On the third night of my imprisonment in the overseer’s house (the fourth since my arrival) I was very restless.  My enforced inactivity, and the lack of fresh air, were producing the natural effect; every night I slept less, waking frequently, to toss and heave until I sank again into a troubled slumber.

In one of these intervals, I heard a scratching sound—­just such a sound as a mouse makes behind the wainscot.  I had not noticed it before, and it caused me nothing but irritation now, for when a man is wakeful, such sounds, however slight they may be, become magnified to his overstrung nerves.  I endured the sound for a time; then shooed to scare the gnawing animal away.  But it did not desist for an instant, and at last, vexed beyond measure, I got out of bed, groped my way to the spot whence I thought the sound proceeded (it seemed to come from the floor) and stamped heavily on the boards.

My action was heard by the men outside the door, and one of them cried out angrily to know what I was about.

“’Tis a wretched mouse will not let me sleep,” I replied.

“And what can you expect, you fool, when your room’s over an empty stable?” he said.  “Curse me! what a fresh-water fair-weather fowl you be!”

The scratching having ceased, I went back to bed.  But in a few moments it recommenced, at what seemed to be a spot nearer to me, and, marveling somewhat at the persistence of the beast (for a mouse is easily scared), I covered my head, and so endeavored to shut out the annoyance.

I think I must have dozed again, for suddenly I found myself sitting bolt upright, straining my ears as a man does when he is suddenly wakened from sleep and is not sure whether ’twas by an actual sound or by a sound heard in dream.  And in a moment my doubt was resolved; assuredly I heard a sound, and ’twas like a human voice, but muffled.  I listened intently; it appeared to come from beneath me.  While I was wondering who could have chosen the stable as a place for conversation in the dead of night I could have sworn (though half-believing it must be an hallucination) that I beard my own name.  In a trice I was out of bed, and groping my way under it, my hand struck against something projecting from the floor, and at the same moment I heard distinctly, and as it were in my very ear, a low whisper, “Massa Bold, Massa Bold!”

“Who is there?” I whispered in return, and, clutching the thing my hand had touched, I felt it move.

I tightened my grasp upon it; it was round, and as I discovered by laying my other hand upon its top, hollow.  Struck by a sudden thought I bent my face down, and whispered again into the hole, “Who is there?” afterwards turning my ear upon it.

“Massa Bold, lill Missy sends a letter.”

The words came clearly up the tube.

“Me poke it up,” said the voice again.

I withdrew my ear, and waited in a tense breathlessness of amazement.  Then I heard a slight rustling, and placing my hand on the tube, I felt a small piece of paper thrust against it.  Grasping this, all my frame thrilling with excitement, I whispered again: