Peter threaded himself into the back seat, and the weary flivver, with a heavy groan, started down the empty road. "Any p'tickeler place?" asked the man at the wheel, turning his weather-beaten face, and looking Peter over from head to foot. "I think I'll want to spend the night here," answered Peter, a trifle dubiously. "Is there a hotel?" The man laughed. "This ain't no metrolopus," he vouchsafed, "but I guess the Widder Lord'll put you up for the night, if you'd like to go there." The "Widder Lord." Peter's heart sank, but he only said, "That'll do all right, I guess. Take me there, will you?" At that moment they turned a sharp corner, and Peter saw why the driver had grinned at the lounger on the station platform. The village, what there was of it, was not four minutes' walk from the station, but quite out of sight, hidden by the small, wooded shoulder of a hill. It was a sleepy, quiet little place, shut in by rolling upland. There was one long street, or, rather, a wide place in the road, on each side of which were small, old village houses, mostly painted white, with green shutters. There were two stores, one of which was also the post office, and a blacksmith's shop. In front of the latter stood an old-fashioned buggy with empty shafts. From within came the ringing clink of metal upon metal. Save for an old dog wandering down the street, and a few loose hens dusting themselves in the road, there was no sign or sound of life. "Rip Van Winkle might have taken his twenty-year nap right here in the middle of the street, instead of going to all the trouble of climbing up one of those mountains," thought Peter. "No wonder there aren't any Jews here. This place sure would cramp their style, and then some.... Wild-goose chase I've come on, anyway, I feel it in my bones. Walter Lord is probably as dead as the rest of the village." The silence got on his nerves and he spoke to the driver. "Think the Widow Lord will be awake when we get there?" he asked. The man turned a sardonic, screwed-up eye upon him. "'S next house," he said, pointing, "and we'll be there in one shake of a lamb's tail. What'd she be asleep this time of day fer?" Peter looked without much interest at the house indicated. It was old and gray and weather-beaten but had evidently once been the considerable house of Hobart Falls. Low and rambling, it faced the street, standing a few feet back, among some ragged, flowering shrubs. Suddenly Peter's eye lightened and he reached over and caught the driver's shoulder. "Stop here," he said, sharply. "This is the place where I want to stop." "Sure it's the place ye want to stop," repeated the driver, disgustedly. "Ain't I been tellin' ye? This is the Widder Lord's." "Oh, yes. I forgot for the moment." The light faded from Peter's eyes. "The '_Widder_ Lord's'," he muttered, inwardly. "The man's dead, of course. However----"