Kent Knowles: Quahaug by Joseph C. Lincoln

It was Asaph Tidditt who told me how to begin this history. Perhaps I should be very much obliged to Asaph; perhaps I shouldn't. He has gotten me out of a difficulty -- or into one; I am far from certain which.

Ordinarily -- I am speaking now of the writing of swashbuckling romances, which is, or was, my trade -- I swear I never have called it a profession -- the beginning of a story is the least of the troubles connected with its manufacture. Given a character or two and a situation, the beginning of one of those romances is, or was, pretty likely to be something like this: