No answer came from the floor above. Again sounded the stentorian
tones.

"Mark says as if you are there, you're to come down; he wants to see
you."

A last "Ho-there-ho"; a long silence; the door opened. There was light
again and Elmer was before me.

"He ain't there, I guess," he said. "Still, if you want me to make
sure, I'll go up."

[Illustration: No answer came from the floor above.]

Inasmuch as mine host's cries must still be echoing in the uttermost
parts of the house, it seemed needless to compel him to take the climb.
Spiker agreed with me. It was not surprising that Weston was out, for
he was an odd one, always spooking around somewhere, investigating
everything, and asking questions. His room was full of books in
various languages, and when he wasn't wandering about the valley, he
would be sitting reading far into the night--sometimes as late as
half-past ten. There was a fellow named Goth, who seemed to be
Weston's favorite writer. This Goth was a Pennsylvania Dutchman, and
as Elmer's own ancestors were from Allentown, he thought he'd like to
take up the language, so he'd borrowed from his guest a book called
"The Sorrows of Werther." Of all the rubbish that was ever wrote, them
"Sorrows" were the poorest. Elmer had only figured out a page and a
half, but that gave him enough insight into their character to convince
him that a man who could set reading them till half-past ten was--here