I sat down against the tree a little dazedly, for I understood the whole story. Here was where the treasure had been concealed, and Silas Tunstall, unable any longer to run the risk of our finding it, had stolen into the orchard the night before, removed the cement cap and abstracted the box containing the papers. He had heard us coming; we had startled him so that he had forgotten to replace the cap, but had hurried away, the box under his arm. This beautiful old place would never be ours!
And sitting there, watching the sun sail up over the treetops, I made a great resolution. I would beard the lion in his den; I would see Silas Tunstall, and at least let him know that we knew he had not played fairly.
I carefully replaced the cap, noting how nicely it fitted into the groove made by the bark, as it had grown around it; then I went slowly back to the house. I thought it best to say nothing to anyone concerning the resolution I had made; I doubted myself whether any good could come of it, but I was determined to make the trial.
Help came from an unexpected quarter.
“Cecil,” said mother, at the breakfast table, “I wish you would walk over to the village for me and get me a spool of number eighty black thread. I thought I had another spool, but I can’t find it anywhere.”
“Very well, mother,” I said, in as natural a tone as I could muster. And as soon as I had finished breakfast, I put on my hat and started for the village.
Though Dick had described the house in which Mr. Tunstall lived, he had given me no idea of its exact location, except that it was somewhere along the road between our place and the town, so there was nothing for it but to ask at the little store where I bought the thread. I asked the question as indifferently as I could, but I saw the quick glance which the boy who waited on me shot at me.
“Tunstall?” he repeated; “oh, yes, miss; I know where he lives. Everybody around here does. It’s about half a mile back up the road—a little gray house, standin’ a good ways back among the trees. You can’t miss it. It’s got two iron gate-posts painted white.”
“Oh, yes,” I said; “I remember the place now.”
“An’ there’s another way you can tell it, miss,” he added, mysteriously. “It’s got green shutters, an’ they’re always closed.”