{"product_id":"2940013335875","title":"THE LIGHT IN THE CLEARING","description":"CONTENTS\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBOOK ONE\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWHICH IS THE STORY OF THE CANDLE AND COMPASS\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCHAPTER\u003cbr\u003e    I The Melon Harvest\u003cbr\u003e   II I Meet the Silent Woman and Silas Wright, Jr.\u003cbr\u003e  III We Go to Meeting and See Mr. Wright Again\u003cbr\u003e   IV Our Little Strange Companion\u003cbr\u003e    V In the Light of the Candles\u003cbr\u003e   VI The Great Stranger\u003cbr\u003e  VII My Second Peril\u003cbr\u003e VIII My Third Peril\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBOOK TWO\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWHICH IS THE STORY OF THE PRINCIPAL WITNESS\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e   IX In Which I Meet Other Great Men\u003cbr\u003e    X I Meet President Van Buren and Am Cross-Examined by Mr. Grimshaw\u003cbr\u003e   XI A Party and--My Fourth Peril?\u003cbr\u003e  XII The Spirit of Michael Henry and Others\u003cbr\u003e XIII The Thing and Other Things\u003cbr\u003e  XIV The Bolt Falls\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBOOK THREE\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWHICH IS THE STORY OF THE CHOSEN WAYS\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e   XV Uncle Peabody's Way and Mine\u003cbr\u003e  XVI I Use My Own Compass at a Fork in the Road\u003cbr\u003e XVII The Man with the Scythe\u003cbr\u003eXVIII I Start in a Long Way\u003cbr\u003e  XIX On the Summit\u003cbr\u003e      Epilogue\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBOOK ONE\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhich is the Story of the Candle and the Compass\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCHAPTER I\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTHE MELON HARVEST\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOnce upon a time I owned a watermelon. I say once because I never did it\u003cbr\u003eagain. When I got through owning that melon I never wanted another. The\u003cbr\u003etime was 1831; I was a boy of seven and the melon was the first of all\u003cbr\u003emy harvests. Every night and morning I watered and felt and surveyed my\u003cbr\u003ewatermelon. My pride grew with the melon and, by and by, my uncle tried\u003cbr\u003eto express the extent and nature of my riches by calling me a\u003cbr\u003emellionaire.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI didn't know much about myself those days except the fact that my name\u003cbr\u003ewas Bart Baynes and, further, that I was an orphan who owned a\u003cbr\u003ewatermelon and a little spotted hen and lived on Rattle road in a\u003cbr\u003eneighborhood called Lickitysplit. I lived with my Aunt Deel and my\u003cbr\u003eUncle Peabody Baynes on a farm. They were brother and sister--he about\u003cbr\u003ethirty-eight and she a little beyond the far-distant goal of forty.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMy father and mother died in a scourge of diphtheria that swept the\u003cbr\u003eneighborhood when I was a boy of five. For a time my Aunt Deel seemed to\u003cbr\u003eblame me for my loss.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"No wonder they're dead,\" she used to say, when out of patience with me\u003cbr\u003eand--well I suppose that I must have had an unusual talent for all the\u003cbr\u003enoisy arts of childhood when I broke the silence of that little home.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe word \"dead\" set the first mile-stone in the long stretch of my\u003cbr\u003ememory. That was because I tried so hard to comprehend it and further\u003cbr\u003ebecause it kept repeating its challenge to my imagination. I often\u003cbr\u003ewondered just what had become of my father and mother and I remember\u003cbr\u003ethat the day after I went to my aunt's home a great idea came to me. It\u003cbr\u003ecame out of the old dinner-horn hanging in the shed. I knew the power of\u003cbr\u003eits summons and I slyly captured the horn and marched around the house\u003cbr\u003eblowing it and hoping that it would bring my father up from the fields.\u003cbr\u003eI blew and blew and listened for that familiar halloo of his. When I\u003cbr\u003epaused for a drink of water at the well my aunt came and seized the horn\u003cbr\u003eand said it was no wonder they were dead. She knew nothing of the\u003cbr\u003esublime bit of necromancy she had interrupted--poor soul!\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI knew that she had spoken of my parents for I supposed that they were\u003cbr\u003ethe only people in the world who were dead, but I did not know what it\u003cbr\u003emeant to be dead. I often called to them, as I had been wont to do,\u003cbr\u003eespecially in the night, and shed many tears because they came no more\u003cbr\u003eto answer me. Aunt Deel did not often refer directly to my talents, but\u003cbr\u003eI saw, many times, that no-wonder-they-died look in her face.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eChildren are great rememberers. They are the recording angels--the\u003cbr\u003ekeepers of the book of life. Man forgets--how easily!--and easiest of\u003cbr\u003eall, the solemn truth that children do _not_ forget.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA few days after I arrived in the home of my aunt and uncle I slyly\u003cbr\u003eentered the parlor and climbed the what-not to examine some white\u003cbr\u003eflowers on its top shelf and tipped the whole thing over, scattering its\u003cbr\u003eburden of albums, wax flowers and sea shells on the floor. My aunt came\u003cbr\u003erunning on her tiptoes and exclaimed: \"Mercy! Come right out o' here\u003cbr\u003ethis minute--you pest!\"","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47147517673712,"sku":"2940013335875","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013335875_p0.jpg?v=1763579854","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013335875","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}