Chapter 4 of Treasure Island is called "The Sea Chest." Jim and his mother realize that they are in great danger at the Admiral Benbow Inn, and so they set out for the nearby hamlet. However, no one there is willing to return to the inn and help them defend it against the pirates, so they go back alone, though someone has provided Jim with a pistol for his protection. Jim takes the key to the old buccaneer's sea chest from around the neck of his dead body, and they open the chest.

Inside the chest, they find fine clothes, pistols, a bar of silver, and gold coins. They also discover a bundle of papers tied up in oilcloth. Jim's mother is determined to count out the gold so that she can take the amount the dead man owed her and no more. However, when they hear first the tapping of the blind man's stick, then a low whistle in the distance, Jim persuades her to run away with the gold she has already counted out, saying that he will take the oilcloth package "to square the count."

Jim and his mother escape from the inn, but before they have gone very far, she faints, and Jim is forced to stay with her, within earshot of the pirates, to find out what happens next.