"They all agree,"--there would be an amused smile on Mrs. Wedge's face as she said it,--"they all agree that you do not amount to much, else you would have gone to Ben's City, instead of coming here. This is always said of every stranger, for Davy's Bend is so dull that its people have forgotten their patriotism. I have not heard a good word for the town in ten years, but it is always being denounced, and cursed, and ridiculed. I think we despise each other because we do not move to Ben's City, and we live very much as I imagine the prisoners in a jail do,--in cursing our home, in lounging, in idle talk, and in expecting that each one of us will finally be fortunate, while the condition of the others will grow worse. We are a strange community." Dorris expressed surprise at the size of the church near The Locks, and wondered at the deserted houses which he had seen in his walks, whereupon Mrs. Wedge explained that Davy's Bend was once a prosperous city, containing five thousand busy people, but it had had bad luck since; very bad luck, for less than a fifth of that number now remained, and even they are trying to get away. What is the cause of this decrease in population? The growth of Ben's City, thirty miles down the river. The belief which existed at one time that a great town would be built at Davy's Bend turned out to be a mistake. Ben's City seemed to be the place; so the people had been going there for a number of years, leaving Davy's Bend to get along as best it could. This, and much more, from Mrs. Wedge, until at a late hour she notices that Dorris is asleep in his chair, probably having got rid of his thoughts; so she takes up the lamp to retire with it. Holding it up so that the shade throws the light full upon his face, she remarks to herself that she is certain he is a good, an honorable, and a safe man, whoever he is, for she prides herself on knowing something about men, and arranging the room for the night, although it does not need it, she goes quietly down the stairs, out at a door in a lower room, and into her own apartment. CHAPTER III. THE FACE AT THE WINDOW. Allan Dorris sleeps on, unconscious of the darkness peering in at him from the outside, which is also running riot in the town, and particularly down by the river, where the crazy houses with their boarded windows seem to collect shadows during the day for use at night, robbing the sunlight for the purpose; for there is little brightness and warmth at Davy's Bend, but much of dampness and hazy atmosphere.