Thanks to the secluded locality and the fact that she was known to spend her leisure moments in wandering there, she could work without suspicion.

Secretly conveying a shovel and a few tools to the spot the next day, she set about her prodigious task.

As the upper works were gone, and the galleon not large, in three weeks, working an hour or two each day, she had made a deep excavation in the stern.

She had found many curious things,--the flotsam and jetsam of previous storms,--but as yet, it is perhaps needless to say, not the treasure.
To-day she was filled with the vague hope of making her discovery before Christmas Day.

To have been able to take her father something on that day--if only a few old coins--the fruit of her own unsuspected labor and intuition--not the result of vulgar barter or menial wage--would have been complete happiness.