Jessie jumped to her feet. “It’s the trap!” she cried. “Quick, open the door!”
Grandfather and Mrs. Ashleigh looked very surprised as the four Aldens rushed toward the kitchen door. “Everyone get a flashlight,” said Henry.
“Hurry! Or they’ll get away!” Violet said.
“What’s going on?” asked Grandfather Alden.
“We’ve found the pirate’s treasure,” said Benny. “Only someone’s trying to steal it.”
With Grandfather and Mrs. Ashleigh right behind them, the Boxcar Children rushed out of the kitchen door and through the backyard toward the gate.
Henry led the way to the door. “We set a trap to catch a thief,” he said over his shoulder.
They all turned their flashlights toward the gate.
“It’s gone!” cried Violet. “Oh, no! It’s gone!”
“Look. There it is!” gasped Jessie, pointing with the beam of her flashlight through the rain and wind.
In front of the house, two figures were struggling to lift the gate into the back of a blue van.
“Stop! Stop, thief!” shouted Henry, running as fast as he could.
Barking madly, Watch ran, too. He leaped up and caught the pants leg of one of the thieves.
“Oww! No! Get away!” a woman’s voice shouted. She kicked at Watch and tripped.
The other thief dropped his end of the gate into the mud and began to run. The woman fell, still holding onto the gate. The gate tipped over on her, trapping her in a puddle.
But Henry caught the escaping thief by one arm and Jessie caught him by the other. “Oh, no, you don’t,” said Henry. “You were trying to steal our gate.”
“No! Let me go,” the man said.
“It’s Jackie,” gasped Violet, bending over the woman. “Jackie James! Oh dear! Are you hurt?” Violet tried to lift the gate off Jackie, but it was too heavy.
“No, I’m not hurt! Mike Carson, don’t you dare leave me here like this,” cried Jackie, struggling to get out from under the gate. “This is all your fault!”
“Mike Carson? Jackie’s partner?” said Mrs. Ashleigh. “Jackie, Mike, what’s going on?” She looked completely bewildered.
It was indeed Mike. He stopped trying to pull free from Henry and Jessie. His shoulders slumped. Slowly he turned to face the Aldens and Mrs. Ashleigh.
“Someone get me out of here,” said Jackie. She was still caught beneath one side of the gate. She was covered with mud. Her rain hat had blown off and her hair was stuck to her head. She looked angry.
“We can’t stay out here,” said Henry. “I think we’d better go in the house.”
“Yes,” agreed Grandfather Alden. “I’d like to hear what’s going on.”
“I would, too!” exclaimed Mrs. Ashleigh.
“Don’t try to run away,” Benny warned as he helped his grandfather and Violet and Mrs. Ashleigh lift the gate off Jackie.
Watch barked.
“I won’t,” said Jackie angrily. She scrambled to her feet.
She stalked ahead of them into the house. Looking sheepish, Mike picked up one end of the gate and helped the Boxcar Children carry it.
“We should put it inside the kitchen door,” said Jessie. “So no one can try to steal it again.”
They carried the gate inside and leaned it carefully against the wall while Mrs. Ashleigh got towels so everybody could begin to rub themselves dry.
Henry pointed to the chairs and said to Jackie James and Mike Carson, “You can sit down if you like.”
“Thanks,” said Mike.
“Humph!” said Jackie, reluctantly sitting beside him and folding her arms.
“I think we should all sit down,” said Grandfather Alden. “Ellen and I would like to know what’s going on.”
“We found the treasure,” Benny burst out. “Mr. Fitzhugh’s pirate treasure!”
Mrs. Ashleigh shook her head. “Oh, Benny. That’s not possible. That’s just an old story that people made up. It’s not really true.”
“Yes, it is,” said Jessie. “Mr. Fitzhugh really did hide a treasure. He hid it where he could see it anytime he wanted. You’ve been looking at it every day your whole life, too.”
Wrinkling her brow and looking confused, Mrs. Ashleigh said, “What are you talking about?”
Violet pointed at the Pirate’s Gate. “It’s there. It’s in the Pirate’s Gate. The Pirate’s Gate is made of gold!”
Mrs. Ashleigh’s mouth dropped open in amazement. “Made of gold? That’s impossible,” she said.
Jackie burst out, “It would have been mine. I was so close! How did you know? How did you figure it out?”
Jessie folded her arms. “First you tell us how you knew about the gate.”
