“I can answer that one,” Penny said with a sigh. “The day our first guests arrived, I heard someone rummaging around in the storage room. I thought it was you, Marjorie, and thought you were fibbing later when you insisted you were out in the Donahues’ cabin helping Ann Mary count their laundry.” She laughed. “I owe you an apology, honey. While you and Ann Mary were busy, and Phil and I were upstairs hanging curtains, Taggart must have sneaked into the storage room and pasted that map behind the rotten lining of the old jewelry box.”
“You’re both two jumps ahead of me,” Philip said, laughing. “Taggart did put the map where you found it, but first he had to have some excuse for coming out here. He heard in the village that we were looking for someone who would take the soiled linen in to the laundry-mat and applied to Penny for the job.”
Penny moaned, covering her pretty face with both hands. “Oh, why did I fall into his trap so easily? I should have guessed when he offered to do it so cheaply, that something was wrong.”
“Not at all,” Peter said protectively. “Taggart did handle the laundry situation in a very satisfactory manner, so I don’t think anyone can blame you for not suspecting him of an ulterior motive.”
Phil nodded. “That’s right, Penny, nobody blames you. The trouble was that no one paid much attention to him when he came out here. I imagine Ann Mary didn’t always have the bundle ready, or his pay when he brought out the clean wash. Once when she left him alone in the kitchen he slipped down to the beach and stuck the bottle containing half the note under a rock.”
“We made everything so easy for him,” Marjorie groaned. “He was there in the kitchen, I remember, the day Ann Mary suggested that Judy and I search for rare shells. He was also there the time I asked her if it would be all right for us to spend the first rainy day rummaging through the old trunks in the storage room.”
“And,” Penny added, “he knew exactly when the boys left on their camping trip. Remember? Ann Mary told him he had to bring back their clean shirts before they left. I imagine it was simple for him to find out from her where they were going.”
“Uh huh,” Phil said. “_Very_ simple. Ann Mary had no reason to suspect him. He followed them to Uncle John’s fishing camp only to find that they had moved deeper into the woods. He saw the Bronc’s tire tracks and followed them to the lake. Early in the morning before Brook’s adventure, he rigged up the coat with the other half of the note in the pocket. He could count on the fact that one of the boys, while out canoeing, would be sure to notice what looked like the torso of a human body.” Phil smiled. “Taggart also knew that Jimmy, like Marjorie, was sure treasure was buried around here and was looking for clues.”