The Swindler's Treasure
Page 1
Praise for the Works of Lois Walfrid Johnson
Intertwining fictional characters with real-life people and critical moments in American history, Lois Walfrid Johnson creates novels certain to catch the attention of readers, and then leaves them wanting to read and learn more. Johnson does an incredible job of bringing us into the lives of the American people in 1857. These adventure-filled, educational books should be read by youth everywhere.
—BILL INGEBRIGTSEN, Minnesota State Senator, former Douglas County Sheriff
Lois Walfrid Johnson writes stories kids love. When they were young, my daughters read her Freedom Seekers books, and really enjoyed them. These are stories that not only entertain, but call children to conviction, courage, and Christ-centered living. I highly recommend Lois and these excellent books.
—RANDY ALCORN, New York Times bestselling author of forty books including Heaven
I’ve used Escape into the Night in my classroom for many years and am thrilled to see the new Freedom Seekers edition coming out with study guides. My students have always enjoyed the well-developed characters and engaging storylines. As a teacher I have appreciated the historical accuracy and timeless spiritual truths.
—JOCELYN ANDERSON, teacher, Our Redeemer’s Christian School, Minot, ND
It’s difficult to find a series of books written for a variety of age groups with both boys and girls and yet remain historically accurate. Mrs. Johnson has succeeded in doing so in the Freedom Seekers series. Set in a geographic area that runs north and south, she describes weather conditions and topographical features that impacted the daring adventures of the main characters, their clothing, and even their food.
While developing the character of Peter, Mrs. Johnson visited with students at the Illinois School for the Deaf, including students in my classroom. We compared and contrasted the life of Peter to their lives. After all, Peter could have stood in our classroom! Often a child becomes a lifelong reader, simply because they relate to a character in a book. My students related to Peter, not only because he was deaf, but because he had so much more in common with them.
—KATHLEEN COOK, teacher, Illinois School for the Deaf, Jacksonville, IL
I want to thank you on behalf of my class and their families for your wonderful books. I teach a reading class at a homeschool co-op in Washington State. I can’t count how many times the parents of my students have thanked me for the class and told me that their child never enjoyed reading like they do now. They have to hold their children back from reading ahead of the others! So many families who are not in my class have begun to read your books. We may have started an epidemic, and one that I am happy to be a part of!
I hope you have more books on the horizon. Your fans here in Gig Harbor, Washington, will be on the lookout for them!
—MARYANN KING, homeschool co-op teacher, Washington State
Your books have encouraged me in trusting in God more and more. Your characters, especially Libby Norstad, Caleb Whitney, and Jordan Parker, sound just so realistic! I sometimes wish that they were real!!!!!! I like how you introduced a new character [Peter] in the fourth book. It kept the story even more exciting than it is!
—S., young reader, Texas
After I read one of your books I often end up asking myself, Would I have helped slaves or not? I have come up with an answer. I would help them because all people are equal and have the right to be free in the sight of God.
—C. B., young reader, Kentucky
We love how you incorporate biblical principles into your stories. When Caleb trusts God and Libby struggles in the same areas we do, it shows us that through God we can overcome every obstacle, because He is our light and our salvation.
—C. FAMILY, Ohio
Other Titles by Lois Walfrid Johnson
The Freedom Seekers
1. Escape into the Night
2. Race for Freedom
3. Midnight Rescue
4. The Swindler’s Treasure
5. Mysterious Signal
6. The Fiddler’s Secret
Adventures of the Northwoods
1. The Disappearing Stranger
2. The Hidden Message
3. The Creeping Shadows
4. The Vanishing Footprints
5. Trouble at Wild River
6. The Mysterious Hideaway
7. Grandpa’s Stolen Treasure
8. The Runaway Clown
9. Mystery of the Missing Map
10. Disaster on Windy Hill
Series also available in German and Swedish
Viking Quest
1. Raiders from the Sea
2. Mystery of the Silver Coins
3. The Invisible Friend
4. Heart of Courage
5. The Raider’s Promise
Series also available in Norwegian
Faith Girlz: Girl Talk: 52 Weekly Devotions
Also available in in the UK
For adults: Either Way, I Win: God’s Hope for Difficult Times
© 2013, 1997
LOIS WALFRID JOHNSON
Previously published as The Riverboat Adventures Series
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
Scripture quotations are from the King James Version of the Bible.
Interior Design: Ragont Design
Side-wheeler illustration by Toni Auble
Map of Upper Mississippi by Meridian Mapping
Sign language chart courtesy of the Illinois School for the Deaf, Jacksonville
Cover Design: Faceout Studio, Tim Green
Cover Illustration: Odessa Sawyer
978-0-8024-0719-1- Printed by Bethany Press in Bloomington, MN – 06/13
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Johnson, Lois Walfrid.
The swindler’s treasure / by Lois Walfrid Johnson.
p. cm. (The Freedom Seekers; #4)
Summary: In 1857, while working for the Underground Railroad on a Mississippi River steamboat, fourteen-year-old Libby hunts for the swindler who has robbed her father, and she tries to reunite the fugitive slave Jordan with his missing father.
