Next there were large sticks , sound , black and heavy , which had lost the principle of decay and were indestructible except by fire , wherein they glowed like red-hot bars of iron . On this solid basis Tabitha would rear a lighter structure , composed of the splinters of door-panels , ornamented mouldings , and such quick combustibles , which caught like straw and threw a brilliant blaze high up the spacious flue , making its sooty sides visible almost to the chimney-top . Meantime , the gloom of the old kitchen would be chased out of the cobwebbed corners and away from the dusky cross-beams overhead , and driven nobody could tell whither , while Peter smiled like a gladsome man and Tabitha seemed a picture of comfortable age . All this , of course , was but an emblem of the bright fortune which the destruction of the house would shed upon its occupants . While the dry pine was flaming and crackling like an irregular discharge of fairy-musketry , Peter sat looking and listening in a pleasant state of excitement ; but when the brief blaze and uproar were succeeded by the dark-red glow , the substantial heat and the deep singing sound which were to last throughout the evening , his humor became talkative . One night -- the hundredth time -- he teased Tabitha to tell him something new about his great-granduncle . `` You have been sitting in that chimney-corner fifty-five years , old Tabby , and must have heard many a tradition about him , '' said Peter . `` Did not you tell me that when you first came to the house there was an old woman sitting where you sit now who had been housekeeper to the famous Peter Goldthwaite ? '' `` So there was , Mr. Peter , '' answered Tabitha , `` and she was near about a hundred years old . She used to say that she and old Peter Goldthwaite had often spent a sociable evening by the kitchen fire -- pretty much as you and I are doing now , Mr. Peter . '' `` The old fellow must have resembled me in more points than one , '' said Peter , complacently , `` or he never would have grown so rich . But methinks he might have invested the money better than he did . No interest ! nothing but good security ! and the house to be torn down to come at it ! What made him hide it so snug , Tabby ? '' `` Because he could not spend it , '' said Tabitha , `` for as often as he went to unlock the chest the Old Scratch came behind and caught his arm . The money , they say , was paid Peter out of his purse , and he wanted Peter to give him a deed of this house and land , which Peter swore he would not do . '' `` Just as I swore to John Brown , my old partner , '' remarked Peter . `` But this is all nonsense , Tabby ; I do n't believe the story . ''
`` Well , it may not be just the truth , '' said Tabitha , `` for some folks say that Peter did make over the house to the Old XXXXX , and that 's the reason it has always been so unlucky to them that lived in it .
Peter Scratch Tabitha chimney-top emblem fire great-granduncle methinks mouldings years