[Listen]

The phrase to which Billy Walker pointed was scrawled in a fashion that was rather slovenly as compared with the remainder of the manuscript. Hitherto, in spite of the many times he had studied the manuscript, Saxe had given small heed to this fragment of writing, which preceded the song of gold. Now, however, at his friend’s instigation, he examined it with scrupulous care before he spoke. Then, he shook his head in discouragement, as he struck the notes on the keyboard.

“It doesn’t mean anything, Billy,” he declared.

“But what’s it there for, if it doesn’t mean anything?” the other persisted.

“Why,” Saxe answered, “I suppose it’s simply that the old man had some sort of an idea, and jotted down a note concerning it. You see, it’s at the top of the page. He did nothing more with it. Afterward, he used the same sheet to write the gold song on. He was a miser, you know.”

“Yes, I know,” Billy conceded. “All the same, I think, in this instance, he would have been comparatively extravagant. I still believe that the bit there has some significance.”

Saxe shook his head emphatically.

“It can’t mean anything,” he repeated, drearily. He was fast yielding to discouragement.For a long minute the two were silent, regarding the manuscript intently, with knit brows. Then, of a sudden, Billy’s rough voice boomed forth a question:

“Aren’t there letters on a staff of music? What are the letters there?”

Saxe smiled, in some disdain.

“Much good may they do you!” he said; and his tone was sarcastic. “The letters are, B, E, D, A, C. Might be a word in Magyar, for all I know. It isn’t from any language more common, I fancy.”

Billy snorted indignantly.

“It’s not altogether impossible that it should be a word from some language or other,” he answered, stoutly. “But we’ll investigate it more closely on an English basis first. Now, what—exactly—does that Italian word mean, there over the music. And what’s it doing there, anyhow?”

Saxe laughed outright at the utter simplicity of the question from the musician’s standpoint.

“It’s a word to guide the player in his interpretation,” he replied. “It means that this particular phrase should be played with great slowness.”

Billy pondered this statement for a time, then vented a lusty sigh of disappointment. Presently, however, his expression took on animation again, for curiosity had hit on a new point of interest.

“What are those two vertical lines doing there in the middle?” he asked, eagerly.

Saxe shrugged his shoulders resignedly.

“They, too, mean nothing—absolutely nothing!” he exclaimed. “They’re in the same class as ‘Bedac’.”

“According to my theory concerning this affair,” Billy asserted with an air of dogmatism, “you are wrong in thus dismissing, one after another, the possibilities of the situation. Now, we have before us a manuscript, which is undoubtedly the work of the man who left this gold to you, if you could find it. He explicitly stated in his communication to you that the clue to the hiding-place was clear enough. You might infer, since the money was left you in this fashion, that the clue would be of a musical sort. He was a musician. Music was his one specialty. It is also your own specialty. It is, then, the most natural thing in the world to suppose that, in one way or another, music would play a chief part in this matter. Following the sequence of facts, we come next to one that follows logically in the line of argument. For we come upon a piece of music, which is in manuscript. It is actually, we are convinced, a piece composed by the late Mr. Abernethey. We have ascertained from his secretary that it is written in his own handwriting. Finally, we are sure that it is the only thing coming directly from him that there is in the house, which offers by its individuality a possibility of having a cryptic meaning of the sort required by us in the prosecution of the search.

“I repeat my firm belief that in this page of music lies the clue to the late Mr. Abernethey’s secret. If I am right, then any single character on this sheet may be of vital importance. You sneer at ‘Bedac,’ which at first glance seems gibberish, and nothing more. There remains the possibility, nevertheless, that it may have a meaning of prime importance to you. A fortune may depend on your learning the meaning of that word. Don’t dismiss it after just one glance. Don’t sneer at it—and those two vertical lines! You say, they are void of purport. The fact is that they don’t belong there—from your musical standpoint. Well, they’re there, notwithstanding. The late Mr. Abernethey put them there. Perhaps they stood for something to him, in spite of the fact that they don’t to you. Anyhow, don’t sneer at them—yet. Wait, at least, until you’ve really studied them. As far as our present knowledge goes, this paper must hold the clue. I tell you, it’s worth working on—hard!”

The harsh, sonorous voice in this long harangue had soon cut short the desultory chat between Roy and David, who had listened almost from the beginning with attention, while smiling a little at the earnestness of the speaker in pursuing his argument.

“Well, Billy,” David remarked, “you’re the one to work out the problem on logical lines. You’ve told the rest of us often enough that we can’t reason.” The other two nodded assent, smiling cheerfully on the nonplussed oracle.

“I’m horribly handicapped by my ignorance of music,” he confessed, wryly. Then, his rough features settled into lines of resolve, and his voice fairly roared in the echoing room: “But, by the Lord! I’ll do it—I’ll work that thing out, if I have to learn music first!”

