We were talking about George Washington.”

“We were talking about the Constitution,” she said. “And these days, the only talk is about the repeal movement.”

“Can we get back to the business at hand?”

“What? History? We can get guns off the street for good, and you want to talk about history.”

“I told you, history matters. Even on this trip.”

“I thought we were here to see a guy about a letter you sold for him.”

“A letter to Rufus King, who helped write the Constitution that everyone is fighting over.” Peter reached into his pocket and handed her a copy. “Read it.”

She started to singsong through it: “ ‘October 26, 1786. Dear Mr. King, It is my pleasure to recommend to you a young man of good character and background, his father having served with distinction in one of my regiments. William Pike is sober, serious, and possesses instinctive skills for debate. In discussion with me over the rule of law, he said, “There are God-made laws, and there are man-made laws. We cannot change God’s laws, but a wise man should know enough to change an unwise law….” ’ ”

Evangeline looked up. “He could be talking about today.”

Peter just nodded.

“Don’t look so smug.” Then she read on: “ ‘Such well-phrased sentiment alone makes him worthy of consideration. Your Obedient Servant, Henry Knox.’ ”

“See?” said Peter. “History matters. Why would a professor of constitutional history be so interested in this letter? And in the death of the man who, if my instincts are correct, sold it through Morris Bindle? And why now?”

THE PIKE-PERKINS MILL was set back from the road, behind a stand of sugar maples planted by some enlightened mill manager a century before. The driveway cut a graceful arc under the trees, so that the visitor’s first impression was of entering a park.

But this was no park. A pair of buildings flanked the main gate. Beyond them rose the mill itself, a huge utilitarian cathedral of brick and glass—flaking brick and broken glass—four hundred feet long and four stories high, with a five-story clock tower that looked like a steeple grafted onto the front.

Peter pulled in under the trees. There were no other parked cars and hardly a sound, except for the traffic speeding by.

Across the road was a row of little story-and-a-half houses, and another row beyond, and perhaps another beyond that. Worker housing, thought Peter, built back when there was work.

It had rained the night before, so there was a powerful smell of damp wood and decay in the air. Peter realized it was coming off the mill.

“Welcome to the land that time and the Superfund forgot,” said Evangeline.

“Welcome to the New England your editors never ask you to write about,” said Peter. “Nice trees, though.”

The building to the right of the gate was a large Colonial house, dating from the days when the mill was no more than a granite wheel grinding grain for country farmers. What windows weren’t boarded up were broken, and the only paint that hadn’t peeled was the sign on the door: MAIN OFFICE: VISITORS PLEASE REGISTER.

The building on the left was bigger and in better shape: two stories of brick with a slate roof, an old loading dock by the gate, a millrace running past the foundation at the far end. When belts and looms replaced granite wheels, this building replaced the wooden mill house; then it had given way to the structure now looming behind it. There was a sign at the loading dock door: MILLBRIDGE HISTORICAL SOCIETY. OPEN SUNDAYS AND TUESDAYS, 11 A.M.–1 P.M.

“Historical society,” said Evangeline. “Looks like history is all they have left.”

A smaller sign said, PLEASE ENTER.

So they did … into a jumble. Small town historical societies were often defined by the word. Jumble. Jumbles of stuff, usually displayed with little regard for the niceties of museum science but with plenty of enthusiasm and occasionally a bit of artistry.

This was a large room, maybe twenty-five by fifty, perfect for a jumble—an old loom, a cabinet with a collection of tools, two crammed bookcases, a musket, a diorama of the original Cousins Mill, a clothes dummy wearing a union suit—one-piece underwear “made from Millbridge weave.” On the walls—a collection of old doorknockers, framed prints from nineteenth-century newspapers, photographs of young men in military uniforms and women in high-necked dresses, all staring severely out of the past….

At the far end, above an ornate desk, a huge photograph hung from a ceiling molding. It showed scores of people standing in front of the mill. “The Men and Women of the Mill, 1861” was carved into the frame and on the matte above the photo was etched the legend, “In America, we get up in the morning, we go to work, and we solve our problems.”

The room had a musty smell that suggested mold, which suggested to Peter that he should not handle any of the old books and should change his clothes before he carried any spores back to his office.