Once again the ancient curse had struck.
Stunned, Sybil stood transfixed for a moment. All kinds of thoughts passed through her mind. Her attempts to pull the body from underneath the heavy chest did not succeed. It was clear to her by now that there was nothing she could do for him anyway.
She realized that she would have to make some decisions. The natural thing would be to call a doctor or the police or both, but she immediately rejected this notion. If she could not save Paul’s life, she could at least save his cherished goal from being taken by outsiders.
No thought of her own advantage crept into her thinking at this point, only what Paul would have wanted her to do had he survived. There was no doubt in her mind now. She had to do something about the body and about the heavy chest.
As she looked around the subterranean passage, she saw Paul’s flashlight, which had dropped from his hands. Luckily it was still working. She searched the narrow chamber with its beam until she found the shovel. Wedging the flashlight in the soft mud of the wall, she began the grim task of digging around the chest. Eventually she was able to budge it sufficiently to pull Paul’s body out from under it. Stopping every now and then because of exhaustion, she managed to pull his body back toward the opening and up to the surface.
She had used up so much energy by then that she collapsed on the ground, regardless of the mud, and slept for an hour before she woke up and realized that she had to move on.
More work had to be done. Hastily, she covered the opening in such a way that she could easily return to the passage underneath. This she accomplished by putting down a layer of branches, cut from some of the trees in the garden; then she added a layer of earth, camouflaging the opening to casual observers. She could explain the signs of digging as part of gardening procedure: they could have been planning to plant a tree, or simply trying to turn the soil for better growth or for flowers or fruit. She now began to drag Paul’s limp body back towards the house.
With the help of the garden hose she managed to get the mud off his body, hands and face. She tried very hard not to faint at the sight of his dead body, telling herself that this inanimate mass of flesh had no connection with the man she had loved and lived with for so long. There was an expression of indescribable terror etched on Paul’s face, as if he had seen something so horrendous and incredible that it had caused his heart to stop.
When she had cleaned him up, she pulled the body toward one of the old trees in the front part of the garden, laid him against it and put the shovel next to him. She was going to tell the examining physician that he had tried to do some digging and had suddenly collapsed. Since Paul had been a city man, who was not known for taking much exercise, and given his family history of heart disease, such an explanation might well be accepted, she thought. At any rate she could think of nothing better at the moment. After she had had a shower, she picked up the telephone with trembling hands and called for an ambulance. As she had expected, the doctor who arrived with the ambulance pronounced Paul dead and took the body to a morgue.
The following morning there was a routine examination and questioning.
The death was put down to heart failure, due to overexertion. There were no complications. Sybil wondered whether this was due simply to good luck—or whether the local doctor wanted to get Paul’s body out of Amityville with the minimum of delay, in the hope that his fiancée would go with him.
Two days later Paul was buried in a Brooklyn cemetery, where his family had buried their dead for the past fifty years. The only mourner was Sybil, who had not yet brought herself to notify anyone of Paul’s passing. Paul was an only child and his parents had previously died; there were no close relatives.
She returned to Amityville immediately after the funeral. Their tenancy was due to expire in a couple of days, and Sybil was determined to do all she could to save the treasure. But, after a few strenuous hours of trying to move the chest, she realized that she would never be able to do it alone.
Naturally, the death of Paul had made all the local papers. In one account it was pointed out that the ancient curse had once again taken its toll and that it was inadvisable for outsiders to come to Amityville. There was nothing Sybil could have done to prevent such stories from appearing. But now that very adverse publicity helped solve her immediate problem. It was essential to have more time if she were going to remove the treasure. She called the owners and asked them to extend the lease for another month. Her heart was beating in her throat as she spoke with them, wondering if they actually thought that Paul had found the treasure. They could, of course, refuse to extend the lease, in which case the treasure would be lost. But the owners were more superstitious than she had counted on: Paul’s death had convinced them that the house was, after all, not as safe as they had originally hoped. They were in no hurry to return, and when Sybil offered a sizeable sum to extend the lease for another month they readily agreed to remain on vacation in Florida and let Sybil stay on in the house. A sigh of relief passed Sybil’s lips. She went to sleep that night totally exhausted, both physically and mentally.
