A Struggle for a Fortune

“That will be my misfortune and not my fault. So, Mr. Graves believes in ghosts, does he?” said Nat, to himself. “I wish to goodness that I knew whether or not Jonas and Caleb believed in them, too. Somehow I feel more afraid of those two men than I do of anything else.” Then aloud he said: “If I believed as your father does I would not come up here for anything; but I have not seen the ghosts yet, and until I do, I am going to stick to my plan. You can carry the provisions up to Mr. Nickerson’s house, can’t you, and then you can put them down and go back if you want to.”

“And do you mean that you are really going on?” exclaimed Peleg, who was really amazed at the boy’s courage.

“Yes, sir, I am going on; and no one will care whether I succeed or not. Come on, Peleg. You must walk faster than that.”

There was no use of trying to get rid of Peleg; Nat saw that plainly enough. He increased his pace and Peleg, as if afraid of being left behind, increased his own and readily kept up with him. He did not have any more to say about the ghosts until after they had covered the half of a dozen miles that lay between them and Mr. Nickerson’s farm; and then they turned off the road, climbed a fence and found themselves in a thicket of bushes which enveloped them on all sides so that they could not see two feet in advance of them. Then Peleg’s courage gave away altogether.

“I believe I won’t go any further,” said he; and he made a move as if he were going to put down the provisions he was carrying. “It is awful dark in there, ain’t it?”

“Pretty dark,” whispered Nat, bending down and trying to see through the bushes. “But this is nothing to what it will be when night comes. If we are going to hear anything we will hear it then. Will you be afraid to come down here to get the spade and pick-ax to-morrow?”

“You just bet I will,” answered Peleg, and Nat noticed that his face was as white as it could get. “If you don’t get that spade and pick-ax until I bring them up to you, you will wait a long while before you do any digging.”

“Well, pick up the provisions and come along,” said Nat, who was getting really impatient. “Stay right close behind me, and if I see any ghosts I will shoo them off.”

Once more Nat started on and Peleg, not daring to remain behind, gathered up his burden and kept along close on his heels. It was a long way through the bushes to the back of Mr. Nickerson’s farm, and with almost every step Peleg heard something that alarmed him; a bird chirped in the thicket close beside him or a ground squirrel vociferously scolded them as they drew near and hurried off to his retreat, and several times he was on the point of throwing down the provisions and taking to his heels. But there was the money that they were after. That had a stronger attraction to him than his fear of the ghosts, and when Nat threw aside the last branch and stepped out into the open field, Peleg was right behind, although he was all out of breath and sweating so, as he affirmed, that he could hear it rattling on the leaves.

“When we go back let us go the other way,” panted Peleg, looking around for a place to sit down. “I am just tired out. Now what are you going to do? Here is the spot, and if you have not got them papers with you, how do you know where to dig?”

“The papers are all in my head where no one will get them,” said Nat, laying down his armful of provisions and looking around to see if there was a path that led down the hill. “You stay here and rest, and I will go on and see – ”

“Not much I won’t stay here,” exclaimed Peleg, rising to his feet as Nat started off. “I am going to stay close by you. I wish I had known about the ghosts. I wouldn’t have come one peg.”

“So do I,” said Nat to himself. “If I can get up some way to scare you to-night, I shall be happy.”

To have seen Nat go to work one would have supposed that he knew where the money was hidden and all about it. He went as straight as he could go to the corner of the ruins of Mr. Nickerson’s house, and there he stopped and his lips moved as if he were holding a consultation with himself.

“Six to one and a half dozen to the other,” he muttered, as if he were not aware that Peleg was anywhere within reach of him. “That paper is burned up here in the ruins, but I have got it in my head.”

“What are you trying to get through yourself, Nat?” said Peleg. “Talk English so that I can understand you.”

Nat did not act as though he had heard him at all.

“The next is a beech tree on the right hand side,” continued Nat. “Now let me see if that can be found.”

