Hope had found the wild peppermint in the right place. She had been studying her map as she walked along the road, and the old Rector came up and told her at once how she could find Boggy Glen. It was over some fields behind a pine wood. Charity had not been so fortunate, but the post office woman had told her that the Towers was the name of Mr. Cardwell's place, and a carrier's cart passed it every Wednesday.
"If only Miss Vale would give us a holiday, I could go," said Charity, "but she won't. And I'm not quite sure that the Pirate is Mr. Cardwell."
"But I'm sure," cried Faith delightedly, "because I've been talking to him, and we're all going to his house to tea very soon."
Then she told her story, and Charity was not best pleased.
"You've been doing what I ought to have done," she said. "You'd no business to go and speak to him. You ought to have come off and told me where he was."
"But I didn't know where to find you," said Faith.
Charity sniffed.
"It's not secret at all if you know all about it," she said. "You've spoiled the whole thing!"
She walked out of the room as she spoke, and banged the door behind her.
Faith felt inclined to cry, but Hope told her that Charity had come home tired and cross, and that she didn't mean what she said, and when the sisters met at tea Charity was her bright self again, and quite interested about writing her sealed letter to the captain.