XIX Alice's Posies
UNCLE VENNER, trundling a wheelbarrow, was the earliest person stirringin the neighborhood the day after the storm.
Pyncheon Street, in front of the House of the Seven Gables, was a farpleasanter scene than a by-lane, confined by shabby fences, andbordered with wooden dwellings of the meaner class, could reasonably beexpected to present. Nature made sweet amends, that morning, for thefive unkindly days which had preceded it. It would have been enough tolive for, merely to look up at the wide benediction of the sky, or asmuch of it as was visible between the houses, genial once more withsunshine. Every object was agreeable, whether to be gazed at in thebreadth, or examined more minutely. Such, for example, were thewell-washed pebbles and gravel of the sidewalk; even the sky-reflectingpools in the centre of the street; and the grass, now freshly verdant,that crept along the base of the fences, on the other side of which, ifone peeped over, was seen the multifarious growth of gardens.Vegetable productions, of whatever kind, seemed more than negativelyhappy, in the juicy warmth and abundance of their life. The PyncheonElm, throughout its great circumference, was all alive, and full of themorning sun and a sweet-tempered little breeze, which lingered withinthis verdant sphere, and set a thousand leafy tongues a-whispering allat once. This aged tree appeared to have suffered nothing from thegale. It had kept its boughs unshattered, and its full complement ofleaves; and the whole in perfect verdure, except a single branch, that,by the earlier change with which the elm-tree sometimes prophesies theautumn, had been transmuted to bright gold. It was like the goldenbranch that gained Aeneas and the Sibyl admittance into Hades.
This one mystic branch hung down before the main entrance of the SevenGables, so nigh the ground that any passer-by might have stood ontiptoe and plucked it off. Presented at the door, it would have been asymbol of his right to enter, and be made acquainted with all thesecrets of the house. So little faith is due to external appearance,that there was really an inviting aspect over the venerable edifice,conveying an idea that its history must be a decorous and happy one,and such as would be delightful for a fireside tale. Its windowsgleamed cheerfully in the slanting sunlight. The lines and tufts ofgreen moss, here and there, seemed pledges of familiarity andsisterhood with Nature; as if this human dwelling-place, being of suchold date, had established its prescriptive title among primeval oaksand whatever other objects, by virtue of their long continuance, haveacquired a gracious right to be. A person of imaginative temperament,while passing by the house, would turn, once and again, and peruse itwell: its many peaks, consenting together in the clustered chimney;the deep projection over its basement-story; the arched window,imparting a look, if not of grandeur, yet of antique gentility, to thebroken portal over which it opened; the luxuriance of giganticburdocks, near the threshold; he would note all these characteristics,and be conscious of something deeper than he saw. He would conceivethe mansion to have been the residence of the stubborn old Puritan,Integrity, who, dying in some forgotten generation, had left a blessingin all its rooms and chambers, the efficacy of which was to be seen inthe religion, honesty, moderate competence, or upright poverty andsolid happiness, of his descendants, to this day.
One object, above all others, would take root in the imaginativeobserver's memory. It was the great tuft of flowers,--weeds, you wouldhave called them, only a week ago,--the tuft of crimson-spottedflowers, in the angle between the two front gables. The old people usedto give them the name of Alice's Posies, in remembrance of fair AlicePyncheon, who was believed to have brought their seeds from Italy.They were flaunting in rich beauty and full bloom to-day, and seemed,as it were, a mystic expression that something within the house wasconsummated.
It was but little after sunrise, when Uncle Venner made his appearance,as aforesaid, impelling a wheelbarrow along the street. He was goinghis matutinal rounds to collect cabbage-leaves, turnip-tops,potato-skins, and the miscellaneous refuse of the dinner-pot, which thethrifty housewives of the neighborhood were accustomed to put aside, asfit only to feed a pig. Uncle Venner's pig was fed entirely, and keptin prime order, on these eleemosynary contributions; insomuch that thepatched philosopher used to promise that, before retiring to his farm,he would make a feast of the portly grunter, and invite all hisneighbors to partake of the joints and spare-ribs which they had helpedto fatten. Miss Hepzibah Pyncheon's housekeeping had so greatlyimproved, since Clifford became a member of the family, that her shareof the banquet would have been no lean one; and Uncle Venner,accordingly, was a good deal disappointed not to find the large earthenpan, full of fragmentary eatables, that ordinarily awaited his comingat the back doorstep of the Seven Gables.