“What about the beech tree? There is one down there at the foot of the hill.”

Nat had already started off toward the beech tree, and a little way from it found a pile of briers; but did not look at them more than once. He went around on the left hand side of the beech tree, and throwing back his head gazed earnestly into the branches.

“Now whichever way that limb points, it points to the hiding-place of the papers,” said “But there are not any limbs that point Nat. any way. They all seem to point upward to the sky. If this is the tree I’ll soon make the limb move. Here, watch that branch and see if it don’t stir. Six of one and half a dozen of the other.”

“What do you keep saying those words for all the time?” inquired Peleg. “Why don’t you talk so that I can understand it?”

“That is a secret that Mr. Nickerson used while he was engaged in burying the papers,” said Nat, a bright idea striking him. “Come here and I will tell you all about it,” he added, catching Peleg by the arm and drawing his face close to his own. “You see these trees and everything about here is in sympathy with Mr. Nickerson, because he is dead, you know. I might come up here or you might come up here and look for those papers, and if we did not have the secret that Mr. Nickerson used while concealing them, why, we wouldn’t know any more about it than we do now. I declare that branch moves; don’t you see it?”

Peleg looked earnestly into the tree but could see nothing. Nat even got hold of him and pulled him around and twisted his head on one side so that he could see the upper part of the tree, but the moving of the limb was something that Peleg could not discern.

“It only moved a little bit so that I could see it,” said Nat, in explanation. “You have got to be quick or you can’t see it. Now we will go off this way and see if we can find something else.”

There was some little thing about this that was certainly uncanny – something that did not look natural to Peleg. The idea of a boy having some mysterious words at his command which made inanimate nature obey him was a new thing to him, and he did not know what to make of it; but Nat seemed to think it was all right and went ahead as if he had been expecting it. He stepped across the brook and moved up the hill, but before he had taken many steps he came back and put his face close to Peleg’s again.

“I must tell you one thing so that you will not be frightened,” said he, in a whisper. “When I get on the track of those papers you’ll hear something.”

“What is it like?” said Peleg, in the same cautious whisper.

“I don’t know. It may be like the report of a cannon; or it may be like something else you never heard of. You must keep your mind on those papers while we are looking for them.”

Nat went on ahead and in a few moments more he stepped upon the very stone which was buried half way in the earth and covered the hiding place of his money. His heart bounded at the thought. If Peleg was away and he had the pick-ax and spade at his command he would be a rich boy in less than half an hour.

“I don’t see it,” said he, dolefully.

“Don’t see what?” said Peleg. “If you repeat your words once more perhaps it will come to you.”

“Six of one and a half dozen of the other,” exclaimed Nat; and instantly there came a response that he had not been expecting. A huge dead poplar, which stood on the bank a hundred feet away, suddenly aroused itself into life and action, took part in Nat’s invocation and sent a thrill of terror through him and Peleg. A branch of the tree about fifty feet from the ground, as large as any of the ordinary trees that were standing around them, ceased its hold upon the parent trunk and came with a stunning crash to the ground. Peleg was so startled that he fairly jumped, while Nat stood perfectly thunderstruck.

This was nothing more than the boys had been accustomed to all their lives. Such sounds were not new in the country in which they had been brought up, and when any settler heard a sound like that coming from the woods he said: “Now we are going to have falling weather.” An old “deadening” is the best place to watch for omens of this kind. The farmer, not having the time or force to clear his land, cuts away all the underbrush and uses his axe to “circle” the trees so that he can put in his crop. The trees stand there until they dry and rot, all the vitality being taken away from them, and finally drop all their limbs until the trunk stands bare. Nat, after he had taken time to think twice, knew in a moment what had caused the poplar to shed its limbs, and was aware that it was one of the incidents of his everyday life; but Peleg, who had been warned that something was going to happen if they found the trail of the papers, was frightened out of his wits. After it struck the ground he remained motionless.