ISBN 978-0-8024-0719-1
[1. Underground railroad—Fiction. 2. Fugitive slaves—Fiction. 3. Slavery—Fiction. 4. AfroAmericans—Fiction. 5. Steamboats—Fiction. 6. Mississippi River—Fiction. 7. Christian life—Fiction.] I. Title. II. Series: Johnson, Lois Walfrid. The Freedom Seekers; #4
[Fic]dc21 974670 CIP AC
We hope you enjoy this book from River North Fiction by Moody Publishers. Our goal is to provide high-quality, thought-provoking books and products that connect truth to your real needs and challenges. For more information on other books and products written and produced from a biblical perspective, go to www.moodypublishers.com or write to:
River North Fiction
Imprint of Moody Publishers
820 N. LaSalle Boulevard
Chicago, IL 60610
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Printed in the United States of America
To the people of Alton, Illinois,
and the surrounding area
who have believed in the worth
and freedom of all people
To Kathleen Cook
for your ongoing, exceptional help
To every student
at the Illinois School for the Deaf
You showed me your hands
to help me hear
Frederick Douglass, John Jones, Samuel Morse, Priscilla Baltimore, Major Charles and Rebecca Hunter, John Livingston, Thomas Dimmock, Benjamin Godfrey, Dr. Thoma
s Brown, Frances Brown, J. W. Gilson, John Hart, Allan Pinkerton, William Florville, and Abraham Lincoln are historic characters who lived in the 1850s. Elijah Lovejoy died in 1837. All other characters are fictitious and spring with gratitude for life from the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidental.
In the time in which this book is set,
African Americans were called Negro,
the Spanish word for black,
or colored people.
Contents
1. The Swindler’s Threat
2. Disaster!
3. Run!
4. Strange Reunion
5. Peter James Christopherson
6. The Big Search
7. Happy Birthday!
8. Jordan’s Daddy
9. Secret in the Rock
10. The Deserted House
11. Caleb’s Hero
12. Narrow Escape
13. Last Chance?
14. The Heat of the Furnace
15. The Disappearing Package
16. Big Bullies
17. Fire!
18. Mr. Lincoln’s Springfield
19. Trick Or …?
20. Nobody Knows
Study Guide
Sign Language Chart: How to Finger Spell the Alphabet
A Few Words for Educators
The Swindler’s Treasure Folks
Acknowledgments
Excerpt from Mysterious Signal
CHAPTER 1
The Swindler’s Threat
A sharp wind rattled the windows, sounding just as angry as the voices. Libby Norstad’s deep brown eyes held a question: What’s wrong?
The sound came from somewhere outside the Christina’s dining room. Pushing back her deep red hair, Libby listened. Men’s voices, she decided. Among them, Pa’s.
As she hurried out to the wide stairway at the front of the steamboat, the voices grew louder. At the bottom of the steps, Libby’s father, the captain of the Christina, stood on the main deck. With him were two men.
“But Mr. Dexter is helping me,” one of them said. From his accent Libby knew he was an immigrant.
The other man was well dressed, redfaced, and angry looking. Pa turned to him.
“Mr. Dexter?” The captain’s quiet voice held a ring of steel that told Libby he was angry too. “Mr. Edward Dexter?”
Already a crowd had gathered around to listen. Feeling concerned for Pa, thirteen-year-old Libby sat down on the steps to watch.
“Your reputation has gone ahead of you, Mr. Dexter,” Captain Norstad said. “Up and down the Mississippi River, respectable captains have told you to get off their boat. And I’m telling you now!”
“No! No!” the immigrant cried. “Look what Mr. Dexter is doing for me!” As though unable to believe his good luck, he held up a well-stuffed sack.
“Mr. Iverson, when did you buy your land?” Captain Norstad asked.
The immigrant’s face shone with pride. “For one year I have worked. I have cleared a field. I have planted corn. I have built a house—and a barn for my cow.”
Digging into the sack, Mr. Iverson held up a fistful of paper money. “Now I will buy more land.”
Captain Norstad took one bill, then two, then five or six. Turning them toward the light, he studied the bills carefully. “You are selling the farm you have?” he asked.
“If a man is willing to work, the streets of America are paved with gold! I will take this money and buy a bigger farm.”
The captain’s “No!” sounded like an explosion. “Look at this!” He held a dollar bill close to the immigrant’s face. “Look at the name of the bank on this greenback! This is wildcat money!”
“Wildcat?” Mr. Iverson peered at the bill. “We have no wildcats on my farm.”
“It’s called wildcat money because it comes from a bad bank!”
Captain Norstad turned to Mr. Dexter. “You are offering him money printed by a bank with a reputation as awful as your own.”
“No! No!” the immigrant exclaimed again. “Mr. Dexter is giving me twice as much money as I paid for my farm. A good return on my hard work, yah?”
“It is not a good return,” the captain answered. “He is giving you money that is worth nothing!”
“You mean counterfeit?”
“Just about,” the captain said. “The United States government doesn’t print money now. It gives permission to state banks to print the money.”