"I never knew Miss Hepzibah so forgetful before," said the patriarch tohimself. "She must have had a dinner yesterday,--no question of that!She always has one, nowadays. So where's the pot-liquor andpotato-skins, I ask? Shall I knock, and see if she's stirring yet? No,no,--'t won't do! If little Phoebe was about the house, I should notmind knocking; but Miss Hepzibah, likely as not, would scowl down at meout of the window, and look cross, even if she felt pleasantly. So,I'll come back at noon."
With these reflections, the old man was shutting the gate of the littleback-yard. Creaking on its hinges, however, like every other gate anddoor about the premises, the sound reached the ears of the occupant ofthe northern gable, one of the windows of which had a side-view towardsthe gate.
"Good-morning, Uncle Venner!" said the daguerreotypist, leaning out ofthe window. "Do you hear nobody stirring?"
"Not a soul," said the man of patches. "But that's no wonder. 'Tisbarely half an hour past sunrise, yet. But I'm really glad to see you,Mr. Holgrave! There's a strange, lonesome look about this side of thehouse; so that my heart misgave me, somehow or other, and I felt as ifthere was nobody alive in it. The front of the house looks a good dealcheerier; and Alice's Posies are blooming there beautifully; and if Iwere a young man, Mr. Holgrave, my sweetheart should have one of thoseflowers in her bosom, though I risked my neck climbing for it! Well,and did the wind keep you awake last night?"
"It did, indeed!" answered the artist, smiling. "If I were a believerin ghosts,--and I don't quite know whether I am or not,--I should haveconcluded that all the old Pyncheons were running riot in the lowerrooms, especially in Miss Hepzibah's part of the house. But it is veryquiet now."
"Yes, Miss Hepzibah will be apt to over-sleep herself, after beingdisturbed, all night, with the racket," said Uncle Venner. "But itwould be odd, now, wouldn't it, if the Judge had taken both his cousinsinto the country along with him? I saw him go into the shop yesterday."
"At what hour?" inquired Holgrave.
"Oh, along in the forenoon," said the old man. "Well, well! I must gomy rounds, and so must my wheelbarrow. But I'll be back here atdinner-time; for my pig likes a dinner as well as a breakfast. Nomeal-time, and no sort of victuals, ever seems to come amiss to my pig.Good morning to you! And, Mr. Holgrave, if I were a young man, likeyou, I'd get one of Alice's Posies, and keep it in water till Phoebecomes back."
"I have heard," said the daguerreotypist, as he drew in his head, "thatthe water of Maule's well suits those flowers best."
Here the conversation ceased, and Uncle Venner went on his way. Forhalf an hour longer, nothing disturbed the repose of the Seven Gables;nor was there any visitor, except a carrier-boy, who, as he passed thefront doorstep, threw down one of his newspapers; for Hepzibah, oflate, had regularly taken it in. After a while, there came a fatwoman, making prodigious speed, and stumbling as she ran up the stepsof the shop-door. Her face glowed with fire-heat, and, it being apretty warm morning, she bubbled and hissed, as it were, as if alla-fry with chimney-warmth, and summer-warmth, and the warmth of her owncorpulent velocity. She tried the shop-door; it was fast. She triedit again, with so angry a jar that the bell tinkled angrily back at her.
"The deuce take Old Maid Pyncheon!" muttered the irascible housewife."Think of her pretending to set up a cent-sho
p, and then lying abedtill noon! These are what she calls gentlefolk's airs, I suppose! ButI'll either start her ladyship, or break the door down!"
She shook it accordingly, and the bell, having a spiteful little temperof its own, rang obstreperously, making its remonstrances heard,--not,indeed, by the ears for which they were intended,--but by a good ladyon the opposite side of the street. She opened the window, andaddressed the impatient applicant.
"You'll find nobody there, Mrs. Gubbins."
"But I must and will find somebody here!" cried Mrs. Gubbins,inflicting another outrage on the bell. "I want a half-pound of pork,to fry some first-rate flounders for Mr. Gubbins's breakfast; and, ladyor not, Old Maid Pyncheon shall get up and serve me with it!"