She slept for twelve solid hours and when she awoke she could think clearly for the first time in several days. As soon as she did so, the terrible fact of the recent tragedy hit her fully. But this was no time to cry. Long before Paul’s untimely demise, she had seen him in a totally different light: he had ceased to be the man she had once known. The bond between them had gradually loosened and she felt quite sure that, had he succeeded in acquiring the treasure, she would no longer have been part of his life. She had sensed, particularly during those past few weeks, that greed and total involvement with the material aspects of the treasure had so altered Paul’s previously sweet and balanced disposition that there was no longer any room in his heart for her; he had lost the capacity to have a relationship of the type that she wanted. Still, he had been her fiancé, and she grieved for him. After all, he had not deserved to die; but it seemed that anyone in this house ran the risk of being affected by the curse. Nevertheless, she decided to stay on and complete what Paul had begun.
At first she thought she could get some help to move the heavy chest from its hiding place, and open it inside the house; but eventually she rejected this notion. Whom could she really trust? Paul surely would not have wanted anyone else involved. On the other hand, bringing the chest up herself seemed out of the question.
So far no one had come to her door and bothered her. The news of Paul’s death had not brought crowds of the curious, as she had feared. If anything, the belief that the curse had struck again kept people away from the house. But she knew that she had to move fast, before some nosey or greedy individual got the idea that there was something valuable hidden at 112 Ocean Avenue.
As if led by an inner voice, she descended into the basement of the house, where she rummaged among the rusty garden implements and other materials left by the owners. Her surprise was great when she came across a well-worn dolly which apparently had been used to move heavy objects into the house. A sudden thought struck her. She took the dolly down to the rear of the garden, uncovered the excavation and went down into it. Then she returned to the house and found some rope. It took her five minutes to lash the ropes around the chest. Her next move was to position the dolly close by, and to build up a ramp of earth between it and the chest. She began pulling at the ropes in the hope that she might move the chest onto the dolly. To her relief she succeeded after only a few minutes.
By now the soil had dried up considerably and the walls were firmer. As soon as the chest was on the dolly she tied the ropes to the front of it and began to pull it towards the entrance to the excavation. This was no easy task because the floor was uneven, but she managed it: now the dolly with the chest on it sat underneath the opening. All that remained to be done was somehow to lift the chest out of the hole and get it up the garden and into the house. But how was she to do this without proper tools or proper equipment?
Once again her ingenuity came to her aid. She recalled having seen a winch in the cellar. The owners of the house had probably used it at one time to get their motorboat out of the water and onto dry land. She brought the winch to the hole and set it up securely over the opening. Then she tied ropes around the chest and began to wind the winch.
Twice the chest fell back onto the dolly, but, far from being discouraged, Sybil determined to find a way in which she could prevent this from happening again, every time the chest slipped back onto the dolly, she could hear metallic sounds from within.
Once more she had an idea which came to her out of the blue, perhaps inspired by someone on the other side of life, or perhaps from her own subconscious; wherever it came from, it was worth trying. Against the side of the house were some two or three dozen bricks, perhaps left over from some building work which the owners had abandoned. She managed to take the bricks to the opening of the hole. Then, gradually hoisting the chest a little bit at a time and putting a brick underneath, she raised the chest, inch by inch, until it was flush with the opening.
With one supreme effort, throwing her body backwards to support the winch, she pulled it toward the edge of the opening, then secured it with ropes so that it could not slip back again.
Exhaustion forced her to take a break. After she had rested for several minutes, she pulled the chest onto the ground, clambered into the hole, brought the dolly up and, with some effort, placed the chest on the dolly again. Now she felt she was halfway home. Pulling the dolly towards the house was child’s play compared to what she had just been through.
