At Old Man Eckert's

One day he disappeared and a prolonged search by his neighbors
failed to turn him up or throw any light upon his whereabouts or
whyabouts. Nothing indicated preparation to leave: all was as he
might have left it to go to the spring for a bucket of water. For a
few weeks little else was talked of in that region; then "old man
Eckert" became a village tale for the ear of the stranger. I do not
know what was done regarding his property--the correct legal thing,
doubtless. The house was standing, still vacant and conspicuously
unfit, when I last heard of it, some twenty years afterward.

Ambrose Bierce

 




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