The Go Ahead Boys and the Treasure Cave Part 40

"Correct," cried John, "only you ought to have read the last of it like this: 'and north by east thirty-three. Dig!" and he shouted the final word with all his might.

"We're going to find the gold, we're going to find the gold!" shouted Fred, borrowing John's chant, and a moment later every one in the little party had joined hands and was dancing joyously about singing and laughing and shouting. Finally they stopped from sheer exhaustion.

"Read dat again, will yo'?" demanded Sam eagerly.

"Read it, Grant," shouted George. "We're going to find the gold, we're going to find the gold!"

"If you'll keep quiet a minute I'll read it," said Grant, and while every one listened with rapt attention he read again the words it had taken them so many days and weeks to discover. "'Take a course due north one hundred feet from the southern extremity of shark rock, then east fifty feet and north by east thirty-three. Dig.'"

"Say, I just happened to think," exclaimed Fred in dismay. "How are we going to get those directions right? How can we tell north from south except in a general sort of way?"

"Fred," said George, pretending to be greatly disappointed in his comrade, "how long will it take you to learn that whenever anything is needed, I am the one who always has it? Don't you know that I always wear a compa.s.s and don't you remember Captain Dodge on board the _Josephine_ complimenting me on the fact one time? You are a great trial to me, Fred," and George shook his head sorrowfully.

"Well, I'm glad you've got it anyway," said Fred shortly. "I still don't see, though, how we are going to measure distances."

"That will be hard," admitted Grant. "How long are your feet, String?"

"A yard and a half," said George readily, and immediately ducked to escape a blow aimed in his direction by the owner of the feet in question.

"Ten inches," replied John. "That is, my shoes are just exactly that long, for I remember measuring them in the gymnasium just before I left home. They're in the cave if you want them."

"Not now," said Grant. "It's too late to do anything to-day, anyway, and it'll be dark in a little while. If your shoes are exactly ten inches long though, we can measure with them and figure out the distance easy enough."

"Are you sure that the shark rock the code speaks of is the one on the end of the island here?" exclaimed Fred.

"Sho' it am," said Sam. "Dey nevah was two rocks lak dat one."

"I guess that's right," agreed Fred. "It must be the one."

"Certainly it is," said John. "We wouldn't have found two codes on this island unless the spot they referred to was here too."

"Oh, that's the rock all right," said Grant confidently. "I wish we could start right down there now, but I suppose it would be foolish."

"I think we've done enough for one day anyhow," said John. "As long as we have solved the code we can't have much to complain of for one day's work."

"You haven't told us how you did it yet," said George.

"Haven't you found out for yourself? My, but you're dull."

"Perhaps I am," admitted George. "I don't see it though."

"Nor I," added Fred. "Tell us how you did it."

"How many letters are there in the alphabet?" asked Grant.

"Twenty-six," said George.

"What's the first letter?"

"A."

"What's the second?"

"B."

"And the third?"

"C."

"What's the twenty-sixth?"

"Z."

"You know your alphabet anyway," laughed Grant. "Now this is how the code works; _a_ is the first letter so we call it one, _b_ is the second so we call that two, and so on all the way through. For instance, the letter _s_ would be number nineteen, and _t_ would be twenty. Do you see the idea?"

"Yes, I see that," said George. "Explain the rest."

"Why, it's just this. Wherever number one came we put the letter _a_. If number thirteen appeared we'd subst.i.tute the thirteenth letter in the alphabet in its place."

"Which would be _m_," said George after a little calculation on his fingers.

"That's right," exclaimed Grant. "Now do you see how it was done?"

"Of course. Isn't that simple?"

"It took us long enough to find it out though," said John.

"Well, I should say so," exclaimed George. "Weren't we stupid?"

"I don't know," said Grant. "The simplest things are often the hardest to explain. Of course when you get the key the rest is easy enough."

"According to this code then," said Fred, "one, two, three would be _a, b, c_. Is that right?"

"Yes," said Grant, "and twenty-four, twenty-five and twenty-six would be _x, y, z_."

"I see," exclaimed Fred. "You couldn't have a number higher than twenty-six in this code then, could you?"

"Of course not. There are only that many letters in the alphabet, you see."

"How did you ever happen to think of it, Grant?"

"Well, I guess I'd thought of about everything else possible," laughed Grant. "When I heard Pop talking about teaching his parrot the alphabet and somebody said there were twenty-six letters in it, I got an idea all of a sudden. I knew those figures backwards and forwards and I remembered that twenty-five was the highest number in it. That would mean that twenty-six stood for the letter z, but that is so uncommon anyway that it didn't seem strange that it should be missing. It was a new idea and it struck me right away as being a good one."

"It certainly was," exclaimed George. "We ought to give you a medal, Grant."

"Wouldn't a gold piece do?" laughed Fred.

"It sho' would suit me," grinned Sam. "Ah does want one ob dem dere diamon' ho'seshoes, dough."