"Indeed I'm not," growled the Scotchman, who although flattered by the demand, was unwilling to admit it. "History of Massachusetts! The very idea!" "I said the clock history," corrected Christopher, not a whit abashed. "Did you? Well, even that is bad enough. What do you think I'm here for? To play school-master?" "Oh, no, indeed. Merely to serve as my private tutor," was the teasing reply. "That's your belief, is it! Egad, I begin to think it is," laughed the clockmaker, amused at the lad's audacity. "Certainly your demand would seem to bear out the theory." "But you made the promise yourself--you can't have forgotten that." "Forget it! Would I be likely to forget--would I so much as get the chance, with you pestering me almost before my hat is off? Well, if I was rash enough to make a promise like that, I see no way but to keep it; so the Massachusetts clock story it shall be. It happens, too, that you have asked for it at just the right moment, for to-day I am going to work on as fine an old Willard clock as ever you saw. She is the real thing!" "Was Willard the first of the Massachusetts clockmakers?" "Among the first; and undeniably one of the best and most important of them. Oh, of course there were other men--some of them excellent. But we know less about them because they left no such long trail of clocks behind as the Willards did. Gawen Brown was a splendid workman; and so was Avery, who in 1726 made the clock for the Old North church. Then there was Benjamin Bagnall, who located in Charlestown about 1712 and remained there almost thirty years. His two sons, Benjamin and Samuel, also went into the clockmaking business and did very commendable work. In addition there were the Munroes of Concord--Daniel and Nathaniel; and Samuel Whiting, Nate's partner; not to mention the Popes, Robert and Joseph; and Daniel Balch of Newburyport. All these men were well established in or near Boston either before 1800 or shortly after that date." "Evidently the Massachusetts people must have known what time it was," grinned Christopher. "If they didn't it was their own fault," returned his companion, "for this list probably represents only a part of those engaged in the business. A good many more, like our friend, John Bailey, moved to small inland villages where they modestly plied their trade, selling their wares to only a limited circle of purchasers. Of these scattered craftsmen we have, as I told you, scant information. It is merely when we chance upon their names in early town records or a clock turns up to testify to their knowledge of their craft that we have tidings of them. But with the Willards it was different. They have left behind them a collection of clocks that speaks in no mistakable terms for their skill and industry." "How many of these Willards were there?" Christopher demanded.