Miss Sibby went and took the note in her hand, looked at it wistfully, then laid it down, and took her spectacles out of her pocket, wiped them, and put them on her nose. Then she took the note up again and read the address.
“To Col. A. Anglesea, Calvert Hotel.”
Then she turned it over and examined it. The gummed edges of the envelope had but lightly adhered. She saw that a slight touch would open them.
She sat down in her low chair, with the note in her hand, and considered. She could hear Roland moving about overhead, and knew that he was safe to be there for ten or fifteen minutes.
She was tempted, but not so much by curiosity as by interest and anxiety in and on account of the boys.
“Them lads is up to somethink!” she said to herself. “I knowed they was up to somethink as soon as I heard ’em talking together! I couldn’t hear half they said, because the wind was a-blowin’ the wrong way, but I knowed they was up to somethink! They always is! Them boys is!
“When two or three of them is gathered together, it ain’t the Lord, but the devil, as is in the midst of them. Now, I’m gwine to see what’s in this note.”
She opened the envelope, and read words that made her hair fairly stand on end.
“The Lord have mercy upon me, a miserable sinner! What is the boys a-coming to in these times, anyhow? This mustn’t go, noways!”
And then she did a very sly thing.