"Not here! _Not here!..._ Where are they?" "Gone. Mees Bereel goes home yest'day. His rev'rence go to Lou-ees-ville wiz her, an' have not return'; _oui_." I made no reply, but left the house and mechanically turned back toward the little hamlet. Gone! Was that the monotonous and deadly refrain to which the world had been set running? All gone. Everybody gone. Wherever I turned--gone. With sagging shoulders I plodded on, trying to think of something else. Where was Snack Hollow? Where was Snack Hollow? Where was Snack Hollow? This sentence raced through my brain with the regularity of a pendulum's swing. Why, the station agent would know! I had reached the foot of the steep hill, where the track ran, when this illuminating idea was conceived. To my right was the small depot, fronted by a platform of a height to unload freight upon from a car door. Looking up suddenly under the force of my discovery, I saw Jeff Angel seated upon this platform, his thin legs hanging from it, an oilcloth-covered bundle at his side. He was leisurely eating cheese and crackers from a yellow paper sack. What a glad sight he was to me in the midst of an empty world! "O you blessed old Satyr!" I yelled, and ran toward him forthwith. "Whut's th' furse 'bout?" he asked, quietly, trying to smile a welcome, but only succeeding in showing some imperfect teeth caked with cheese and dough. "Why, damn your dirty, good old hide, I'm glad to see you!" I continued, jumping to a seat at his left and squeezing his disengaged hand. "I'm about two-thirds crazy, you know, and I need somebody to hold me when the other third slips over. Think you can?" I nudged his skinny ribs jocularly. My mental condition truly was not up to standard that moment. "Huh!" grunted Jeff, casting me a quick, amused glance. "Why didn't you wait and have breakfast?" I asked, drawing a breath which flooded the deepest cell in my lungs. I tell you it was good to sit by the side of that ragged piece of flotsam. I felt hope coming back, for I knew he was my friend. "Woke up--thirsty 's 'ell. Your'n gone; mine gone. Had to hev some liquor, so I lit out, easy, so 's not to wake you up. Had some muster, didn't we?--Huh?" I nodded. I didn't care to review that night's doings. "See here, Satyr," I said, abruptly; "where's Lessie?" "She's 'ith Granny 'n' Gran'fer, I reck'n," he replied, with a naturalness which for a moment caused me to wonder if he knew of their departure. "Leas'ways, they lef' together," he added, after a brief interval. "Where have they gone?--what did they go for?--when are they coming back?" My companion tossed the last bit of cheese, rind and all, into his mouth; inverted the sack and allowed all the crumbs to go the same way; blew the sack up and burst it on his knee, and began to feel for his pipe before he replied. "I don' know whur they gone. They went to git Lessie 'way frum you. They 's com'n' back putty durn soon." "I know where they've gone! It's to Snack Hollow!"