They got there first. The stream, knowing its own mind better and better as it recognized its old road, reached the Castle, and by dinner-time all the grass round the Castle was under water. By tea-time the water in the moat was a foot or more deep, and when they got up next morning the Castle was surrounded by a splendid moat fifty feet wide, and a stream ran from it, in a zigzag way it is true, but still it ran, to the lower arch under the mound, and disappeared there, to run underground into the sea. They enjoyed the moat for one whole day, and then the stream was dammed again and condemned to run underground till next spring, by which time the walls of the Castle would have been examined and concrete laid to their base, lest the water should creep through and sap the foundations.
"It's going to be a very costly business, it seems," Elfrida heard her father say to the engineer, "and I don't know that I ought to do it. But I can't resist the temptation. I shall have to economize in other directions, that's all."
When Elfrida had heard this she went to Dickie and Edred, who were fishing in the cave, and told them what she had heard.
"And we _must_ have another try for the treasure," she said. "Whoever has the Castle will want to restore it; they've got those pictures of it as it used to be. And then there are all the cottages to rebuild. Dear Dickie, you're so clever, do think of some way to find the treasure."
"You once saw the treasure being carried to the secret room--in a picture, didn't you?"
"Then why didn't you go back to that time and see it really?"
"We hadn't the clothes. Everything in our magic depended on clothes."
"There were lots of soldiers in the picture," said Edred, "and fighting."
"I'm not afraid of soldiers," said Elfrida very quickly, "and you're not afraid of _anything_, Edred--you know you aren't."
"You can't be or you couldn't have come after me right into the cave in the middle of the night. Come on. Stand close together and I'll spread out the moon-seeds."
So Dickie said, and they stood, and he spread the moon-seeds out, and he wished to be with the party of men who were hiding the treasure. But before he spread out the seeds he took certain other things in his left hand and held them closely. And instantly they were.