Page 31 of The Trick of the Treasure
“A collector of antiquities. Tell me, who knew the purpose of your expedition? Everyone in the club here?”
“And several others. All my friends. It wasn’t a secret.”
“And who was this sailor who gave you the map in the first place?”
“Old Cauley? He sailed with me often in the early days, before I had my own ship. Arthritis got him in the end, though—he couldn’t work, so he never could get back to his treasure. He asked me to do it for him.”
“Then the treasure is his?”
“It would have been, but he died long before I sailed. No family.”
“Why did it take you so long to sail? Were you collecting subscriptions?”
“Lord, no. To be honest, though I thanked old Cauley for his map, I thought it was a load of old rubbish and had no intention of taking it further until I came across another old salt in a Bristol alehouse. When we discovered Cauley was a mutual acquaintance, he asked me if Cauley had ever gone back to collect his treasure. ‘What treasure?’ I asked. And the answer came back, ‘The stuff he found in the West Indies and buried on a deserted island when their ship was wrecked.’ He was ill when he was rescued, so he couldn’t dig it up and he didn’t trust his surviving shipmates.
“Anyway,” Lloyd continued, “It was enough to send me back to old Cauley for more details, but he had, sadly, died in the interim. All I knew was that the island was off East Africa, so we sailed round the Horn of Africa and anchored at every island that looked remotely the same shape as Cauley’s map. We found the right one eventually, some two hundred miles north of Madagascar.”
“It must have been like finding a needle in a haystack.”
“It was,” Lloyd said fervently. “But I needed something big like this, to cover not only the huge costs of the expedition, but also to replenish the family coffers. Expensive business, adventuring, and I can’t let my family go short.”
Hewouldlet them, though, Solomon felt, rather than give up the adventuring and take to farming the acres of his ancestral home instead.
“Do you still have the map?” Solomon asked.
“It’s on the table, with the photographs.”
Showing just how clever he had been, Solomon thought cynically, though he rose and followed Lloyd with some interest.
The map was aged, creased, and frail through being folded so often, but its shape seemed to have been drawn with attention to detail. Nothing was named, but pictures identified trees, pools, reedy grounds, and hills. A chest marked, presumably, the burial place of the treasure, with feet shapes drawn from a crooked tree through the reeds.
“Here’s the spot,” Lloyd said, picking up a photograph and pushing it in front of him. It showed the tree in the background, a lot of reeds, and several people, including Lloyd and Sydney, clustered about an open chest. Solomon thought he could make out a coin at the top of what appeared to be a sizable heap inside.
“Keep it,” Lloyd said generously. “In fact, if everyone’s finished looking, take any you like. I have several copies at home.”
This caused another stir of interest among the other men present, many of whom seemed very interested in the processes of photography.
Solomon chose a few that were similar to others and promised to return them.
“Join us for luncheon,” Lloyd said amiably, apparently forgetting his earlier annoyance.
Solomon glanced at his watch. “Sadly, I have another appointment. My thanks, sir. Gentlemen, good day.”
Chapter Seven
Constance arrived atthe office only minutes after Solomon.
“Run and fetch us all something to eat, Janey,” she said in the hall. “And then you can go about Bibby’s business. She’s at the establishment, by the way.”
“Bless you, ma’am,” Janey responded with unusual warmth, and the front door opened and closed even before Constance blew into his room like a whirlwind.
“The back door might not have been locked,” she said without greeting or introduction. “We need to speak to the servants again, and to Jemimah.”
Solomon caught her hand as she breezed past his chair and pulled her onto his lap. Before she could protest, he kissed her lips. She yielded without thought, kissing him back with enthusiasm.
“What was that for?” she asked breathlessly at last.
“We have not quite established the affectionate greetings of an engaged couple. I thought I would try this to see if you liked it.”
