Old Neb and The Lighthouse Treasure by Swoboda Lois;Wallace Leslie;

Author:Swoboda, Lois;Wallace, Leslie;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pineapple Press
Published: 2015-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 6

AUGUST had arrived and we had only a month left on St. George. Over the next week, Snooky, Walter, and I discussed ways of getting to the west end of the island.

It was a five-mile walk and, if we found the treasure, we had to have a way to get it home. We decided the answer was Billy and the cart. Walter and Snooky would ride in the goat cart and I would ride Prince. We figured if we left early in the morning, we could reach our destination, find the circle of trees, dig up the treasure, and be home in time for supper. If we didn’t find the treasure, nobody had to know we had made the trip. If we did find it and returned home rich, our parents would have to forgive us.

Our effort to retrieve the pirate gold was delayed by a week of stormy weather. It began raining on Friday night and the next five days were punctuated with cloudbursts, thunder, and lightning. We were confined to the house, as Mama is as afraid of lightning as she is of snakes. We spent the days reading and drawing or playing games. Walter and I played hangman and tic-tac-toe. There was a checkerboard and dominoes and a deck of cards for “Go Fish.” We joined the little ones in games of hide-and-seek and tag until Mama, driven to distraction by our pent-up energy, put a stop to it. During a period when the rain abated some, she shooed us onto the porch so she could clean the floors. I was put in charge of Evelyn and Cap’n. The thunder had stopped, so we moved our game to the barn. We climbed in the hayloft, petted the saddle horses, and rubbed the milk cow’s velvety nose. We hadn’t seen Neb all week. He was not a big fan of storms and was probably holed up in his bayside barn.

Me and Walter climbed into the stall with Billy and Prince and hand-fed them hay while Cap’n and Evelyn watched. We opened the stall, led Prince out, and put Evelyn on his back to be guided around the barn. Then Cap’n had a turn. The rain began again, tapping on the tin roof of the barn, and suddenly there was an enormous roar of thunder and lightning blazed through the cracks in the barn walls. The whole building shook, which must have spooked poor Billy. The goat, who had been placidly standing in his stall chewing his cud and watching the proceedings, suddenly bolted. Billy ran from his stall and began racing around the barn. This was an unprecedented event. I ran after him with Walter hopping along behind me, favoring his good foot. We tried to corner Billy but he eluded us and made a mad dash for the door. All four of us children ran to the door to watch as he raced across the yard and up onto the front porch.

Mama, who was also spooked by the lightning, had come to the kitchen door to see what had become of us kids.

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