“So as a summer person yourself, Mr. Webster, are you saying that what Willard means to you is a piece of property?”

“Oh no,” Sally said quickly. “It’s being part of a rural world. That’s why we came. We fell in love with the village itself. It feels as if here things are still human somehow. Don’t you agree, Tim?”

“I guess so, yes.”

“Your husband does not seem to have quite your fervor about the rural world,” Eben needled with a twinkle in his eyes.

Sally had hardly heard the interruption.

“I wanted the children to have a place where they could be rooted. We’ve moved six times in our marriage. I wanted somewhere they would know would always be there, and for grandchildren eventually. You do agree with that, Tim?”

“Oh yes. But we really haven’t come here to tell Mr. Fifield about ourselves but to ask him to tell us about Willard. I gather that Boston people began to come up here by the early nineties. Am I right?”

“About then—and they came first as boarders, you know. There must have been some idea about fresh air for the children—the summer camp did not exist at that time. So people either went to Europe, which was the usual thing, or they found some fanner to take them in as boarders. The father often came only on weekends, and there were splendid Friday expeditions to meet the Boston train from which the fathers descended coal-black from the soot, in stiff collars and black coats.”

“How vivid you make it!” Sally exclaimed. “Do go on.”

“I wanted to write the history of Willard myself, you see.” And for the first time Eben Fifield put off his genial mask and looked serious.

“Why didn’t you?” Sally asked.

“Oh”—Eben shrugged it off—“that’s a long story. Indolence, I wouldn’t be surprised … and Olive’s death … a lot of things.” But now he leaned forward with a new intentness, his hands clasped round one knee. “I’ll be honest with you. The more you dig the worse everything becomes. I chickened out.”

“You mean you learn things you can’t tell?” Timothy ventured.