Year by year it became more of a disgrace in the eyes of Bayport's neat and thrifty inhabitants--for neat and thrifty we are, if we do say it.

The selectmen would have liked to tear it down, but they could not, because it was private property, having been purchased from the Howes heirs by the third Cy Whittaker, Captain Cy's only son, who ran away to sea when he was sixteen years old, and was disinherited and cast off by the proud old skipper in consequence.

Each March, Asaph Tidditt, in his official capacity as town clerk, had been accustomed to receive an envelope with a South American postmark, and in that envelope was a draft on a Boston banking house for the sum due as taxes on the "Cy Whittaker place." The drafts were signed "Cyrus M.Whittaker." But this particular year--the year in which this chronicle begins--no draft had been received.

Asaph waited a few weeks and then wrote to the address indicated by the postmark.

His letter was unanswered.