Further on they rattled through the quiet streets of East Tottingham, a typical New England village built around a square, elm-shaded common.  It was all as Ed had described it; the white church with its tall spire lost behind the high branches, the Town Hall guarded by an ancient black cannon, the white houses, the green blinds, the lilac hedges, the toppling hitching-post before each gate.  Tottingham Center succeeded East Tottingham and they eventually reached Eden Village twenty minutes behind schedule.

It was difficult to say where country left off and village began, but after passing the second modest white residence Wade believed he could safely consider himself within the corporate limits.  Before him stretched a wide road lined with elms.  So closely were they planted that their far-reaching branches formed a veritable roof overhead, through which at this time of day the sunlight barely trickled.  They were sturdy trees, many of them larger in the trunk than any hogs-head, and doubtless some of them were almost as old as the village itself.  The cool green-shadowed road circled slightly, so that as they travelled along it the vista always terminated in a wall of green, flecked at intervals with a gleam of white where the sun-bathed front of some house peeked through.  Wade viewed the quaint old place with interest, for here Ed had lived when a boy, and many a story of Eden Village had Wade listened to.

The houses were set, usually, close to the street, with sometimes a wooden fence, sometimes a hedge of lilacs before them.  But more often yard and sidewalk fraternized.  Flowers were not numerous; undoubtedly the elms threw too much shade to allow of successful floriculture.  But there were lilacs still in bloom, lavender and white, and their perfume stirred memories.  The houses in Eden Village were not crowded; for the first quarter of a mile they passed hardly more than a dozen.  After that, although they became more neighborly, each held itself well aloof.  Then came a small church with a disproportionately tall spire, a watering trough, the Town Hall, and “Prout’s Store, Zenas Prout 2nd, Proprietor.”  Here the gray sidled up to the ancient hitching-post.  The boy tossed the reins over the dashboard and jumped out.  “You don’t need to hold him,” he said reassuringly.  Presently he was back.  “It’s further up the street,” he announced.  “But he says there ain’t anybody livin’ there an’ the house is locked up.”

“I’ve got the key,” answered Wade.  “Go ahead.”

They went on along the leafy nave.  Now and then a road or grass-grown lane started off from the main highway and wandered back toward the meadow-lands.  Presently the street straightened out, the elms presented thinner ranks, houses stood farther apart.  Then the street divided to enclose a narrow strip of common adorned with a flagpole greatly in need of a new coat of white paint.  The elms dwindled away and an occasional maple dotted the common with shade.  The driver guided the patient gray to the left and, near the centre of the common, drew up in front of a little white house, which, like the picket fence in front of it, the flagstaff on the common, and so many other things in Eden Village, seemed to be patiently awaiting the painter.