He walked crooked and shaky, and something told me as the
young fellow had done terrible wrong and felt it.
Whatever 'twas he'd hid, it lay now in the deepest part of the river, and
that, no doubt, he knew. But I knowed more. The bottom where his bottle
was lying happened to be fine sand with a clear lift to the little beach;
and so, given a proper tool, 'twas easy enough to rake over the river-bed
and fetch up anything of any size on that smooth surface.
Of course, my first thought was to fetch that bottle out of the water; but
then a cold shiver went through me, and I told myself to mind my own
business and leave Cranston Champernowne to mind his. Yet somehow I
couldn't do that. There was a sporting side to it, and a man like me
wasn't the sort to sit down tamely afore such a great adventure. So I said
to myself: "I'll have that bottle!"
My wits ran quick in them days, as was natural to a night-hawk, and I only
waited till the young chap was off through the woods, and then nipped back
into the grass field, fetched a haymaker's rake, made fast a brave stone
to 'un, got my night-lines up, and soon lowered down the rake over the
spot where the bottle went in. At the second drag I got him, and there,
sure enough, was the thing that Mister Champernowne had throwed in the
pool. But it weren't a bottle by no means. Instead, I found a black, tin,
waterproof canister a foot long; and, working at it, the lid soon came
off.
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