“What did I tell you?” whispered Nat. “Didn’t I tell you that you would hear something drop?”

“Whew!” stammered Peleg. “I have seen enough of this place. I am going home as quick as I can go.”

“Hold on, Peleg,” exclaimed Nat, who was overjoyed to hear him talk this way. “We will hear something else pretty soon, and that will let us know that we are close to the papers.”

“You can stay and look for them until you are blind,” said Peleg, who was taking long strides toward the other side of the brook. “You will never see them papers. I believe you are cahoots with the ‘Old Fellow’ himself.”

As Peleg said this he pointed with his finger toward the ground. He did not care to mention who the “old fellow” was. When he was across the brook he broke into a run and dashed up the hill. He did not even stop to take with him his gun, ammunition or the provisions he had brought up from Manchester. He kept clear of the bushes – you could not have hired Peleg to go through them alone – and when he struck the open field he increased his pace and was out of sight in a moment. Nat waited until he was well under way and then followed him to the top of the bank. He was just in time to see Peleg’s coat tails disappear over the bars; and then he dug out at his best gait for home.

“There!” said Nat taking off his hat and feeling for the extra money he had stowed away. “I am well rid of him, thank goodness. Now I will go to work and make a camp, get something to eat, and to-morrow morning I will go down and get the spade and pick-ax; that is, if the ghosts leave anything of me. But I don’t believe there are any ghosts. The storekeeper said that just to frighten him.”

But before Nat began his lean-to he wanted to see the stone that covered his fortune. It seemed strange to him that all he had to do was to pry the stone out of its place, dig for a few minutes and then he would be worth more money than he ever saw.

“There is one thing that I forgot,” said he, after he had tested the weight of the stone by trying his strength upon it. “But I will get that to-morrow. I must cut a lever with which to handle this weight.”

For the first time in a long while Nat was happy. He would be so that night – there would not anybody come near him after dark – but the next morning he would come back to himself again – sly and cunning, and afraid to make a move in any direction without carefully reconnoitering the ground. Jonas and Caleb had got him in the way of living so.

“But I will soon be free from them,” said Nat, as he left the stone walked across the brook and seated himself proceeded to find some of the cheese and crackers which Peleg had brought up. “I am free from them now; but if they come after me and catch me, why then I have got my whole business to do over again. I hope Peleg will go safely home and spread the story of the ghosts that are living here, for I don’t think Jonas will care to face them.”

Nat thoroughly enjoyed his meal, for the walk of twenty miles along that rough road was enough to give him an appetite, and all the while he was looking about him and selecting the limbs with which he intended to build his lean-to. He did not expect to be there a great while, not longer than to-morrow at any rate, but he did not believe in sleeping out while there was timber enough at hand to build him a shelter. The lean-to was soon put up, and in a very short space of time all the luggage he had was conveyed under it. A fire would come handy as soon as it grew dark, and all the rest of the time he spent in collecting fuel for it; so that when the sun went down and it began to grow gloomy in the woods, he was as well sheltered as a boy in his circumstances could expect.

“I am glad that Peleg is not here,” said Nat, as he looked all around to make sure that he had not forgotten something, and began another assault on the crackers and cheese. “I know that nothing will come here to bother me, but Peleg would all the while be listening for one of those ghosts to come down on him. There’s an owl now. His hooting sounds awful lonely in the woods.”

While Nat was stretched out on his bed of boughs listening to the mournful notes of the owl, his thoughts were exceedingly busy with sad remembrances of the old man who had labored so hard to save his money from the rebels, little dreaming that the amount would one day fall into the hands of one who needed it as badly as Nat did.

“I really wish I had some one to enjoy it with me, but I have not got any body,” Nat kept saying to himself. “The first thing I will do will be to get an education; then I can tell what I am going to do.”

So saying Nat arose and replenished the fire, then lay down and fell into a quiet sleep. He did not see a ghost nor did he dream of one the whole night.