Chapter 25 The Quest of the Missing Map by Carolyn Keene
The End of the Quest
Bright sunlight streamed through the porthole of Nancy’s cabin as she opened her eyes. The room was uncomfortably warm, and she immediately knew that it was very late. Jumping up from bed, she awakened Bess and George, who shared the other bunks.
“Get up!” she urged. “It must be at least nine o’clock. I don’t know how we overslept.”
“How still it is,” Bess remarked, sitting up in bed. “Not a sound except the slapping of the waves against the boat.”
“And for good reason!” exclaimed George. “Just read this!”
She had picked up a note lying on the dresser. Ellen’s name was signed to the bottom and it read:
“We’ve all gone to the island. Trixie talked Mrs. Chatham into the idea of getting started early. Join us as soon as you awaken.”
“Now isn’t that nice?” George demanded indignantly. “They’ve gone off and left us. By this time they may have found the treasure.”
Quickly dressing, the girls had one of the sailors row them to the beach.
“I don’t see our crowd anywhere,” Nancy declared, gazing about in perplexity. “They should be close to the water’s edge.”
Only after a long search did the three chums find their friends in a barren, rocky section of the island.
A huge pile of dirt had been thrown up by the men of the party, who had taken turns digging. At the moment of the girls’ arrival, Tom More and Bill Tomlin had collapsed beneath a tree.
“Oh, Nancy, we’re so discouraged,” Mrs. Chatham greeted her. “We’ve worked for over two hours and haven’t found anything.”
“We followed instructions exactly, too,” added Ellen gloomily. “We thought Tom had found the buried fortune right away, but when he didn’t we thought we might as well go on working and save you the disappointments. But it’s no use. The story must be a hoax.”
“Which maps did you use?” Nancy asked, her eyes troubled.
“Why, Captain John Tomlin’s parchment and your copy of Father’s lost section,” Ellen replied, offering the two pieces for inspection.
“But this is the second copy I made,” Nancy said excitedly. “Don’t tell me you used this. Where did you get it?”
“Trixie found it. Isn’t it an accurate map?”
“Accurate, yes, but I’m not surprised it misled you.”
“I wish you would explain,” Ned said wearily. “Haven’t we been digging in the right place?”
“Not within forty yards. You see, this is the copy of the copy I made, if you gather my meaning. When Irene and Fred Brown followed me that day and I was afraid they might steal the precious paper, I mailed it to Dad at his office. Just before that I made a sketch of it, but I deliberately made all the instructions appear backward.”
“Then we’ve done all this digging to no purpose!” Bill Tomlin groaned. “Guess it served us right for going off without you girls this morning.”
Nancy adjusted the map to the bright sunlight. Thus viewed, with the directions showing through it, the diagram appeared in its true order.
“Come on, fellows,” Ned cried, seizing a spade. “This time we work in earnest.”
With Nancy directing operations, the ground was paced off according to instructions. The actual site proved to be beneath a huge palm, on a beautiful knoll overlooking the rolling sea.
“Dig here!” Nancy said, chalking off a large rectangle on the ground. “If I’ve made no mistake we should find the treasure.”
For half an hour the young men toiled faithfully, turning up mounds upon mounds of sand and dirt. As the sun rose higher, they became hot and discouraged.
“If the chest is here, it’s sure buried deep,” Bill Tomlin complained.
“Maybe the treasure was removed years ago,” murmured Mr. Smith, who watched the work from the shade. “I’ve always been afraid it would be gone.”
“Don’t give up yet,” said Nancy quietly. “The hole isn’t very deep.”
The digging was resumed. After perhaps fifteen minutes Ned’s spade struck a hard substance.
“Probably just a rock,” he said without much hope.
Turning up another spadeful of dirt he bent to examine the object.
“This is no rock!” he cried jubilantly. “I think we’ve found the treasure!”
The others began to dig with renewed energy. Presently the top of a rusty iron chest was uncovered. Another five minutes, and the men were able to lift it from the hole.
“It seems too good to be true,” Ellen murmured, tears of happiness in her eyes. “The treasure is ours at last.”
“Nancy must have the honor of lifting the lid,” Mrs. Chatham declared, fairly beside herself with excitement. “Had it not been for her, none of us would be here at this moment.”
“I shall pass my honor on to Ned,” Nancy laughed. “The chest must be opened with a crowbar, and I never was handy with tools!”
The young men fell to work again and soon succeeded in prying off the lid. As they lifted it there was a moment of stunned silence. Inside lay heap upon heap of gold and silver coins, jewelry and rich ornaments from all over the world. That the wealth had been collected by Grandfather Captain Tomlin they could not doubt, for a stained letter addressed to his descendants bore his signature.
“Father! This means we’ll never again have to worry about money!” Ellen exclaimed, tears of happiness glistening in her eyes. “We owe Nancy for this wonderful hour!”
“It’s been a glorious adventure,” declared Mrs. Chatham. “The money doesn’t mean so much to me, but this trip has given me a new lease on life. It has brought Trixie and me closer together.”
A great deal of labor was required to transport the contents of the treasure chest to the Primrose, but at last it was accomplished. Mrs. Chatham, Bill Tomlin and the Smiths consulted together, with the result that they bestowed a generous gift upon the Heyborns, and similar tokens for every member of the expedition. As her share, Nancy received a beautiful jeweled bracelet, by far the finest piece in the collection.
With such a precious cargo aboard, Captain Stryver was somewhat worried lest the prisoners make trouble. He tried to keep the news from them, but they overheard the excited conversations of those aboard. The three were furious, each blaming the other for their failure to obtain the money.
“How did the men get together in the first place!” asked the young people of Nancy, who had heard the prisoners’ confessions.
“When Bellows failed to buy Mr. Smith’s half of the map, he got in touch with his old partner Spike,” she explained. “To his surprise he found his friend already had heard the story from the Warwick’s first mate, and was working on it from the Captain John Tomlin angle.”
As Nancy paused, George spoke up. “When Spike traced Mrs. Chatham, it was easy for him to work at Rocky Edge. He was familiar with the place for years before he had robbed it.”
“He hid in the house and in the studio,” added Bess. “He overheard many things, and found out Mrs. Chatham had a lot of money in the safe. When he needed some cash, he took the opportunity of capturing Trixie.”
“Spike used the secret room in the studio to examine all the papers he could lay his hands on,” went on Nancy. “When Trixie and I bothered him, he tried to scare us.”
“Was he the one who stole my half map?” asked Ellen’s father.
“Yes. Bellows got him to do that.”
“Where do the Browns fit in?” inquired Bill Tomlin.
“They were part of the ring, but didn’t get along very well with the others,” explained Nancy. “They thought they were better than Bullseye and Spike. But Spike managed to get the wanted piece of map from them—at least the one Hannah made. She copied the word ‘Little,’ thus giving Spike the third word in the name of the island, but she misled him completely in the directions to the treasure.
“Blessed Hannah Gruen really saved this treasure, do you know it? If she had given away the right piece, the buried box might have been gone by the time we reached here!”
“Three cheers for her!” cried Ellen.
“And three cheers for Nancy Drew!” said Mr. Smith warmly. “She solved the mystery of my missing brother.”
“She succeeded in her quest for the lost half of the map,” added Ned warmly.
“And caught the villains!” put in Bill Tomlin. “She even——”
“Oh, stop it!” cried Nancy, blushing to the roots of her hair. “I couldn’t have done a thing without the help of every one of you.”
That was like the girl—to remain generous and unspoiled no matter how much praise was heaped upon her. This was to remain true as she solved her next mystery, “The Clue in the Jewel Box.”
“Come on, let’s sing,” Nancy urged.
She started a familiar tune which the crowd took up. Their voices carried far across the water as the Primrose started for its home port. The adventure was at an end.
THE END