The second officer's eye flashed, and he nodded understandingly.

"Aye, aye, sir," he replied. "As for the men, sir," he went on reflectively, "there's a dozen I could stake my life on who wouldn't be in any crooked game. Suppose," he counted off on his fingers, "we take Olsen and Binney and Barker and Dodd and Thompson and Willis. They're all true blue, and I don't think they're in such a funk over the volcano as some of the others."

"They'll do," a.s.sented the captain. "They're the very men I had in mind. Call some of them down now and have them get this stuff up on deck. And tell the cook to send dinner grub along, for we may be gone all day."

"Aye, aye, sir," answered Rogers, as he left the cabin.

A little later the party gathered at the rail, and the captain spoke to the mate.

"Mr. Rogers is going to take us ash.o.r.e, Mr. Ditty," he said pleasantly.

"There are no special orders. You can let some of the men have sh.o.r.e leave if they want it, although after yesterday I don't suppose they will."

"I suppose not," replied Ditty surlily. "They'll all be glad when we turn our backs on this cursed island."

The captain pretended not to hear. The goods were stowed in the boat, the party and crew took their places, and the craft was pulled smartly to the beach.

"Now, my lads," said the captain briskly, as he stepped ash.o.r.e, "there's quite a trip ahead of you and you've got a man's job in carrying this stuff, but I'll see that you don't lose anything by it.

Step up smartly now."

The men shouldered their burdens and started off on the trail that had now grown familiar to the treasure seekers. The men were able to maintain a fairly rapid pace, and before long the party arrived at the edge of the clearing within which the treasure was supposed to be buried.

The captain took Rogers aside.

"Take your men back to the beach now, Mr. Rogers," he directed.

"Remember, I want none of them poking about here. We'll rejoin you in good season for supper, if not before."

"Aye, aye, sir!" was the cheerful reply.

Rogers turned with his men, and the captain watched their backs far down the forest path, until they were lost to sight in the greenery of the jungle.

"Well now," he remarked, as he turned again to the others, "lively's the word. Let's get busy and----. Great Scott! Look at that!" he exclaimed, staring at the top of the whale's hump.

A column of black smoke was rising from the crater.

"Looks like the whale was going to blow again," Tyke said, with a feeble attempt at levity to disguise his apprehension.

The next moment the ears of the party were deafened by a terrific explosion.

CHAPTER XXVIII

BY FAVOR OF THE EARTHQUAKE

No thunder that had ever been heard could be compared with the sound of the explosion. It was like the bellowing of a thousand cannon. It was as though the island were being ripped apart.

The earth shook and staggered drunkenly beneath the feet of the treasure seekers. Great trees in the adjacent forest fell with tremendous uproar. The slope of the whale's hump was ridged until it looked like a giant accordion. Creva.s.ses opened, extending from the summit of the hill downward. Rocks came tumbling down by the score, and a column of smoke and flame rose from the crater to a height of two hundred feet or more.

None of the party had been able to keep on a footing. All had been thrown to the ground by the first shock, and there they lay, sick from that awful seismic vibration.

A cloud of almost impalpable dust spread broadly and shrouded the sun.

There was not a breath of air astir. Not a living thing was to be seen in the open--even the lizards had disappeared.

The spot where they had delved the day before, was now in plain view to the treasure seekers. They saw the hillside yawn there in an awful paroxysm, till the aperture was several yards wide. Then, from beneath, there shot into the open, smoking rocks, debris of many kinds, and--something else! Drew, seeing this final object, shrieked aloud.

His voice could not be heard above the uproar, but the others saw his mouth agape, and struggled to see that at which he was pointing so wildly.

The creva.s.se closed with a crash and jar that rocked the whole island.

It was the final throe of the volcano's travail. The lurid light above the crater subsided. The dust began to fall thick upon the treasure seekers as they lay upon the ground. They sat up, dazed and horror-stricken. It was some time before their palsied tongues could speak, and when they did, the words came almost in whispers.

Drew found that his arm was around Ruth. She had been near him when the first shock came, and he had seized her instinctively. Now he turned to her and asked:

"You're not hurt, are you, Ruth?"

"N--no," she gasped, "but dreadfully frightened! Oh, let's get away from here!"

She realized that he was holding her and drew away with a faint blush.

He released her and staggered to his feet.

Tyke and the captain followed suit, and the three men looked at each other.

"Now, if I was superst.i.tious----" began Tyke in a quavering voice.

"Never mind any 'ifs' just now," interrupted the captain. "We've got to get away from here just as fast as the good Lord will let us. I don't believe in tempting Providence."

"And leave the doubloons?" queried Tyke, in dismay.

"Yes, and leave the doubloons," replied the captain stubbornly. "If Ruth weren't here, we men might take a chance, but my daughter is worth more to me than all the pirate gold buried in the Caribbean."

Drew, if inaudibly, agreed with him. "Let's get Ruth down to the sh.o.r.e, anyway," he said. "Then, if you'll come back---- I saw something just at that last crash."

"By the great jib-boom!" roared Tyke, "so did I. What did you see, Allen? Something shot up out o' one o' them pits we dug yesterday. I saw it. An' it wasn't a lava boulder, neither!"

"You're right, there," Drew agreed. "It was a box or something. Too square-shaped to be a rock."

"We can't fool with it now," Captain Hamilton said, with determination, though his eyes sparkled. "Come, Ruth. I must get you down to the boat."

But here the girl exercised a power of veto. "I don't go unless the rest of you do--and to remain, too," she declared. "I am not a child.

Of course, I'm afraid of that volcano. But so are you men. And it's all over now. If Allen really saw something that looked like a box or a chest thrown out of that opening, I'm going to----"

She left the rest unspoken, but started boldly for the barren patch where they had dug the day before. It looked now like a piece of plowed ground over which were scattered blocks of lava of all sizes and shapes.

Captain Hamilton hesitated, but Drew ran ahead, reaching the spot first. Anxious and frightened as he had been at the moment of the phenomenon, the young man had noted exactly the spot where the strange object had fallen. Half buried in a heap of earth was a discolored, splintered chest. Its ancient appearance led Drew to utter a shout of satisfaction.

"I guess we've got it," he remarked in a tone that he tried to keep calm, but which trembled in spite of himself.

A cry of delight rose from all. The men joined Drew, and helped him clear away the earth. The chest soon stood revealed. Then by using their spades as levers, they pried it loose and by their united efforts dragged it over to the shade at the jungle's edge. They sat beside it there, panting, almost too exhausted from the excitement and their tremendous efforts to move or speak.

Ruth fluttered about like a humming bird, excited and eager. She looked somewhat less disheveled and begrimed than the men. But if they looked like trench diggers, they felt like plutocrats, and their hearts were swelling with jubilation.