"But do hear reason, Mrs. Gubbins!" responded the lady opposite. "She,and her brother too, have both gone to their cousin's, Judge Pyncheon'sat his country-seat. There's not a soul in the house, but that youngdaguerreotype-man that sleeps in the north gable. I saw old Hepzibahand Clifford go away yesterday; and a queer couple of ducks they were,paddling through the mud-puddles! They're gone, I'll assure you."
"And how do you know they're gone to the Judge's?" asked Mrs. Gubbins."He's a rich man; and there's been a quarrel between him and Hepzibahthis many a day, because he won't give her a living. That's the mainreason of her setting up a cent-shop."
"I know that well enough," said the neighbor. "But they'regone,--that's one thing certain. And who but a blood relation, thatcouldn't help himself, I ask you, would take in that awful-tempered oldmaid, and that dreadful Clifford? That's it, you may be sure."
Mrs. Gubbins took her departure, still brimming over with hot wrathagainst the absent Hepzibah. For another half-hour, or, perhaps,considerably more, there was almost as much quiet on the outside of thehouse as within. The elm, however, made a pleasant, cheerful, sunnysigh, responsive to the breeze that was elsewhere imperceptible; aswarm of insects buzzed merrily under its drooping shadow, and becamespecks of light whenever they darted into the sunshine; a locust sang,once or twice, in some inscrutable seclusion of the tree; and asolitary little bird, with plumage of pale gold, came and hovered aboutAlice's Posies.
At last our small acquaintance, Ned Higgins, trudged up the street, onhis way to school; and happening, for the first time in a fortnight, tobe the possessor of a cent, he could by no means get past the shop-doorof the Seven Gables. But it would not open. Again and again, however,and half a dozen other agains, with the inexorable pertinacity of achild intent upon some object important to itself, did he renew hisefforts for admittance. He had, doubtless, set his heart upon anelephant; or, possibly, with Hamlet, he meant to eat a crocodile. Inresponse to his more violent attacks, the bell gave, now and then, amoderate tinkle, but could not be stirred into clamor by any exertionof the little fellow's childish and tiptoe strength. Holding by thedoor-handle, he peeped through a crevice of the curtain, and saw thatthe inner door, communicating with the passage towards the parlor, wasclosed.
"Miss Pyncheon!" screamed the child, rapping on the window-pane, "Iwant an elephant!"
There being no answer to several repetitions of the summons, Ned beganto grow impatient; and his little pot of passion quickly boiling over,he picked up a stone, with a naughty purpose to fling it through thewindow; at the same time blubbering and sputtering with wrath. Aman--one of two who happened to be passing by--caught the urchin's arm.
"What's the trouble, old gentleman?" he asked.
"I want old Hepzibah, or Phoebe, or any of them!" answered Ned,sobbing. "They won't open the door; and I can't get my elephant!"
"Go to school, you little scamp!" said the man. "There's anothercent-shop round the corner. 'T is very strange, Dixey," added he tohis companion, "what's become of all these Pyncheon's! Smith, thelivery-stable keeper, tells me Judge Pyncheon put his horse upyesterday, to stand till after dinner, and has not taken him away yet.And one of the Judge's hired men has been in, this morning, to makeinquiry about him. He's a kind of person, they say, that seldom breakshis habits, or stays out o' nights."
"Oh, he'll turn up safe enough!" said Dixey. "And as for Old MaidPyncheon, take my word for it, she has run in debt, and gone off fromher creditors. I foretold, you remember, the first morning she set upshop, that her devilish scowl would frighten away customers. Theycouldn't stand it!"
"I never thought she'd make it go," remarked his friend. "Thisbusiness of cent-shops is overdone among the women-folks. My wifetried it, and lost five dollars on her outlay!"
"Poor business!" said Dixey, shaking his head. "Poor business!"
In the course of the morning, there were various other attempts to opena communication with the supposed inhabitants of this silent andimpenetrable mansion. The man of root-beer came, in his neatly paintedwagon, with a couple of dozen full bottles, to be exchanged for emptyones; the baker, with a lot of crackers which Hepzibah had ordered forher retail custom; the butcher, with a nice titbit which he fancied shewould be eager to secure for Clifford. Had any observer of theseproceedings been aware of the fearful secret hidden within the house,it would have affected him with a singular shape and modification ofhorror, to see the current of human life making this small eddyhereabouts,--whirling sticks, straws and all such trifles, round andround, right over the black depth where a dead corpse lay unseen!
The butcher was so much in earnest with his sweetbread of lamb, orwhatever the dainty might be, that he tried every accessible door ofthe Seven Gables, and at length came round again to the shop, where heordinarily found admittance.
"It's a nice article, and I know the old lady would jump at it," saidhe to himself. "She can't be gone away! In fifteen years that I havedriven my cart through Pyncheon Street, I've never known her to be awayfrom home; though often enough, to be sure, a man might knock all daywithout bringing her to the door. But that was when she'd only herselfto provide for."
Peeping through the same crevice of the curtain where, only a littlewhile before, the urchin of elephantine appetite had peeped, thebutcher beheld the inner door, not closed, as the child had seen it,but ajar, and almost wide open. However it might have happened, it wasthe fact. Through the passage-way there was a dark vista into thelighter but still obscure interior of the parlor. It appeared to thebutcher that he could pretty clearly discern what seemed to be thestalwart legs, clad in black pantaloons, of a man sitting in a largeoaken chair, the back of which concealed all the remainder of hisfigure. This contemptuous tranquillity on the part of an occupant ofthe house, in response to the butcher's indefatigable efforts toattract notice, so piqued the man of flesh that he determined towithdraw.
"So," thought he, "there sits Old Maid Pyncheon's bloody brother, whileI've been giving myself all this trouble! Why, if a hog hadn't moremanners, I'd stick him! I call it demeaning a man's business to tradewith such people; and from this time forth, if they want a sausage oran ounce of liver, they shall run after the cart for it!"
He tossed the titbit angrily into his cart, and drove off in a pet.
Not a great while afterwards there was a sound of music turning thecorner and approaching down the street, with several intervals ofsilence, and then a renewed and nearer outbreak of brisk melody. A mobof children was seen moving onward, or stopping, in unison with thesound, which appeared to proceed from the centre of the throng; so thatthey were loosely bound together by slender strains of harmony, anddrawn along captive; with ever and anon an accession of some littlefellow in an apron and straw-hat, capering forth from door or gateway.Arriving under the shadow of the Pyncheon Elm, it proved to be theItalian boy, who, with his monkey and show of puppets, had once beforeplayed his hurdy-gurdy beneath the arched window. The pleasant face ofPhoebe--and doubtless, too, the liberal recompense which she had flunghim--still dwelt in his remembrance. His expressive features kindledup, as he recognized the spot where this trifling incident of hiserratic life had chanced. He entered the neglected yard (now wilderthan ever, with its growth of hog-weed and burdo
ck), stationed himselfon the doorstep of the main entrance, and, opening his show-box, beganto play. Each individual of the automatic community forthwith set towork, according to his or her proper vocation: the monkey, taking offhis Highland bonnet, bowed and scraped to the by-standers mostobsequiously, with ever an observant eye to pick up a stray cent; andthe young foreigner himself, as he turned the crank of his machine,glanced upward to the arched window, expectant of a presence that wouldmake his music the livelier and sweeter. The throng of children stoodnear; some on the sidewalk; some within the yard; two or threeestablishing themselves on the very door-step; and one squatting on thethreshold. Meanwhile, the locust kept singing in the great oldPyncheon Elm.
"I don't hear anybody in the house," said one of the children toanother. "The monkey won't pick up anything here."
"There is somebody at home," affirmed the urchin on the threshold. "Iheard a step!"
Still the young Italian's eye turned sidelong upward; and it reallyseemed as if the touch of genuine, though slight and almost playful,emotion communicated a juicier sweetness to the dry, mechanical processof his minstrelsy. These wanderers are readily responsive to anynatural kindness--be it no more than a smile, or a word itself notunderstood, but only a warmth in it--which befalls them on the roadsideof life. They remember these things, because they are the littleenchantments which, for the instant,--for the space that reflects alandscape in a soap-bubble,--build up a home about them. Therefore,the Italian boy would not be discouraged by the heavy silence withwhich the old house seemed resolute to clog the vivacity of hisinstrument. He persisted in his melodious appeals; he still lookedupward, trusting that his dark, alien countenance would soon bebrightened by Phoebe's sunny aspect. Neither could he be willing todepart without again beholding Clifford, whose sensibility, likePhoebe's smile, had talked a kind of heart's language to the foreigner.He repeated all his music over and over again, until his auditors weregetting weary. So were the little wooden people in his show-box, andthe monkey most of all. There was no response, save the singing of thelocust.
"No children live in this house," said a schoolboy, at last. "Nobodylives here but an old maid and an old man. You'll get nothing here!Why don't you go along?"
"You fool, you, why do you tell him?" whispered a shrewd little Yankee,caring nothing for the music, but a good deal for the cheap rate atwhich it was had. "Let him play as he likes! If there's nobody to payhim, that's his own lookout!"
Once more, however, the Italian ran over his round of melodies. To thecommon observer--who could understand nothing of the case, except themusic and the sunshine on the hither side of the door--it might havebeen amusing to watch the pertinacity of the street-performer. Will hesucceed at last? Will that stubborn door be suddenly flung open? Will agroup of joyous children, the young ones of the house, come dancing,shouting, laughing, into the open air, and cluster round the show-box,looking with eager merriment at the puppets, and tossing each a copperfor long-tailed Mammon, the monkey, to pick up?
But to us, who know the inner heart of the Seven Gables as well as itsexterior face, there is a ghastly effect in this repetition of lightpopular tunes at its door-step. It would be an ugly business, indeed,if Judge Pyncheon (who would not have cared a fig for Paganini's fiddlein his most harmonious mood) should make his appearance at the door,with a bloody shirt-bosom, and a grim frown on his swarthily whitevisage, and motion the foreign vagabond away! Was ever before such agrinding out of jigs and waltzes, where nobody was in the cue to dance?Yes, very often. This contrast, or intermingling of tragedy with mirth,happens daily, hourly, momently. The gloomy and desolate old house,deserted of life, and with awful Death sitting sternly in its solitude,was the emblem of many a human heart, which, nevertheless, is compelledto hear the thrill and echo of the world's gayety around it.
Before the conclusion of the Italian's performance, a couple of menhappened to be passing, On their way to dinner. "I say, you youngFrench fellow!" called out one of them,--"come away from that doorstep,and go somewhere else with your nonsense! The Pyncheon family livethere; and they are in great trouble, just about this time. They don'tfeel musical to-day. It is reported all over town that Judge Pyncheon,who owns the house, has been murdered; and the city marshal is going tolook into the matter. So be off with you, at once!"
As the Italian shouldered his hurdy-gurdy, he saw on the doorstep acard, which had been covered, all the morning, by the newspaper thatthe carrier had flung upon it, but was now shuffled into sight. Hepicked it up, and perceiving something written in pencil, gave it tothe man to read. In fact, it was an engraved card of Judge Pyncheon'swith certain pencilled memoranda on the back, referring to variousbusinesses which it had been his purpose to transact during thepreceding day. It formed a prospective epitome of the day's history;only that affairs had not turned out altogether in accordance with theprogramme. The card must have been lost from the Judge's vest-pocketin his preliminary attempt to gain access by the main entrance of thehouse. Though well soaked with rain, it was still partially legible.
"Look here; Dixey!" cried the man. "This has something to do withJudge Pyncheon. See!--here's his name printed on it; and here, Isuppose, is some of his handwriting."
"Let's go to the city marshal with it!" said Dixey. "It may give himjust the clew he wants. After all," whispered he in his companion'sear, "it would be no wonder if the Judge has gone into that door andnever come out again! A certain cousin of his may have been at his oldtricks. And Old Maid Pyncheon having got herself in debt by thecent-shop,--and the Judge's pocket-book being well filled,--and badblood amongst them already! Put all these things together and see whatthey make!"
"Hush, hush!" whispered the other. "It seems like a sin to be thefirst to speak of such a thing. But I think, with you, that we hadbetter go to the city marshal."
"Yes, yes!" said Dixey. "Well!--I always said there was somethingdevilish in that woman's scowl!"
