"Now," thought he, "what's this?"
It was darkly, vitally mysterious.
"'Tis the queerest thing ever I knowed!"
The letter was a folded brown paper, sealed tight, doubtless with a paste of flour and water; and it was inscribed in an illiterate scrawl: Brednbutr—which Billy Topsail had the wit to decipher at once. Bread-and-Butter—nobody in particular at Bread-and-Butter; anybody at all at Bread-and-Butter. Need was signified; haste was besought—a letter in a cleft stick, left to do its own errand, served by its own resources, with a fluttering red flannel rag to arrest and entreat the traveller.
Obviously it was intended for the mail-man. But the mail-man, old Bob Likely, with his long round—the mail-man, where was he? Billy Topsail did not open the letter; it was sealed—it was an inviolate mystery. Fingering it, scrutinizing it, in astonished curiosity, he reflected, however, upon the coincidence of its immediate discovery—the tracks were fresh in the snow and the brown paper was not yet weather-stained; and so remarkable did the coincidence appear that he was presently obsessed with the impulse to fulfill it.
He pushed back his cap in bewilderment.
"Jus' seems t' me," he reflected, gravely, "as if I was meant t' come along an' find this letter."
It was, truly, a moving coincidence.
"I ought t' be shot," Billy Topsail determined, "if I doesn't get this here letter t' Bread-and-Butter the morrow night!"