I was struck silent by this, and looked blankly at the dark forbidding structure that fronted on the road. “You're right,” said Mrs. Knapp with a laugh. “Can't you make out that funny little window at the end there?” I looked more closely at the building. In the dim light of the stars, the coat of whitewash that covered it made it possible to trace the outlines of a window in the gable that fronted the road. Some freak of the builder had turned it a quarter of the way around, giving it a comical suggestion of a man with a droop to his eye. “And the iron cow?” I asked. “Stupid! a pump, of course,” replied Mrs. Knapp with another laugh. “Now see if there is a lane here by the barn.” A narrow roadway, just wide enough for a single wagon, joined the main road at the corner of the building. “Then drive up it quietly,” was Mrs. Knapp's direction. Just beyond the barn I made out the figure of the pump in a conspicuous place by the roadside, and felt more confident that we were on the right road. The lane was now wrapped in Egyptian darkness. Trees lined both sides of the narrow way. Their branches brushed our faces as we passed, and their tops seemed to meet above us till even the faint light of the stars scarcely glimmered through. The hoofs of the horses splashed in the mud, and the rather clumsy carriage dragged heavily and slowly forward. “I'd give five dollars to light my lamps,” growled the driver. We were traveling by the instinct of the horses. “If your life is worth more than five dollars, you'd better keep them dark,” I said. The driver swore in an undertone as the hack lurched and groaned in a boggy series of ruts, and a branch whipped him in the face. I was forced to give a grunt myself, as another slapped my sore arm and sent a sharp twinge of pain shooting from the wound till it tingled in my toes. Dicky, protected between us, chuckled softly. I reflected savagely that nothing spoils a man for company like a mistaken sense of humor. Suddenly the horses stopped so short that we were almost pitched out. “Hello! what's this?” I cried, drawing my revolver, fearful of an ambush. “It's a fence,” said the driver. “There must be a gate,” I said, jumping down quickly. Mrs. Knapp rapped on the carriage door and I opened it. “Have you come to the bars?” she asked presently. “I guess so. We've come against something like a fence.” “Well, then,” she replied, “when we get through, take the road to the left. That will bring us to the house.” “You are certain?” “That is what Henry wrote in the cipher beneath the map. The house must be only a few hundred yards away.” The bars were there, and I lifted the wet and soggy boards with an anxious heart. Were we, after all, so near the hiding-place? And what were we to find? I mounted the seat again, and we drove forward. The road was scarcely distinguishable, but the horses followed it without hesitation as it led behind a tall hedge and among scattered oaks.