Past Malice
Chapter One
To most people, I'll bet the old place looked nothing at all like a battlefield. To most casual observers, the Chandler House was the epitome of what they imagine the past to have been: a big colonial house by the ocean, a
wind-swept lawn leading down to a dramatic cliff, romantic
to the nth-degree. The reason that so many people think the past really was the good old days is because of the fine, lovely things that survive. These are the very best, the very richest things that would have inspired pride and a desire to preserve them. Seeing these objects causes people to confide in me how much they've always loved history, how they've always wanted to be archaeologists, how they would have loved to have lived "back then," whether back then was ancient Egypt, imperial Rome, or, as it was in this case, colonial New England.
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