The place was perfectly situated for the evening s

business. It stood almost exactly at the midpoint of

e five-mile crescent of the bay; from the air, the

sweeping shoreline resembled a crude sickle slicing into

the water, marked by a pale, foamy smear where the easy

wash of the bay tides met the dark rocks footing the

bluffs.

The house sat close to the cliff. It was a loose, sprawl-

ing geometry of shingle and clapboard in the middle of

what had once been a wide clearing in the surrounding

pine forest--a glade, now covered with a roughly cared-

for lawn. According to local legend, the Vikings had

landed here and been slaughtered on the spot by local

Indians, themselves now long since driven off, first by

~rs and finally by the insistent encroachment of resort

houses.

To sailors entering the bay on a misty day, the forest