“So!” Mr. Iverson declared. “American money is good money.”
“Sometimes good. Sometimes bad.”
“Bad? If America says print the money, why bad?”
Captain Norstad sighed. “I wish I knew your language so I could explain better. If you take this money to a bank and say, ‘I want to buy a new farm,’ they would look at you and say, ‘These paper bills are not worth a cent. The bank that printed this money has no gold in it.’”
“Yah?” Mr. Iverson looked even more confused. “I don’t understand what you say.”
“It’s simple.” Captain Norstad spoke slowly. “Edward Dexter is a swindler.”
“Ha!” Dexter scoffed. “The captain wants to keep you from getting rich. This is between you and me.”
With troubled eyes Mr. Iverson looked from one man to the other. In that third week of May, 1857, countless immigrants were traveling to their new homes in America. Often they found it hard to know whom they should trust.
Captain Norstad paid no attention to Dexter. “Do you have a wife?” the captain asked Mr. Iverson.
The immigrant nodded. “I go to meet her now. She is coming on train from the Old Country.”
“Do you have children?”
“One girl and two boys. They will be proud of what their papa has done in America.”
“No!” Captain Norstad shook his head. “They will think, ‘An evil man made a fool of my papa.’ Do you want your wife and your children to have no house?”
“No house?” Fear filled Mr. Iverson’s eyes. “I have worked hard to make a home in America.”
Captain Norstad pointed to Edward Dexter. “This man will rob you of your home.”
“Yah?” Still Mr. Iverson looked uncertain. “You are telling me the truth?” Again the immigrant looked from one man to the other. “Who should I believe?”
“The captain doesn’t want you to make a lot of money,” Dexter said quickly.
“Yah, it is a lot of money,” the immigrant answered. “I can do many things for my family with this much money.” He stretched out his hand toward the swindler. “We shake on it.”
But Captain Norstad stepped between the two men. “No, you won’t. I will not let you shake on it.”
At the top of Mr. Iverson’s open trunk lay a large Bible. The captain pointed to it. “You believe the words of this book?”
“Yah, it is truth.”
“If I put my hand on your Bible and say, ‘This man is a swindler,’ would you believe me?”
“You would make your words so strong?”
“May I?” Captain Norstad asked.
Mr. Iverson nodded. As if expecting Captain Norstad to be struck dead, the farmer stepped back.
With a careful touch Captain Norstad reached down. As his hand rested on the Bible, his face showed how much the book meant to him. “I am telling you the truth,” he said. “This man will cheat you of your land. His money is worthless.”
“He is trying to make a fool of me?” the immigrant asked. “To take what I have?”
The captain nodded.
Still looking into Captain Norstad’s eyes, Mr. Iverson reached down. With one quick movement, he put his hand over the captain’s hand as it rested on the Bible. “I believe you.” Without another word Mr. Iverson held out the bag filled with wildcat money.
His eyes blazing with anger, Edward Dexter snatched the bag. Holding up his clenched fist, he shook it at the captain. “If it’s the last thing I do, I’ll get even with you!”
Libby felt a chill
down her spine. No doubt about it: Edward Dexter was a dangerous man. But her father acted as if he hadn’t heard the swindler’s threat.
“Pack your bags!” the captain said to Dexter. “In twenty minutes we’ll reach Fairport, Iowa. You’re getting off there.”
“You can’t do this to me!”
“I already have. Be here on the deck, or I’ll send my crew after you. I’ll stand at the gangplank till you get off this boat.”
As though wondering if anyone would help him fight the captain, the swindler looked around. At the edge of the crowd stood Jordan Parker, a runaway slave who worked for Captain Norstad. For a moment the swindler’s gaze rested on Jordan, as though memorizing every detail of his appearance.
Quietly Jordan edged back into the crowd, but Libby knew it was too late. Dexter will remember, she thought, the fear within her growing. If he guessed that Jordan is a fugitive, Dexter will know there is a big reward on his head.
Through fugitive slave laws, Congress had strengthened the right of slave owners to hunt down and capture fugitives, even in free northern states. Owners often hired slave catchers—rough, cruel men—to bring back runaways.
In that moment Libby remembered Jordan’s family. If Dexter somehow discovered they were hiding on the boat, Pa could go to prison, or lose the Christina, or both.
Libby shivered. Will Edward Dexter try to get money any way he can? Pa seems to think so.
When the swindler stalked away, the crowd broke up. Libby ran down the steps to her father. Moving over to one side of the deck, Pa stood where he and Libby could talk without other people listening.
The knot of dread in Libby’s stomach was growing. “What if Dexter finds a way to get even? He knows that the Christina stops at every town on the Mississippi River.”
Pa sighed. “As captain, I could have arrested Dexter if he passed counterfeit money. But he did something legal, even though it’s wrong.”
As the Christina steamed toward the next town, Libby kept thinking about the swindler’s clenched fist. “Dexter can wait for us. He knows where you’ll be before you get there.”
“Sometimes there’s a cost to doing the right thing,” Pa said.