three o'clock in the afternoon
It was extremely cold when the girls left the Hall , but before they reached Ridgway the mercury had gone several degrees lower . The road to Windburne from the Ridgway junction is a local affair , narrow gauge , with little rocking cars in which a tall person could scarcely stand upright . Windburne is the county-seat and consequently a place of importance , but Ridgway has little traffic and the roads intersecting there take no pains to make close connections . It was three o'clock in the afternoon when the girls reached the junction , a bleak little place with a low-roofed station , black and dirty . A hotel stood at the corner -- a rough saloon . An engine with a coach usually waited on this narrow gauge track , but this afternoon there was none . Before she entered the waiting-room Miss Wilson looked about , expressing her surprise at the condition of affairs .