There came a shout of laughter from the three; the vision of Billy Walker thus engaged was too ludicrous! Notwithstanding their merriment, there came no relaxation of the set purpose in the speaker’s face. It was evident that he was wholly sincere in his announcement. Indeed, no sooner had the mirth exhausted itself than he craved a first lesson.

“Tell me about the letters that are on the staff,” he besought Saxe, who good-naturedly complied, with a smile still on his lips.

“Then, that’s all the letters there are in musical notation,” Billy exclaimed, when the instructor paused. There was distinct disappointment in his voice. “Only, A, B, C, D, E, F, G. That’s bad. Yet there are two vowels, A and E, and E is the most important vowel.” He fell silent, standing moveless before the piano, with his gaze fixed on the manuscript in a brown study. “Bedac!” he muttered, after a little; and Saxe, hearing, smiled again. “And those vertical lines!” he mused aloud. Saxe kindly volunteered some information as to the purpose served by bars to separate the measures. When he ceased, Billy propounded a question, which was an affirmation: “Then, there is a measure with nothing in it?”

“Oh, in a way!” Saxe replied. “Only, this isn’t really a measure. It’s merely a mistake the old man happened to make—that’s all.”

“Why isn’t it a measure?” came the crisp demand.

“Because, if it were really meant for a measure, it would contain something, either notes or rests, or both.”

“You may thank your lucky stars I’m not a musician,” Billy declared, and he snorted loudly in contempt. “You’re hide-bound, so to speak, by the technique of your art. Thank heaven, I have an open mind. Because the thing is different, you assert that it can’t possibly have any meaning. For my part, on the contrary, the fact that it’s different is just why I suspect it to be of importance. I give the late Mr. Abernethey credit for some cleverness. Also, I deem him to have been capable of a bit of originality. The manner of his will suggests that possibility, at least. If he amused himself by evolving a musical cipher, I’ll warrant he didn’t construct a mere tonic sol-fa—whatever that may be—which any piano-banger could sing at sight to this tune here. I’ve always thought that much knowledge of technique was deadening. Now, I know it. The critic knows technique perfectly; the genius never does. Here, I’ll take it. You’ll do no good, muddling over it!” With this pronouncement, Billy Walker rudely leaned forward, and snatched the sheet of music from the rack, and stalked away with it to the morris chair, leaving Saxe well content with such ending of the inquisition.

It was a half-hour later. Saxe had joined Roy and David, and the three were talking pleasantly of many things as they smoked. Throughout the whole time, Billy had remained huddled in the easy chair, his cigar, unlighted, clenched firmly between his teeth, his fierce, shaggy brows drawn down, his little, dull eyes set steadfastly on the sheet of music, which lay on his knees. Occasionally, there sounded an unintelligible mumbling from his lips, or a raucous grunt of dissatisfaction. Then, with disconcerting abruptness, the scholar lifted his head, ran his hands roughly through the bristling, unkempt thatch of hair, and exploded into Gargantuan laughter.

The three regarded him in perplexity, smiling a little under the contagion of his merriment. He gave no heed to their questions for a full minute, but continued his rollicking mirth.

“Well, I’ve made the first step toward the treasure,” he announced, at last. The rolling volume of his voice was more thunderous even than its wont.

Came a chorus of ejaculations and questions from the others, as they sprang to their feet, and crowded about him.

Billy waved his hand imperiously for silence.“But it’s only the first step, remember!” he warned. “The first step! And, incidentally, it proves that I was right about the value of this document.” He flourished the music aloft, in a gesture of triumph.

“Tell us! Tell us!” was the cry.

Billy regarded his friends quizzically.

“It’s only the first step that I have taken, remember,” he admonished. “But, as Saint Augustine said, it’s the first step that counts. The miser’s gold is somewhere at the bottom of the lake.”

There followed an interval of astounded silence. It was broken by Roy with an exclamation of bewilderment:

“But—” he began. Then, he halted in confusion. He had been on the point of saying something concerning the secret vault in the music-room, and had checked himself only just in time. The others, however, had given no attention to his utterance, and he sighed with relief. It had flashed on him that his own knowledge in a way corroborated the statement by Billy, inasmuch as he found the vault empty.

“How? How?” Saxe was clamoring; David added his insistence.

Billy Walker preened himself with all the pride of a great discoverer, as well he might.

“It was simplicity itself,” he assured them. “It was only necessary for me to learn music, and the matter soon became clear.” Saxe and the others fairly gaped at the naÏve assumption on the part of their friend that, in five minutes, he had mastered the art, but they did not care to question his complacency just then. “Being unhampered by over-much technique,” the oracle continued, with buoyant self-satisfaction, “I was able to investigate with an open mind, examining all the facts.” He paused to grin exultantly on the expectant trio, and then resumed his explanation:

“I had before me two determined facts, which gave no information in themselves, but required perhaps only the addition of other facts to become significant. Now, observe this lone bit of music at the head of the page.” He held up the sheet, so that the others could note the phrase at the top.