“What plan?”
“A tremendous one.”
“What’s it about?”
“Treasure,” said Titty. “Come on and see the captain off. Then we’ll go to a secret place while the mate goes on with your buttons.”
Captain John sailed away up the lake to Holly Howe. It was a grim business this, of being unjustly suspected by Captain Flint, but at the same time he could not let mother write to Mrs. Blackett about it. That might mean trouble for the Amazons. He found mother writing letters in the Holly Howe garden.
“I say, mother, you’re not writing to Mrs. Blackett?”
“Not I,” said mother. “I wasn’t going to write unless you wanted me to. That was why I rowed down to the island yesterday. What time did you get back last night? After I left Titty, nurse and I kept a lookout for you by the boathouse, thinking I might stop you on your way back and ask you about writing.”
John was a little taken aback. With Captain Flint in his mind, he had forgotten quite a number of other things.
“We didn’t get back till this morning,” he said.
“So the Blacketts made you stop the night,” said mother. “Poor Titty!”
“It wasn’t poor Titty at all,” said John. “Titty did better than any of us. She captured the Amazon all by herself.”
“But then where were the Blacketts?”
“They were on Wild Cat Island.”