believe you could reach them if you did, Chicken Little. See, you'd have to go clear out on the ends of the branches. Perhaps if we'd go up on the hill above--it's pretty steep here--we could reach some. It will be hard to get through--there's a perfect rat's nest of vines and bushes."

Chicken Little was already crawling under the overhanging vines. She soon shouted a discovery.

"Say, somebody's cut a little path here through the bushes. Come on--it's easy after you get through a little ways."

The others followed and sure enough there was a faintly worn path leading off up the hill side. Some of the densest undergrowth had been trimmed a little to permit a fairly easy passage.

"How queer!" Alice exclaimed. "Somebody's been here right lately. Funny they didn't take the grapes--they're dead ripe."

"Whoever came here last crawled right in under those vines." Katy's sharp eyes had noticed how the weeds had been crushed down by some heavy body and that some of the vines were broken.

"You're right--they have--dear me, I hope it isn't a tramp!" Alice replied, a little anxious. "Anyway he wasn't here today because--see those leaves he broke off are dead."

"What do you suppose he went in there for?" demanded Katy.

"I'm sure I can't imagine--to hide maybe," Alice looked puzzled.

"Oh, maybe he was the burglar--maybe he hid the things under there--I'm going to find out," and before Alice could stop her, Chicken Little was disappearing under the vines again.

"O-h--Oh! I'm 'fraid! Oh, Alice, don't let her!" Gertie flew to the protection of Alice's skirts in terror and Katy edged nearer to her side.

"Don't Chicken Little--don't--come back--there might be snakes under there." Alice was worried herself.

The mention of snakes brought Katy with a scream to cling to her arm, but Jane was not to be daunted. They could hear her puffing and breaking off twigs as she progressed. Suddenly there was a complete silence and Alice's heart jumped with fear lest something had happened to the child.

"Jane," she called anxiously.

"I'm here, Alice, but there's something funny--there's a great big hole in between some rocks--only I can't see much, 'cause there's so many vines and it's dark."

"Oh, do you s'pose it's a bear den? Oh, I want my mother!" Gertie began to whimper.

"Shut up, silly, there aren't any bears 'round here!" said Katy unfeelingly. "It's a woodchuck hole most likely."

"I wonder if it could be that cave," said Alice. "You wait here, girls, I'm going in there too."

Alice fought her way in to Chicken Little's side. Sure enough there was a dark hole about two feet high.

Jane encouraged by Alice's presence was for exploring at once, but Alice caught her dress determinedly.

"Don't you dare, Jane Morton, it wouldn't be safe--there might be snakes--you can't tell what's in there. I believe whoever came in here went into that hole--see, here's two foot prints. I think we'd better get out of this."

Alice made Chicken Little precede her back to the spot where Katy and Gertie were waiting.

The Halford girls were thoroughly frightened and clamored to go home. Alice hesitated.

"I hate not to get some of those grapes after all our trouble. I don't believe there's anybody round here now and there hasn't been a wild animal seen on Duck Creek for years."

"I could reach those over there if you'd hold me up, Alice," said Chicken Little.

"Pooh, I can get some by myself," said Katy reassured by Alice's words.

"Well, let's fill this old apron anyhow, it won't hurt it." Alice had worn an old apron to protect herself against the muss of the lunch and had forgotten to take it off.

They all set to work, but the apron proved capacious and before it was half loaded, they heard a shrill whistle below them and Carol's voice calling:

"Hello there--where have you got to?"

An answering call soon brought him to the tree.

"Whew, aren't they beauties?" he gloated, surprised.

"How'd you find us?" inquired Katy.

"Trailed you by your tracks--woke up and found everybody vamoosed and I knew it was no good going after the boys and----" he was not allowed to finish.

"Oh, Carol, we've found the cave!" Chicken Little's voice was shrill with importance.

"Honest to goodness?" Carol looked incredulous.

"Cross my heart," affirmed Katy promptly though she hadn't so much as had a glimpse of the mysterious hole.

"Where?"

"Under there--I'll show you," Jane made a dive for the vines but Alice caught her arm.

"You are not going in there again."

"Show me--I'll go." Carol was eager with excitement.

"Got any matches, Carol?"

"No, but Ern has a pocket full."

"I tell you--the boys must be coming back by this time. You go meet them while we finish picking these grapes and when they come we'll explore the thing. Cut some big sticks and bring them along, Carol." Alice had hardly finished speaking before Carol was off.

Fifteen minutes later the boys were heard hallooing below them. They came swarming through the thicket excited and breathless.

"Bully for Chicken Little Jane!" cheered Sherm when they got the facts. "Here, Carol, give me your knife and I'll hack away some of these vines."

The boys cleared a way in a jiffy, letting in a stream of light at the same time so they could see more of the hole.

"I bet you 'tis!"

"Geewhillikens, I wonder how big it is!"

"Alice says somebody has been in there--they have too--see there!"

"Here boys, go slow. Light a match and throw it in and see how much you can see," Alice counselled.

The match illuminated only a little way and a lone chipmunk darted out. It was certainly a cave but apparently empty as they heard no further movement.

The boys tied a half dozen matches on the end of a stick and thrust it in. This improvised torch worked beautifully. The cave was only a small affair about three feet one way and five the other--not high enough for Carol to stand upright. It was so hung with cobwebs they could not see into the corners clearly. The floor was partly covered with dead leaves that had drifted in and were fast decaying into mold.

As their eyes penetrated the dimness, three of the children gave a yell in unison.

"There's something over in that corner!"

The something proved to be a market basket covered with an old gunny-sack.

Ernest insisted on going after it. Satisfied that the cave contained nothing else they rushed their trophy out to the light and examined its contents. It yielded a regular pirate treasure.

"What under the sun?" Alice opened eyes and mouth in blank amazement. "Children, sure as you're born, we've found that stolen silver!"

The basket was speedily emptied. One silver sugar bowl, four dozen spoons, two silver goblets, a watch and some small pieces of jewelry were revealed, besides a package of official looking papers.

"There's Mrs. Jones' pin. I remember they advertised one big pearl set round with ten little ones. But what do you suppose these papers are?" Carol and Alice were busy untying them.

"Well, 'pon my soul!--do you suppose we are bewitched?--they've got my father's name on them. Pinch me and see if I'm dreaming." Alice looked at the papers in a daze, Ernest and Carol staring over her shoulder.

"They're some sort of legal papers 'cause they've got those big red seals on them."

"It is your father's name--Donald Fletcher. We'll take them home to Father--he'll know what they are," said Ernest.

"Yes, that would be best and we must be getting back. Frank will be waiting for us."