While the girls crowded about her, Mrs. Fabian placed the picture, face downwards, on the table near by and tried to draw out the old headless tacks driven in to hold the backboard snugly in its place.
“Well, whoever framed this picture did it for all time!” exclaimed she, breaking several fingernails and tearing the skin on her hands in the attempt to loosen the fine steel nails.
“Here! I’ve found an old pair of broken scissors in this desk—let’s use them to clinch the nails and force them out,” said Nancy, handing her mother the shears.
With this assistance, Mrs. Fabian soon had the nails out and then carefully removed the old sections of thin boards. Under the boards was a yellowed newspaper, folded neatly, and so wedged in at the edges of the frame that no dust could work a way through to the picture. Without a thought of the paper, Mrs. Fabian took it out and expected to see the back of the picture. Instead, she found a yellow-stained letter written to Paul Revere Esq. and signed by one of the famous men of the Revolution. It was a personal letter of that time, and had been used to paste over a crack in the back of the picture.
“Why—why! How very wonderful!” breathed Mrs. Fabian, as she stared at the old letter.
“What is it—anything valuable?” asked the girls.
“A genuine letter written to Paul Revere! Now that I think of it, girls, Paul Revere lived in Morristown and his home is still intact on De Hart Street, I believe. This old picture must have come from his house; or in some way, this letter found its way into someone else’s hands and was used at that time for scrap paper to mend this picture. Now let’s see what the picture is.”
But a cry from Polly, who had picked up the old newspaper and now had opened it wide, caught their fullest attention.
“Oh, oh! Isn’t this too funny for anything! Listen and I will read it.” Then Polly read aloud an advertisement in the tiny old newspaper, of a Squire at Baskingridge who wished to sell a healthy, young negro wench of unquestionable pedigree. Price and particulars would be given any interested buyer.
“Polly!” chorused her audience, in surprise. “That paper must be as old as the letter!”