Three or four of these tales had appeared in the "Token," after a long
time and various adventures, but had encumbered me with no troublesome
notoriety, even in my birthplace. One great heap had met a brighter
destiny: they had fed the flames; thoughts meant to delight the world and
endure for ages had perished in a moment, and stirred not a single heart
but mine. The story now to be introduced, and another, chanced to be in
kinder custody at the time, and thus, by no conspicuous merits of their
own, escaped destruction.
The ladies, in consideration that I had never before intruded my
performances on them, by any but the legitimate medium, through the
press, consented to hear me read. I made them sit down on a moss-grown
rock, close by the spot where we chose to believe that the death tree had
stood. After a little hesitation on my part, caused by a dread of
renewing my acquaintance with fantasies that had lost their charm in the
ceaseless flux of mind, I began the tale, which opened darkly with the
discovery of a murder.
A hundred years, and nearly half that time, have elapsed since the body
of a murdered man was found, at about the distance of three miles, on the
old road to Boston.
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