The Pirate of Panama | Page 4

for reasons that will hereafter appear.
It must have been fifteen minutes after my return that our office boy, Jimmie, came in to tell me that a lady wanted to see me.
"She's a peach, too," he volunteered with the genial impudence that characterized him.
This brought me back to earth, a lawyer instead of a treasure seeker, and when my first client crossed the threshold she found me deep in a volume on contracts, eight other large and bulky reference books piled on the table.
The name on the card Jimmie had handed me was Miss Evelyn Wallace. I rose at once to meet her.
"You are Mr. John Sedgwick?" asked a soft, Southern voice that fell on my ears like music.
"I am."
My bow stopped abruptly. I stifled an exclamation. The young woman was the one I had seen framed in a second-story window some hours earlier.
"I think you know me by sight," she said, not smiling exactly, but little dimples lurking in her cheeks ready to pounce out at the first opportunity. "That is, unless you have forgotten?"
Forgotten! I might have told her it would be hard to forget that piquant, oval face of exquisite coloring, and those blue eyes in which the sunshine danced like gold. I might have, but I did not. Instead, I murmured that my memory served me well enough.
"I have come for the paper you were good enough to take care of for me, Mr. Sedgwick. It belongs to me--the paper you picked up this morning."
From my pocket I took the document and handed it to her.
"May I ask how you found out who I was, Miss Wallace?"
You might have thought that roses had brushed her cheeks and left their color there.
"I asked a policeman," she confessed, just a little embarrassed.
"To find you a man in a gray ulster, medium height, weight, and complexion," I laughed.
"I had seen you come from the Graymount once or twice, and by describing you to the landlady he discovered who you were and where you worked," she explained.
Her touch of shyness had infected me, too. It was as if unwittingly I had intruded on her private affairs, had seen that morning an incident not meant for the eyes of a stranger. We avoided the common interest between us, though both of us were thinking of it.
Later I was to learn that she had been as eager to approach the subject as I. But she could not very well invite a stranger into her difficulty any more than I could push myself into her confidence.
"I hope you find the paper exactly as you left it, or rather as it left you," I stammered at last.
She had put the map in her hand-bag, but at my words she took it out, not to verify my suggestion but to prolong for a moment her stay in order to find courage to broach the difficulty. For she had come to the office in desperation, determined to confide in me if she liked my face and felt I was to be trusted.
"Yes. It was torn at the moment I threw it away. My cousin has the other part. It is a map."
"So I noticed. My impression was that the paper was yours. I examined it to see whether it held your name and address."
Her blue eyes met mine shyly.
"Did it--interest you at all?"
"Indeed, and it did. Nothing in a long time has interested me more."
I might have made an exception in favor of the owner of the document, but once more I decided to move with discretion.
"You understood it?" Her soft voice trailed upward so that her declaration was in essence a question.
"I am thinking it was only a wild guess I made."
"I'd like right well to hear it."
My eyes met hers.
"Buried treasure."
With eager little nods she assented.
"Right, sir; treasure buried by pirates early in the nineteenth century. We have reason to think it has never been lifted."
"Good reason?"
"The best. Except the copy I have, this map is the only one in existence. Only four men saw the gold hidden. Two of them were killed by the others within the hour. The third was murdered by his companion some weeks later. The fourth--but it is a long story. I must not weary you with it."
"Weary me," I cried, and I dare swear my eyes were shining. But there I pulled myself up. "You're right. I had forgotten. You don't know me. There is no reason why you should tell me the story."
"That is true," she asserted. "It is of no concern to you."
That she was a little rebuffed by my words was plain. I made haste to explain them.
"I am meaning that there is no reason why you should trust me."
"Except your face," she answered impulsively. "Sir, you are an honest gentleman. Chance, or fate, has thrown