The Swindler's Treasure (25 page)

W
hen Jordan saw Libby and Peter, he broke into a run. “My daddy?” he asked the moment they met. “What happened to him?”

“He left the train two stops after you,” Libby said. “He waited as if he wanted to make sure Riggs saw him. Then he raced across the platform. Riggs followed him.”

“Did Daddy get away?”

In the hours since Libby's last sight of Micah Parker, she had kept hoping that he escaped. She wanted to pass that hope along to Jordan. Yet Libby knew she had to be honest.

“The last I saw him, your daddy was ahead.” Libby tried to push away her next thought.
And Riggs was running fast
.

After rolling down the bank next to the railroad tracks, Jordan had hid under the bridge, then walked to the nearest town. There he used his pass to climb aboard the next train for Springfield. When Libby told him about the swindler, Jordan's eyes lit up.

“Let's get a shovel and see what we can find.”

When they knocked on the door of the home used as a meeting place for the Colored Baptist Church, the woman who lived there welcomed them in. Jordan poured out his story.

“We'll be on the lookout for your daddy,” the woman promised him. “Now, what do you need? A shovel? Some food? A lantern? It'll be dark soon.”

Libby smiled. It felt good to have someone watching out for them.

When she and Jordan and Peter were ready to leave, the woman told them, “If you need a place to stay tonight, just come on back.”

As they walked the few miles to the cemetery, the sun dropped lower and lower in the sky. By the time they got there, the trees and tombstones cast long shadows across the ground.

Peter took one look at the spot the hack driver showed them and said, “This isn't the right place.”

“Why?” Libby wrote on the slate.

“The swindler would be afraid to be inside a cemetery.”

“Afraid?” The idea seemed strange to Libby. “A cemetery should be special for people who have loved ones buried there.”

Then she remembered. Girls in her Chicago school thought that ghosts haunted cemeteries. Libby felt sure the girls were wrong.

“Let's look around,” Jordan said. Already he had been doing just that—looking over his shoulder often, as if he expected Riggs or Dexter to be lurking behind a tree.

But Peter led them outside the cemetery. Before long, they found just what they were looking for—a small square of ground that had been dug up.

As the sky turned orange and red in the west, Jordan began digging. Before long, the shovel clinked against metal.

“That's it!” Jordan cried. “A good, hard box with lots of money!”

Soon Jordan had all the dirt off the top. He and Peter pulled up a small black chest.

Jordan's face glowed with excitement. The worry he had felt about the stolen money seemed to slide off his back.

Libby's excitement bubbled up. “Your name will be cleared,” she told Jordan. “And Pa can make the payment on the
Christina
!”

When Jordan shook the chest, it made no noise. “Lots of paper money in here!” he said. Then he turned it over to open it, and his excitement changed to disappointment. “It's locked!”

“Then it's the swindler's treasure for sure!” Libby exclaimed. “Why else would a locked chest be buried here?”

Even so, she felt an uneasy nudge.
What if I'm wrong? What if it really doesn't hold Pa's money and what Reverend Freeman calls the Lord's treasure?

Afraid that someone might be watching them, Libby looked around. By now the orange light of the setting sun had started to fade. In the dusky grayness between sundown and night, every tree seemed to hide someone—a person standing straight and tall behind the trunk.

“We better leave the treasure here,” Libby said.

“Leave it?” Clearly Jordan didn't like the idea.

“If we take it, we can't prove the swindler buried it,” Libby answered. “If he comes back to dig it up, and we catch him in the act—”

“But if he comes back, and we ain't here to see him—”

Even the thought of such a possibility frightened Libby. In twelve days Pa had to make his payment on the
Christina
. Jordan needed to restore the faith his church had put in him. Fugitives in Chicago needed money for the boat ride to Canada. But as she felt the pressure of time, Libby remembered something else.

As if it were still happening, she remembered one scene after another: Pa standing on the deck of the
Christina
, telling Dexter he couldn't swindle an immigrant. Reverend Freeman saying, “Let's not accuse someone unjustly.” Caleb and Jordan standing near Elijah Lovejoy's unmarked grave. Dr. Brown pleading with Riggs for the life of a slave. Micah Parker sacrificing his own freedom for his son. All those men—Pa, Reverend Freeman, Elijah Lovejoy, Dr. Brown, Micah Parker—had stood for something important.

And women, too—Priscilla Baltimore, rowing fugitives across the wide Mississippi, making sure that slaves learned about Jesus. Frances Brown, hiding runaways, reading Bible stories to them in the attic.

Libby drew a deep breath. What she and Jordan and Peter needed to do seemed simple in comparison with all that. “If we don't stop the swindler, he'll keep on hurting people,” Libby said.

When Libby explained this to Peter, he agreed. Jordan thought about it a moment longer, then said, “We need to leave the money, all right. But planting it in the ground sure scares me.”

