"I know that," replied my friend; "but I am in a peculiar position. Some day I will tell you all."
I saw that he was growing nervous, and changed the subject of conversation.
Returning from the post office that afternoon to the old farm house, I stopped for a little chat with Deacon Thompson, my good natured host, who was mending his orchard fence; for the well loaded boughs of apples, just beginning to assume their various tinges of red, yellow, or russet, offered a strong temptation to the cattle in the adjoining pasture. Incidentally I inquired regarding an old excavation which I had noticed on the hill near an unfrequented road. This excavation had apparently once served for a cellar, although most of the stones had been removed, and the sheep easily ran down its now sloping and grassy sides. In close proximity was a deep well, over the top of which had been placed a huge, flat stone. Overshadowing both cellar and well were three ancient elms, storm-beaten and lightning-cleft, but still standing as if to guard the very solitude which was unbroken save by the tinkling bell, which told whither the farmer's flock was straying. From Mr. Thompson I learned the history connected with this scene.
Twenty years before he was born, his father's folks saw, one morning in March, a smoke curling above the tops of the elms which were just visible over the brow of the hill. Quickly going to the scene, they found the house burned to the ground. The occupants were an old man, named Peter Colburn, and his wife; and they, together with a traveller, who had obtained lodging there for the night, were all burned with the house. The stranger's horse and saddle were found in the barn, some little distance from the house, but there was no clew to his identity. There were only a few people then who had settled in this bleak region, and there was no funeral other than the assembling of a half dozen together, who dug a grave within fifty feet from the elms, and there laid the charred remains of the unfortunate victims. I had seen a small, rough, unlettered stone standing there, but did not before know its meaning.
The next day I related the bit of tragic history to Christopher Gault, and we strolled over the hill to its scene.
"What a magnificent view!" he exclaimed, as we came to the place.
Certainly it could not be finer. We stood upon an elevated plateau, from which the prospect in either direction was beautiful and grand. To the north could be seen the graceful curves of the Green Mountain range, gradually growing fainter and of paler blue as the eye followed them to at least seventy miles away.
Farther to the east rose the majestic form of Monadnock, if not the highest, one of the very noblest peaks in the Granite State. In an opposite direction, and nearly one hundred miles from Monadnock, stood old Greylock, the greatest elevation in Massachusetts; while much nearer by—in fact, seeming almost at our feet when compared with these immense ranges—lay the charming Deerfield valley, up from which rose the curling smoke of the locomotive as it moved steadily westward, until hidden from view by a sudden entrance into Hoosac Tunnel.
The view so absorbed our attention for a time that we hardly noticed our immediate surroundings. When we did so we began to make an examination. Gault, with characteristic curiosity, began a search in the bottom of the old cellar. Suddenly he emerged.
"A veritable relic!" he exclaimed. "See! an old knife; and here on its handle is a name. Can you read it?" and he handed it to me.