A ready interpretation had Binnhart, a keen intuition. The native endowment might have wrought him good service in a better field. As it was it had been the pivotal faculty on which had turned with every wind of opportunity the nefarious successes that the thieves had achieved. He now watched the glimmer of recognition in Captain Treherne’s eyes as he, too, gazed breathlessly with intent interest at the mansion, despite his bound and gagged situation. He even made shift to turn his head that he might fix his eyes on the eastern side. Only to the east he looked, and always. Binnhart felt a bounding pulse of prideful discovery that in the east the treasure was hidden, in an eastern pilaster of the portico.
He was not familiar with the meaning of the architectural term, but just what a “pilaster” was he would know before he was an hour older, he swore to himself, if there was a carpenter or builder awake in the little town of Caxton where his shop was located and where he must needs repair for tools. There he would learn this all-significant fact, for that there was treasure hidden at Duciehurst all the country-side had been aware for forty years--the question was, where?
They bore Captain Treherne through half a dozen darkling rooms, showing as yet scant illumination from the slow coming day. The windows gave upon a gray nullity outside, and even the size and condition of the bare, echoing apartments could not be ascertained by the prisoner’s searching gaze as he was laid down on the floor at full length, watching the preparations of his captors for their temporary departure. One of them would remain, as he was assured by Binnhart, who had again adopted a tone of deference suited to the evident station and culture of the victim. Connover would stay and see to it that he was not molested in any manner whatever during the short absence of the others. Binnhart, making his words as few as possible, took his leave and once more in the boat Jorrocks pulled down the river with every pulse of energy he could command.
Captain Treherne had spent forty years of his life in an insane asylum, but the experience had not bereft him in this lucid interval of the appreciation of certain fundamental facts of human nature. He realized that although he could not use his hands, Connover was in no wise restricted. Perhaps the offer of the funds in his pocket might compass his release if he could find means to intimate this delicate proposition. Treherne waited till he heard the shuffling gait of Jorrocks and the swift assured step of Binnhart die away in the distance before he would seek to communicate his desire by means of winks and such significant grimaces as the gag would permit. Before the others were clear of the house Connover had come and stood beside him gazing down at him with a sort of vacant curiosity on his weak, dissipated face, unmeaning and without intention. But he immediately turned away, and, repairing to a long hall hard by, began to tramp idly back and forth to while away the time of waiting.