Darkly the December night closed in, and still the train kept on, until
at last Danville was reached, and she must alight, as the express did
not stop again until it reached Worcester. With a chill sense of
loneliness, and a vague, confused wish for the one cheering voice which
had greeted her ear since leaving Spring Bank, Adah stood upon the
snow-covered platform, holding Willie in her arms, and pointing out her
trunk to the civil baggage man, who, in answer to her inquiries as to
the best means of reaching Terrace Hill, replied: "You can't go there
to-night; it is too late. You'll have to stay in the tavern kept right
over the depot, though if you'd kept on the train there might have been
a chance, for I see the young Dr. Richards aboard; and as he didn't get
out, I guess he's coaxed or hired the conductor to leave him at
Snowdon."
The baggage man was right in his conjecture, for the doctor had
persuaded the polite conductor, whom he knew personally, to stop the
train at Snowdon; and while Adah, shivering with cold, found her way up
the narrow stairs into the rather comfortless quarters where she must
spend the night, the doctor was kicking the snow from his feet and
talking to Jim, the coachman from Terrace Hill.