"Now for it!" cried Tom.

And up the cliff he started, Jack following, with Billy Topsail, who was quite as deeply stirred as they, bringing up the rear, a pick in one hand and a shovel in the other. It was not hard climbing. The declivity could hardly be called a cliff. Rather, it was a hill, rising sharply from the water's edge—steep, strewn with broken rock, loose turf and decaying stumps, and overgrown with moss and ill-nourished shrubs. Jack was impressed with the instability of the whole mass.

"If it weren't for the juts of naked rock," he thought, with some alarm, "this stuff would all slip into the water, like snow from the roof of a house."

But he was far too deeply interested in the search to dwell upon such speculation, however threateningly the imagination might present the possibilities. They all kept to the perpendicular line, from their landing place to the crest of the hill; and they searched painstakingly, tearing aside the shrubs, peering under overhanging rocks, prying into dark holes. It was all without reward. At last, Jack came to the top of the hill. Tom was below him, following a narrow ledge; and Billy Topsail, now wearied of the search, was sitting on a boulder, lower down.

"Hello, Tom!" Jack shouted. "What luck?"

Jack caught hold of a shrub, and leaned outward, in an attempt to catch sight of Tom.

"Nothing yet," Tom answered.

Then Jack's feet, which had been resting on an insecure footing of loose stones, shot from under him. He clung to his shrub and held his position, but in the effort he dislodged a small boulder, which went crashing down, dislodging earth and the accumulations of broken rock in its course. He had started a little avalanche; and the most he could do was to cry a horrified warning and watch it go rolling down, growing greater as it went.

"Tom!" he called. "Oh, Tom!"

This time there was no answer. Dead silence followed the frantic call and the plunge of the avalanche into the water. What had become of Tom? Billy Topsail, who had found shelter in the "lee" of the boulder upon which he had been sitting, suggested, when Jack joined him, that Tom had been swept into the water by the flood of stones and earth. Jack scouted the suggestion. Had he not watched the course of that selfsame flood? Tom had been on the ledge. He must still be there—unconscious, probably, and unable to answer to the call of his name.

"We'll look there first, at any rate," he determined.

A great part of the avalanche had lodged on the ledge. Stones and moss and new earth lay in slanting heaps in many places; but of Tom's body there was no sign.

"He've been swep' into the water, I fears," Billy declared.

"Or buried on the ledge," said Jack.

Jack called to his friend again. While they listened, straining their ears for the remotest response, he had his eye fixed on a remnant of the avalanche near by. To his unbounded astonishment, he perceived evidences of some disturbance within the heap. The disturbance suddenly developed into an upheaval. A foot and an ankle shot out. A moment later Billy Topsail had that foot and its mate in his hands and was hauling with small regard for the body behind.

It was Tom.

"I've found the cave!" he gasped, when they had set him on his feet, profusely perspiring, flushed and exceedingly dirty. "But what's up? How did I get shut in there? Part of the hill slipped away! I thought it was a landslide. I found the hole, and started to crawl in, to make sure that it was the place before I said anything. Then I heard a racket; and then the light was shut out. I thought I might as well go on, though, and find out afterwards what had happened. So on I went. And it's the cave, boy!" he cried. "When I made sure of that," he went on, "I wanted to get out in a hurry. I was afraid to crawl into that hole head foremost—afraid of being jammed. Of course, I knew that something had fallen over the mouth of it; and I thought I could kick the thing out of the way just as easily as I could push it, and meantime have all the air there was. So out I came, feet first. Have you got that pick and shovel, Billy? Let's clear this stuff away from the hole and go in."

"What's in there, Tom?" Jack asked.

"You'll soon find out."

They left Billy Topsail outside, as a precaution against entombment. Tom went first with the lantern. When, looking along the passage, Jack saw a flare of light, he followed. The passage was about six feet long, and so narrow that he could not quite go upon hands and knees. He squirmed through, with his heart in his mouth, and found himself, at last, in a roomy chamber, apparently rough-hewn, wherein Tom was dancing about like a wild Indian.

"Pirate gold!" he shouted. "Pirate gold!"

"Where is it?" Jack cried, believing, for the moment, that he had discovered it in sacks.

"Dig, boy!" said Tom. "It's underground."

At any rate, a glance about, by the light of the lantern, discovered no treasure. It was underground, if it were anywhere. So they set about unearthing it without delay. But there was no earth—nothing but broken rock. The shovel was of small use; they took turns with the pick, labouring hard and excitedly, expecting, momentarily, to catch the glitter of gold. Occasionally, the strength of both was needed to lift some great, obstinate stone out of the way; but, for the most part, while one wielded the pick, the other removed the loosened rock.

"What in the world is this thing?" Tom asked.

He had taken a round, brown object from the excavation. Suddenly he let it drop, with a little cry of horror, and started to his feet. Jack picked it up and held it close to the lantern.

"Pirates!" whispered Tom, now utterly horrified.

"Last night," said Jack, "I told you that we'd find something. We've found it."

"We've found a pirates' den," said Tom.

"No," Jack replied, handing him the skull; "we've found a Beothuk Indian burial cave. We've struck it rich for the Ethnological and Antiquarian Club!"

"Well," Tom admitted, ruefully, "that's something!"

Struck it rich? Indeed, they had! The most valuable part of the collection of Indian relics, now in the club's museum, came from that cave. The excavation occupied three days; and at the end of it, when they laid their treasures out at Ruddy Cove, they were thrown into a transport of delight. In addition to the skeleton remains, which have since served a highly useful purpose, they had found stone hatchets, knives, spearheads, clubs, and various other implements of warfare and the hunt; three clay masks, a curious clay figure in human form, and three complete specimens of Indian pottery, with a number of fragments.

The rusted iron mooring-ring has never been explained.