Mrs. Sutherland looked up from her delicate work, and eyed the boy as he bent over the papers Mr. Sutherland laid before him.
“Can this boy read?” she asked, indolently.
“Yes,” replied her husband.
“What does he do about the place?”
“He is a field hand,” he replied.
“He had better confine his attention to corn and cotton than serve you as an amanuensis. You are spoiling the hands,” she added, impatiently.
Tom’s eyes never wandered from his paper, but he lost not a word, and the firm set of lips showed him no indifferent listener.
“Can you read these?” asked the master with no reply to his wife’s observation.
“Yes, sir, I think so.”
“Well, then, let me hear them.”