And then I took the
second text, and here again the Psalm was given correct, but the verse
was two, and not six, as my scribe had it. It was just the same with the
other three--the number of the Psalm was right but the verse wrong. So
here was a discovery, for all was painfully written smooth and clean
without a blot, and yet in every verse an error. But if the second number
did not stand for the verse, what else should it mean? I had scarce
formed the question to myself before I had the answer, and knew that it
must be the number of the word chosen in each text to make a secret
meaning. I was in as great a fever and excitement now as when I found the
locket in the Mohune vault, and could scarce count with trembling fingers
as far as twenty-one, in the first verse, for hurry and amaze. It was
'fourscore' that the number fell on in the first text, 'feet' in the
second, 'deep' in the third, 'well' in the fourth, 'north' in the fifth.
Fourscore--feet--deep--well--north.
There was the cipher read, and what an easy trick! and yet I had not
lighted on it all this while, nor ever should have, but for Sexton Ratsey
and his burial verse. It was a cunning plan of Blackbeard; but other folk
were quite as cunning as he, and here was all his treasure at our feet. I
chuckled over that to myself, rubbing my hands, and read it through
again:
Fourscore--feet--deep--well--north.
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