"An' if I was you," continued his wife, "I wouldn't say a blessed word to nobody about it. Keep your business to yourself, kase if you don't, them that helps you will want to share in what you get."
"Susie, you've got a long head an' that's a fac'," said Bud, who wondered why he had not thought of all these little things himself. "I'll bear them idees in mind. Now, punch up the fire a little an' let me see if I can read what's into this letter. One of the most prominent an' respected citizens of Barrington; that's what I be, an' the feller who writ to me knows it."
Having lighted his pipe and waited until the blaze from the fire had attained sufficient brightness, Bud drew the letter from his pocket and read aloud:
"Dear sir and frind i take my pen in hand to let you know that you aint doing as you had oughter do you are paid by the committee of safety to keep an eye on all the abolitionists in the kentry and you dont do it theres plenty of them in barington and a hul pile of them up to the cademy wich is a disgrace to the town them boys some of them is spiling for a licking sich as you and your frinds had oughter give them long ago but aint done it and had oughter have a little sense knocked into their heads why dont you send them warning to shet up or clear themselves outen the federasy like the govment says they must do inside of ten days theres that gray boy for one and that graham boy for an other but they aint no kin though theyre awful sassy and need looking to if you dont tend to business bettern this i shall have to see that the committee gets some body else in your place hurra for jeff davis and the south and long may she wave that is my moto."
Men of sense do not usually give a second thought to anonymous communications, but put them into the fire as soon as they ascertain their character; but Goble, of course, did not know this, and besides he was not that sort of a fellow. He was not strictly honorable himself, and was glad to receive hints, even if they came from a correspondent who was too much of a coward to sign his name to what he had written. He saw at once that he had been remiss in his duty, and the threat contained in the closing lines made him a little uneasy.
"Land sakes, I plumb forgot to keep an eye on them boys at the 'cademy," he said, as he folded the letter and prepared to return it to the envelope. As he did so, he found that there were a few lines written on the outside which he had not before noticed. They ran as follows:
"Them boys I spoke of that gray and graham boy are the verry ones who fooled you about that under ground rail road—"
When Bud read these words he hit his rheumatic leg another heavy blow, and jumped to his feet with a fierce exclamation on his lips.
"So them's the fellers that fooled me, are they?" he shouted, as soon as the pain in his leg would permit him to speak. "You haven't disremembered how they offered me a cool hundred dollars in gold if I would look around in the woods an' find the ladder or the stairs that led down to that railroad, have you, Susie? If it hadn't been for Riley I might have been lookin' for it yet. I said at the time that I would get even with them for that, but I couldn't seem to find no way to do it, kase I don't never have no dealin's with 'em; but I've got an idee now. I wisht I could think up some way to get them two out in the woods by theirselves. I'll have to have somebody to help me if I try that, Susie."
As that was very evident to Mrs. Goble she made no reply, but went on with her preparations for supper, while Bud smoked and meditated. When the chickens, potatoes, and hoe-cake were declared to be ready, he did not change his position, but grabbed what he wanted from the table, and devoured it while sitting by the fire and trying to conjure up some plan for making himself square with those fun-loving academy boys. He inferred that they had been preaching Union doctrines at the school, but Bud did not care a straw for that. He wanted to punish them for making him search for that underground railroad. When the dishes were cleared of everything eatable that had been placed upon them, and the table moved back to its place, Bud stretched his heavy frame on the ground in front of the fire and went to sleep, using his hat and boots for a pillow.