From a Bench in Our Square

by Samuel Hopkins Adams

I assented.

“Dominie,” said the Little Red Doctor, “it is no kind of a day for an old man to be sitting on a bench.”

I dissented.

“Dominie,” persisted the Little Red Doctor, “you can’t deny that you’re old.”

“Whose fault is that but yours?” I retorted.

“Don’t try to flatter me,” said the Little Red Doctor. “You’d have licked my old friend, Death, in that bout you had with him, without any help of mine. And, anyway, you were already old, then. You’re a tough old bird, Dominie. Otherwise you wouldn’t be sitting here in a March blizzard staring at the Worth mansion and wondering what really happened there three years ago.”

“Your old friend, Death, beat you that time,” said I maliciously.

The Little Red Doctor chose to ignore my taunt. “Look your fill, Dominie,” he advised. “You won’t have much more chance.”

“Why?” I asked, startled.

“The wreckers begin on it next month. Also a nice, new building is going up next door to it on that little, secret, walled jungle that Ely Crouch used to misname his garden. I’m glad of it, too. I don’t like anachronisms.”