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study.”
    In his study, thought Homer. On the way, struggling to keep up, he wondered eagerly about the nature of Henry’s study. Homer was a connoisseur of other people’s working arrangements. How, for instance, did they keep their pens and pencils, and where did they put their stamps? Did they stick up notes around their computer monitors about passwords and user IDs and reminders to pick up their pants at the cleaner’s? And, above all, how did they control their teeming collections of pamphlets and folders, books and notebooks, miscellaneous pieces of paper, unanswered letters, and all the ragtag strokes of genius scribbled down on the backs of envelopes? What about their dictionaries? And by the way, what other reference books did they keep on hand to be snatched up at a moment’s notice?
    As it turned out, Henry Whipple’s arrangements were charming. He had built himself a nest around his keyboard. Small high-piled tables were gathered in close to take the overflow. A comfy sweater hung over the back of a chair to ward off a chill, and a whirly fan stood beside the printer in case of a heat wave. All that was missing in Henry’s nest was a lining of downy feathers.
    And to Homer’s delight, Henry was ready at once to reveal a blot on the escutcheon of Concord’s old First Parish Church. “How about a hanging sermon?” he said. “Will that do?”
    â€œA hanging sermon?” said Homer joyfully. “No kidding?”
    â€œNo indeed.” Henry sat back and said smugly, “The Reverend Dr. Ripley preached a hanging sermon in 1799.”
    â€œEzra Ripley? Pious old Dr. Ripley?” Homer’s eyes bulged. “But that’s impossible. You don’t mean the same dear old Ezra Ripley who was pastor of the First Parish for years and years?”
    â€œSixty years, that’s right. I do indeed.” Then Henry frowned. “But I don’t know as I’d call him ‘dear.’ He was a pretty authoritarian old—” Stopping himself, Henry reached for a book and flipped it open.
    Homer was merciless. “Pretty authoritarian old what?”
    â€œNever mind,” said Henry, busily turning pages. “Back to the hanging sermon. You know, Homer, it wasn’t anything out of the ordinary for the time.” Then Henry slammed the book shut and looked at Homer fiercely. “First, you’ve got to picture the congregation in the old church, all the pews packed with people eager to witness a hanging, and the unhappy victim sitting smack in front of the pulpit while the pastor scolded him for his criminal ways. Okay, Homer, you get the picture?” Henry opened the book again. “Here’s what Ripley said to poor old Samuel Smith. ‘Your life for thirty years past has been a predatory warfare against society and individual families and persons.’”
    â€œSamuel Smith was the—ah—hangee?”
    â€œRight,” said Henry, and he went on to describe the scene on Gallows Hill, with Smith pleading for his life, then dancing a fandango in the air with the rope around his neck and women fainting and lying on the ground with their fair legs exposed. “Well, I suppose it was their legs,” said Henry. “In George W. Hosmer’s memoir, the word fair is followed by four asterisks.”
    â€œHmmm,” said Homer, looking at the ceiling. “What else could they have exposed that had only four letters?”
    â€œNothing in George Hosmer’s vocabulary,” said the archivist firmly, and he went on to tell Homer about Parson Ripley’s distress over the drunkenness and disorder in the town and his passionate reaction to the schism in his congregation. “He fought it tooth and nail,” said Henry, shaking his head in awe. “He walked right into a gathering of dissenters and preached a sermon, so the poor people had to sit there and listen. But he couldn’t prevent