Read Online The Pandora Box by Lilly Maytree - Free Book Online Page A

not exactly sure. But believe me, Mare, we’ll get the whole thing sorted out right, as soon as we get back. I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
    “So why don’t we save the trouble of maybe getting ourselves killed and sort it out first? That ring all by itself is worth a fortune. Besides that, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, you know.”
    “But what if the whole collection, together, really is worth fifty million? The partners knew that before I ever even met them, yesterday. And what if, while we’re fumbling around trying to do everything proper, Scott Evans gets there, first? Peterson gave them to me, Marion. Personally. Practically with his last dying breath!”
    “I thought you said that old man might not even be Peterson. What if he’s the very thief that had to murder somebody to get them? A lot of those crimes went on in that war.”
    “Murdered somebody?” Dee looked out her window for a few moments, thinking. “Oh, you’re...probably right. I wonder if we could get in trouble digging up stolen treasure sixty years after the fact? Even though it no longer belongs to anyone and we had nothing to do with the original crime.”
    “Beats me. But I know one thing.” She clicked on the blinkers and turned onto the Interstate highway onramp, headed south. “Going to jail at my age would kill me.”
    Dee pursed her lips together and looked out her window again. “If it was a national treasure, I think the worst they could do is want it all back. Otherwise, it’s fair game. All treasure can be traced back to some original owner, so that fact can’t be relevant.”
    “Could be a finders-keepers sort of a thing!” Marion brightened at the thought.
    “That’s the way I was looking at it, too. But maybe we should go to the police anyway. Just to be sure.”
    Neither of them said another word for the next ten miles. On the outskirts of the city, Marion pulled into a fast food place.
    “Listen. Bill and I used to have this rule when we were married. Never—never—make an important decision without sleeping on it for a night. Because the next day a person almost always regains their common sense.”
    “Marion, this isn’t exactly a vacuum cleaner or a new car.”
    “But it’s the same principle. Want an ice cream?”
     
    ****
     
    It was nearly four o’clock in the afternoon when they drove into the marina parking lot. It’s just that they kept thinking of little extra things they might need—a book on the basics of seamanship, extra batteries for their computers, and a few food items that were personal favorites.
    When they gathered their things for the long walk out onto the docks, Dee suddenly realized how exhausted she was. She set her duffel bag and a suitcase down at space forty-three and knocked this time (as well as a person could knock on the side of a boat), but there was no one aboard the Pandora .
    Marion came up behind her, panting under the load of both her suitcases. “This is it? Looks like something out of the eighteenth century. Where’s the motor?”
    “Inside somewhere, I guess.” Dee climbed up over the rail, which was a little more difficult to do in her yellow dress than it had been in her jeans.
    “Shouldn’t we wait for the captain, or something?”
    “I’m the captain, or something,” she said more to herself than to Marion. “So we’re moving aboard. Toss me the stuff, and I’ll give you a hand up.”
    Once aboard, she didn’t even take time to change. Instead, she left Marion to settle in and headed for the port office so that she could pay the outstanding bill before it closed. The partners had such a know-it-all attitude, she wanted nothing in the way of proving herself absolute owner of Pandora . She had to find out just exactly how far she could trust them. Until then, she would carry her canvas bag, with everything from the safety deposit box inside, wherever she went. She wasn’t born yesterday.
    As practical and business-like as Wayne