A soft cloth bag was in the bottom of Sarah’s chest.

“Does your chest have a bag like this?” she asked Elizabeth.

“Yes. What do you think is inside?” Elizabeth asked. Together, Sarah and Elizabeth opened the cloth bags. They were amazed to discover they were filled with cloth. Just cloth!

But it was the most beautiful cloth they had ever seen. Elizabeth held the white silk up in front of her. Gold threads sparkled in tiny lines all over the cloth.

“This looks like something for a queen,” Elizabeth cried.

“... or a bride,” added Sarah.

“A bride?” asked Elizabeth.

“There is a letter from Father with my cloth.” Sarah began to read.

“‘Someday you will wear a white dress with gold threads. You will be the most beautiful bride ever. The man who marries you will have a treasure. A treasure worth more than all the gold in the world.’”

A tear rolled down Sarah’s cheek. “Father won’t be at my wedding,” she said sadly.

“But he has been planning your wedding since the day you were born.” A voice came from across the room. Sarah was startled and quickly closed the top of her chest. “Uh. . . Oh, Rebecca, I didn’t hear you come in.”

“Don’t be afraid,” Rebecca said calmly. “I see you have discovered your father’s treasure.”

“Did you know about it?” Elizabeth asked.

Rebecca walked closer to Sarah and Elizabeth. “He began to plan your weddings long ago. On the day each of you was born, he started. He began to put things into your chests. They were not ordinary things. They were very valuable gifts from faraway places. These chests are special too. He brought them home from India. They are hope chests.”

“What is a hope chest?” Elizabeth asked.

Rebecca smiled. “A hope chest is a box full of hopes. Your hope chest contains valuable and useful things. They are things you will need in the future.”

One by one, the pieces of the mystery started to fit together. Sarah thought about the hope chest and Father’s letter. “That’s why Father said our keys open the door to the future.”

“But why did Father make a map? Why didn’t he just tell us where our chests were?” Elizabeth asked. The girls seemed confused. Rebecca decided it was time to tell them the whole story. “Your father had been sailing the seas. Governor Bellomont and the king of England had been your father’s friends. The governor had given your father his ship and permission to hunt pirates. When your father was on a faraway island, however, he learned that people were accusing him of being a pirate.”

“Now, he thought the governor would support him. That’s why he sailed back to America to prove he was not a pirate. Still, he was afraid of being arrested. So he decided to hide the treasure first before meeting with Governor Bellomont in Boston. Remember when your family and I went to Boston on the ship?” The girls nodded their heads.

Rebecca continued, “During that trip to Boston, your father made the map. He gave it to your Uncle Sam to hide.”

“Your father had no idea what was about to happen. He didn’t know the governor would arrest and send him to England. He didn’t know the king would treat him like a pirate. He thought his ‘friends’ would help him at his trial. But everybody except your mother had abandoned him.”