"What is it, my child?"
"That guardian up there is a very bad man."
"That is an old story, Käthi," said Walter.
"Yes, but you don't know what he does; he empties the letter-box at the school-house when it is dark."
"Is that true?"
"Yes, father saw him do it, but he told me he would shut me up for three days if I told any one."
"How did your father happen to see such a thing?" asked Herr Leonhardt, amazed.
"Oh, he told mother all about it, and I ought not to have heard it, but I did hear. Last week, one night when he was biding to try and catch the thief who steals our grapes, he heard some one going softly towards the school-house, and he hid close, thinking it was the thief. And then he saw it was Herr Gleissert, who busied himself about the place where the letters are slipped into the box. And father crept nearer, and saw plainly how he poked something long and thin into the slit and drew out the letters, and then lighted a match and held his hat before it that no one might see it. Then by the light of the match he read all the writing on the letters, and put them back again into the box,--all but one, which he kept. And then he went home to the castle again. Father said he wanted to seize him and hold him, but he did not know what weapons he might have about him, and that there was no use of accusing him, for father would be sure to get the worst of it."
"What mischief can the scoundrel be brewing?" said Herr Leonhardt, anxiously.
Walter laughed. "Ah, father, we are paid now for always reading the addresses of the letters he sent from the castle."