Question
Deep River Connecticut.  Sorry I forgot it.
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Followup To
Question -
I wonder if you could identify or have leads to identifying a small plant I saw last week. It was growing at the side of the road, probably on a leaf or wood chip base. It consisted of a leafless, white stalk about 6 inches high (of the kind the Indian Pipe and some fungi have) with a single flower an inch to an inch and a half wide. (There was smaller one a few inches away.) The flower was eight or ten pointed with a brownish-lavender color. The petals were connected only at their origin. Unfortunately, the next day when I went back with a camera, the flower had fallen off. But I managed to lay it on the sidewalk and get a picture of its dimished and shrunken self. You can see this picture at www.siteideas.net/unidentifiedsaprophyte.jpg
Answer -
I do think you are on the right track as far as what kind of plant this might be, but I am not familiar with it.  Since you do not state your location, I do not know where to start researching it.


Answer
Could it have been a spent flower (discolored by overmaturity) of Indian Pipes?  All other achlorophyllous plants (Monotropaceae) occurring in this region on which I could find info had sprays of small flowers rather than a single, larger one.  What makes me doubt that ID, though, is that I seem to recall seeing Indian Pipes in bloom in late spring-early summer only.  This source, though http://www.wellesley.edu/Biology/Web/Species/pindianpipe.html says it appears June-September and the flower turns blackish, so your initial guess may well have been correct.