“Do you realize that we’ve made a very valuable find this morning, after all, Sally?” she cried.
“Why, no, I don’t. Everything’s just spoiled!” retorted Sally dubiously. “If it isn’t pirates, it isn’t anything that’s worth anything, is it?”
“I don’t know yet how much it’s worth,” retorted Doris, “but I do know that we’ve unearthed enough to start us on a new hunt.”
“Well, what is it?” demanded Sally, still incredulous.
“Can’t you guess? The name of this vessel that the lumber came from,—and the date. Whatever happened that cave couldn’t have been made before 1843, anyhow, and that isn’t so terribly long ago. There might even be persons alive here today who could remember as far back as that date, if not further. And if this Anne Arundel was wrecked somewhere about here, perhaps there’s some one who will remember that, and—”
But here Sally interrupted her with an excited cry. “My grandfather!—He surely would know. He was born in 1830, ’cause he’s eighty-seven now, and he ought to remember if there was a wreck on this beach when he was thirteen years old or older. He remembers lots about wrecks. I’ll ask him.”
Doris recalled the hearty old sea-captain, Sally’s grandfather, whom she had often seen sitting on Sally’s own front porch, or down at the Landing. That he could remember many tales of wrecks and storms she did not doubt, and her spirits rose with Sally’s.
“But you must go about it carefully,” she warned. “Don’t let him know, at first that you know much about the Anne Arundel, or he’ll begin to suspect something and ask questions. I don’t see quite how you are going to find out about it without asking him anyway.”
“You leave that to me!” declared Sally. “Grandfather’s great on spinning yarns when he gets going. And he grows so interested about it generally that he doesn’t realize afterward whether he’s told you a thing or you’ve asked him about it, ’cause he has so much to tell and gets so excited about it. Oh, I’ll find out about the Anne Arundel, all right—if there’s anything to find out!”
They parted that morning filled anew with the spirit of adventure and mystery, stopping no longer to consider the dashed hopes of the earlier day.