The Story of the Treasure Seekers

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Эдит Несбит. The Story of the Treasure Seekers

CHAPTER 1. THE COUNCIL OF WAYS AND MEANS

CHAPTER 2. DIGGING FOR TREASURE

CHAPTER 3. BEING DETECTIVES

CHAPTER 4. GOOD HUNTING

CHAPTER 5. THE POET AND THE EDITOR

CHAPTER 6. NOEL’S PRINCESS

CHAPTER 7. BEING BANDITS

CHAPTER 8. BEING EDITORS

CHAPTER 9. THE G. B

CHAPTER 10. LORD TOTTENHAM

CHAPTER 11. CASTILIAN AMOROSO

CHAPTER 12. THE NOBLENESS OF OSWALD

CHAPTER 13. THE ROBBER AND THE BURGLAR

CHAPTER 14. THE DIVINING-ROD

CHAPTER 15. ‘LO, THE POOR INDIAN!’

CHAPTER 16. THE END OF THE TREASURE-SEEKING

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I am afraid the last chapter was rather dull. It is always dull in books when people talk and talk, and don’t do anything, but I was obliged to put it in, or else you wouldn’t have understood all the rest. The best part of books is when things are happening. That is the best part of real things too. This is why I shall not tell you in this story about all the days when nothing happened. You will not catch me saying, ‘thus the sad days passed slowly by’—or ‘the years rolled on their weary course’—or ‘time went on’—because it is silly; of course time goes on—whether you say so or not. So I shall just tell you the nice, interesting parts—and in between you will understand that we had our meals and got up and went to bed, and dull things like that. It would be sickening to write all that down, though of course it happens. I said so to Albert-next-door’s uncle, who writes books, and he said, ‘Quite right, that’s what we call selection, a necessity of true art.’ And he is very clever indeed. So you see.

I have often thought that if the people who write books for children knew a little more it would be better. I shall not tell you anything about us except what I should like to know about if I was reading the story and you were writing it. Albert’s uncle says I ought to have put this in the preface, but I never read prefaces, and it is not much good writing things just for people to skip. I wonder other authors have never thought of this.

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Then Albert-next-door began to scream again, and his uncle wiped his face—his own face, not Albert’s—with his silk handkerchief, and then he put it in his trousers pocket. It seems a strange place to put a handkerchief, but he had his coat and waistcoat off and I suppose he wanted the handkerchief handy. Digging is warm work.

He told Albert-next-door to drop it, or he wouldn’t proceed further in the matter, so Albert stopped screaming, and presently his uncle finished digging him out. Albert did look so funny, with his hair all dusty and his velvet suit covered with mould and his face muddy with earth and crying.

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