The weather-stained, mud-smeared chest dominated the living room. Sybil stared at it for a moment, breathing deeply after her exertions. But she could not risk opening it yet, much as she wanted to. Passers-by might see her excavations. She ran to the opening and covered it again with layers of branches and earth. Once again, she returned to the house, ready to do the ultimate to complete Paul’s quest: open the chest.
Half an hour later the chest was pried open. What Sybil saw was beyond belief. Before her was an array of gold bracelets, rings, a wide range of antique jewelry, gold doubloons and silver coins. It was an astonishing example of the booty which pirates would take from the passengers and crew of the ships they had captured. On top of it all, carefully wrapped in a separate box, was the glowing opal that had caused so much tragedy to those who had possessed it. The radiance of the precious stone fascinated her. She remembered that Paul had said the opal was reputed to bring bad luck to those who possessed it, but somehow she could not believe that anything so beautiful could be cursed. The story must be a myth; the evil in this house must be due to the desecration of the Indian burial grounds, not to the stone. She decided to dispose of the treasure as soon as possible, but to keep the opal for herself.
The next day Sybil spent most of the time filling in the hole and covering up all traces of her activities. It was not an easy task, for Paul had dug very deeply; and yet she managed it by the end of the day. In order to camouflage the site even further, she went into the village and bought some plants, which she then placed into the soft soil on top of the opening. As far as casual observers were concerned, this was simply an improvement in the garden.
Selling the hoard proved to be somewhat more difficult than she had anticipated. The first jeweler she approached with some of the bracelets wanted to know where she had obtained them. Since Sybil had no intention of disclosing anything about her find, she left the shop. Then she recalled that a friend had once advised her that, if she wanted to sell something without publicity, she should do so by auction. Quickly she contacted one of the top auction houses in Manhattan and placed the entire treasure trove into the skilled hands of the auctioneer. As far as the story she told him went, the valuables had been in her family for two centuries and an eccentric aunt had just left them to her. In view of Sybil’s personal credentials as a reputable individual, the firm did not question this story; besides, auctioneers are less concerned with where something comes from than where it goes and how much it can be sold for.
The auctioneer had promised no undue publicity. The auction took place quickly, and Don Pedro’s treasure was dispersed all over the world. It brought a goodly sum, nearly a million dollars. After the auctioneer had taken his percentage, some $700,000 was turned over to Sybil.
At first she thought that having that kind of money was wonderful. But then she gave it further thought, for something about all this did not sit well with her. Within two or three days an idea had crystalized in her mind.
She went to the local library; there she asked the librarian where the nearest Indian settlement was in the area and when he pointed her to a small village no more than ten miles away, she drove there. The Indians she encountered were all up-to-date Long Islanders: were it not for their dark skins and the strange hair styles which some of them wore, one would have never suspected them to be of Indian origin. Sybil found the head man of the settlement. She wanted to do something to help Indian children have better lives, she explained to the puzzled head man; what could she possibly do to be of immediate value to them?
“It is simple,” the head man replied. “We desperately need a new school.”
That was it, Sybil thought. She donated half the money to the village to establish a school for Indian children. The rest, after taxes, would leave her with perhaps $150,000. It was a relatively modest amount, and she felt she had earned it by her work over the last few months, by restoring the grave to its previous condition, and by her donation to the Indian village. All in all, Sybil believed that she had done as well as could be expected under the circumstances and that the entire incident had reached its final chapter. Wherever Don Pedro was now, she thought, he should be satisfied—not to mention Rolling Thunder, whose grave was once again hidden. As for the people who owned the house, that was their problem and not hers; she knew very well that, no matter how much money she had realized from the treasure, she could not have persuaded them to move or to turn the land back into an ancient Indian burial ground!
With all that completed, Sybil felt almost at peace again. There was, of course, the opal which was still waiting to be mounted, so it could be worn in suitable fashion. As yet, she had no idea of the history and meaning of the gem in her possession.