"We ought to find some clue to the buried treasure, something like Poe's 'Gold Bug,'" suggested Nellie Agnew.
"Sure!" cried Lance. "So many fathoms from a certain tree with arms like a gibbet, on a line with a stone on which is scratched the outline of a skull. Then dig straight down--so far--till you strike----"
"A lard kettle!" cried Jess. "Sounds just like Poe, doesn't it?"
"Just like Poe's ravin'," chuckled Bobby, the only one who dared make such an atrocious pun.
They piled out of the boats at the usual landing and Billy took them to the several "hide-outs," or camps, he had found while he was living like a castaway on the island.
The twins were as eager to see Billy's camps as anyone; the big boulder before the mouth of the farther cavern, into which they did not dare to venture without a guide, had been the boy's lookout. That was where he was perched in his wig and whiskers when Dora and Dorothy had first seen him and nicknamed him "the lone pirate."
"And how under the sun did you chance to have that Hallow E'en disguise with you, Billy boy?" demanded Dora.
Short and Long grinned. "I didn't know but one of those fresh detectives was hanging around the house when I went off fishing that morning; so I put on the wig and whiskers before I slid down the woodshed roof."
"By jolly!" laughed Lance. "You must have looked like a gnome when you went through the streets."
"Nobody saw me. It was before sun-up," said Billy.
Dorothy had scrambled to the top of the big rock. Suddenly she uttered a loud screech.
"What's bit you now?" demanded Chet, starting up.
"Oh! my trophy pin! It's dropped off my blouse directly into the water. Oh, dear me! I won that in the relay races this spring."
"And the water's deep there," declared Bobby. "It's a regular diving hole."
"Now, you've lost it!" cried Dora, sadly. "But you can wear mine sometimes."
"Don't you fret, Miss--which is it, Dora, or Dorothy?" demanded Billy.
"I'm Dorothy," admitted the twin in question, climbing sadly down to the shore again.
"That's all right, Dorothy," said Short and Long. "Leave it to me. I put my bathing trunks in my pocket and while you girls are spreading the luncheon over yonder I'll dive and see if I can get the pin. It's some muddy down there, I guess; but I can stay under water nearly two minutes--can't I, Chet?"