Jordan's fear made Libby even more uneasy. More than once she had seen how well Jordan heard the Lord. More than once that still, small voice inside Jordan had helped them find their way.
Now that we've found the money, what if we lose it again?

Then, as though Jordan guessed Libby's thoughts, he said, “But it ain't the Lord making me scared.”

With each of them taking a handle, Jordan and Peter lowered the chest into the hole again. Peter shoveled the dirt into place. Jordan smoothed it out until the ground looked the way they found it.

From that moment on, the three of them kept watch on the place where the treasure was buried. Two at a time, they waited behind a large rock and some bushes, always afraid they would miss the swindler when he returned. Men from the Colored Baptist Church started taking turns, watching with them.

When Libby looked up the address Allan Pinkerton had given her, no one was there. That made Libby even more nervous. Pa wanted them to get help from a law officer if they needed it. Libby hoped that help could be Mr. Pinkerton. Then she discovered the house where he planned to stay belonged to a Springfield policeman, and she felt better.

As Monday night turned into Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and then Friday, Libby grew more tired and more frantic.
What if we're watching a box that isn't really the treasure?

But their troubles were much bigger than that. As one day followed the next, Jordan's daddy did not reach Springfield. With each day Jordan seemed to grow thinner, his eyes darker with fear.

Added to that, Libby, Jordan, and Peter kept wondering what had happened to Caleb.
If all goes well, the ride from Brighton to Springfield takes about two hours
, Libby remembered.
How can a two-hour ride take all week?

Ever since meeting Caleb, Libby had dreaded the idea of someone hurting him because of his work with the Underground Railroad. Now she wondered if her worst fears had come true.

Where are you, Caleb?
Libby's heart cried out.
Are you safe? What has happened to you?

Day after day, the family living at the house used by the Colored Baptist Church gave Libby, Jordan, and Peter a place to stay. Throughout the week the family fed and encouraged them. Yet on Saturday morning, Libby woke up feeling as if she couldn't handle another moment of waiting.
Exactly one week from today Pa needs that money. And we still need to find Pa and get to Galena
.

Climbing out of bed, she walked over to a window. Standing in the light, she began to pray. “Lord, I always depend on Caleb. I don't know what to do.”

But I know
. Like a still, small voice the words came.
Ask me
.

Instantly Libby prayed. “Lord, I do! I ask You to show me.”

In the stillness Libby listened. From somewhere in the house, she heard the chiming of a clock. From down the street came the rumble of a wagon. Then from near at hand—as near as Libby's mind and spirit—she remembered Caleb's verse:
“The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?”

At last Libby knew what to pray. “Lord, right now, in this moment, I'm making a choice—to depend upon
You
.”

After supper that evening, Libby walked alone to meet Jordan and Peter near the swindler's treasure. By the time she reached the large rock, it was dark. To her dismay neither Jordan nor Peter was there.

Something happened
, Libby thought.
Why did Peter leave? Why isn't Jordan here?

Her first thought was that the swindler had come for the treasure, and the boys followed him. But the ground wasn't dug up.

Where are you, Jordan?
she wanted to cry out.
Where are you, Peter? Why aren't you here?
Turning every direction, Libby tried to find some hint of where they could be.

Fearful now, she began praying again. There could be only one reason for both of them being gone. Something was wrong.

Then, as Libby prayed, a memory flashed into her mind. Riggs standing at the back of the train during the prairie fire. Riggs talking to the swindler while everyone else worked desperately to put out the fire.

In that moment Libby remembered something she had seen but hadn't thought about.
Riggs gave money to the swindler. Why?

Either the swindler had already done something for Riggs or the swindler was about to do something for him.

Like a thunderbolt, a thought entered Libby's mind.
Has Edward Dexter somehow tricked Jordan about his father?

Just thinking about such a terrible thing filled Libby with panic. More than once Caleb had said, “The one place where Jordan doesn't use good judgment is when he gets scared about his family.”

Feeling desperate, Libby started walking around. When she came to the top of a hill, darkness veiled the trees, the bushes, the narrow valleys between hills. With growing fear, she peered into the night, trying to see.

Then, as if someone were walking through a ravine, Libby saw the light of a lantern below her. The lantern moved from side to side, as if the person who held it could not walk a straight line.
Peter!

Trying to keep the light in sight, Libby started after him. There could be only one reason for Peter leaving the treasure. He had to be following Jordan. That had to mean Jordan needed help.

But what if I'm wrong?
Libby asked herself.
What if this is a trick to get us away from the treasure? What if the swindler comes while we're all gone? If he digs up the treasure and disappears, Pa loses the
Christina
!

Still staring at the light, Libby stopped.
How can I make such a choice? I'm walking away from helping my own father! From saving the
Christina
—Pa's hiding place for fugitives, Pa's way to earn a living, our home!

CHAPTER 20