“I didn’t right away,” said Jackie sulkily. “I thought there might be more truth to the legends of Mr. Fitzhugh’s pirate’s treasure than most people believed, but I didn’t connect it to the gate.”
“But weren’t you trying to steal it when we first found you and Diana putting it into the truck that day?” asked Jessie.
“That gate is a valuable antique in its own right. When the high tides of the hurricane washed it into my yard, I knew that I could sell it for a lot of money to an antiques dealer who wouldn’t ask any questions about where it came from. Then my money problems would be over.” She frowned at the Aldens. The shadows from the candles flickered across her face. “Diana offered to help me with it. But she didn’t recognize the gate. She’s just a carpenter! And then, as I was loading it into the truck, I realized it wasn’t just an old wrought-iron gate. There was something funny about it, something that I couldn’t put my finger on. A little piece of the ship had been chipped away, leaving a little hollow place. But before I could take the gate away safely — ”
“We came along,” said Violet. “And made you give the gate back to Mrs. Ashleigh. That’s why you were so rude to us.”
Jackie shrugged. “I still didn’t realize what that gate was made of. I thought that something in the design of it was a clue to where the treasure was hidden. Or maybe that a clue or map was actually hidden in the hollow ship. I knew the ship was cast iron and thought it sounded hollow when I accidentally banged it against my truck.”
She glanced over at the gate, then looked away as if it pained her to look at it. She went on, “Because I’m a history buff, I knew that Ellen had papers dating back from Mr. Fitzhugh’s time, including plans for the house and designs for the gate. I thought if I could just get a look at those papers, I might be able to piece together the clues, come up with a map for the treasure.”
“So you invited us to a carriage tour and broke into the house while we were gone,” said Violet.
“Yes,” Jackie said.
Mike said, “I was supposed to keep you busy while I searched.” He glanced at Jackie.
“When I opened the window and climbed through,” Jackie continued, “I accidentally knocked most of the papers off the desk. A gust of wind came through and did the rest. I barely had time to find the design and start tracing a copy when you came back.”
“With Mike following us. Dressed in a gray raincoat, right?” guessed Jessie.
“Yeah,” Mike said. “I heard you say something about a treasure hunt and a map. So I followed you and stole the map. But it wasn’t a real map.”
Jackie gave him a disgusted look.
Mike sighed. “I’m Jackie’s partner in the tour guide business,” he said. “And in the hunt for the treasure. We were going to split it fifty-fifty.”
“Then I studied the design I’d copied — I remembered that hollow sound and realized the gate was filled with gold. After all this time, the pirate’s treasure was right there in front of my nose,” said Jackie.
“That’s when you tried to break into Mr. Farrier’s shop,” said Henry.
“And failed,” said Jackie.
“We thought the old iron fence might be made of gold, but it wasn’t,” added Mike.
“You found out because you came back to look. You hit the hinges with a hammer,” said Violet.
Mike nodded. “We couldn’t do anything else but keep an eye on you, then. Or hope I could persuade Mr. Ashleigh to convince his mother to sell us the house, gate and all.”
“Forrest didn’t know about this?” his mother cried out.
“No. He didn’t even know who I was,” said Mike. “Just that I represented somebody who would pay a lot of money for the old house.”
“You kept watching us and saw Mr. Farrier deliver the gate. Then you saw us hang it up,” Jessie said.
“We didn’t think you knew!” said Jackie, glaring at the Boxcar Children. “I thought you’d think that this hurricane had blown it away. And we could have gotten away with it, too.”
“If we hadn’t set the trap,” said Violet quietly.
Jackie’s cheeks turned a dull, angry red. “Ooh, that trap,” she muttered.
“What do you want to do?” asked Jessie. “Should we tell the police?”
Mrs. Ashleigh looked dazed. “I don’t know. I don’t know what to do. But I think Jackie and Mike should leave.”
The two gate thieves got up and walked to the door. Mike said to Mrs. Ashleigh, “I’m sorry. I knew it was wrong and I did it anyway. I’m sorry.”
He went out.
Jackie lifted her chin. “It was pirate’s gold. It was stolen in the first place. How can you steal what’s already been stolen?”
She and Ellen Ashleigh stared at one another. Then Jackie said, so softly that they could barely hear her, “I’m sorry, too. That’s what I get for being greedy.”
She followed Mike, closing the door behind her.
And at that very moment, the lights came back on. |