The men wheeled about, accordingly, and retraced their steps up thestreet. The Italian, also, made the best of his way off, with aparting glance up at the arched window. As for the children, they tookto their heels, with one accord, and scampered as if some giant or ogrewere in pursuit, until, at a good distance from the house, they stoppedas suddenly and simultaneously as they had set out. Their susceptiblenerves took an indefinite alarm from what they had overheard. Lookingback at the grotesque peaks and shadowy angles of the old mansion, theyfancied a gloom diffused about it which no brightness of the sunshinecould dispel. An imaginary Hepzibah scowled and shook her finger atthem, from several windows at the same moment. An imaginaryClifford--for (and it would have deeply wounded him to know it) he hadalways been a horror to these small people--stood behind the unrealHepzibah, making awful gestures, in a faded dressing-gown. Childrenare even more apt, if possible, than grown people, to catch thecontagion of a panic terror. For the rest of the day, the more timidwent whole streets about, for the sake of avoiding the Seven Gables;while the bolder signalized their hardihood by challenging theircomrades to race past the mansion at full speed.
It could not have been more than half an hour after the disappearanceof the Italian boy, with his unseasonable melodies, when a cab drovedown the street. It stopped beneath the Pyncheon Elm; the cabman tooka trunk, a canvas bag, and a bandbox, from the top of his vehicle, anddeposited them on the doorstep of the old house; a straw bonnet, andthen the pretty figure of a young girl, came into view from theinterior of the cab. It was Phoebe! Though not altogether so bloomingas when she first tripped into our story,--for, in the few interveningweeks, her experiences had made her graver, more womanly, anddeeper-eyed, in token of a heart that had begun to suspect itsdepths,--still there was the quiet glow of natural sunshine over her.Neither had she forfeited her proper gift of making things look real,rather than fantastic, within her sphere. Yet we feel it to be aquestionable venture, even for Phoebe, at this juncture, to cross thethreshold of the Seven Gables. Is her healthful presence pot
ent enoughto chase away the crowd of pale, hideous, and sinful phantoms, thathave gained admittance there since her departure? Or will she,likewise, fade, sicken, sadden, and grow into deformity, and be onlyanother pallid phantom, to glide noiselessly up and down the stairs,and affright children as she pauses at the window?
At least, we would gladly forewarn the unsuspecting girl that there isnothing in human shape or substance to receive her, unless it be thefigure of Judge Pyncheon, who--wretched spectacle that he is, andfrightful in our remembrance, since our night-long vigil withhim!--still keeps his place in the oaken chair.
Phoebe first tried the shop-door. It did not yield to her hand; andthe white curtain, drawn across the window which formed the uppersection of the door, struck her quick perceptive faculty as somethingunusual. Without making another effort to enter here, she betookherself to the great portal, under the arched window. Finding itfastened, she knocked. A reverberation came from the emptiness within.She knocked again, and a third time; and, listening intently, fanciedthat the floor creaked, as if Hepzibah were coming, with her ordinarytiptoe movement, to admit her. But so dead a silence ensued upon thisimaginary sound, that she began to question whether she might not havemistaken the house, familiar as she thought herself with its exterior.
Her notice was now attracted by a child's voice, at some distance. Itappeared to call her name. Looking in the direction whence itproceeded, Phoebe saw little Ned Higgins, a good way down the street,stamping, shaking his head violently, making deprecatory gestures withboth hands, and shouting to her at mouth-wide screech.
"No, no, Phoebe!" he screamed. "Don't you go in! There's somethingwicked there! Don't--don't--don't go in!"
But, as the little personage could not be induced to approach nearenough to explain himself, Phoebe concluded that he had beenfrightened, on some of his visits to the shop, by her cousin Hepzibah;for the good lady's manifestations, in truth, ran about an equal chanceof scaring children out of their wits, or compelling them to unseemlylaughter. Still, she felt the more, for this incident, howunaccountably silent and impenetrable the house had become. As hernext resort, Phoebe made her way into the garden, where on so warm andbright a day as the present, she had little doubt of finding Clifford,and perhaps Hepzibah also, idling away the noontide in the shadow ofthe arbor. Immediately on her entering the garden gate, the family ofhens half ran, half flew to meet her; while a strange grimalkin, whichwas prowling under the parlor window, took to his heels, clamberedhastily over the fence, and vanished. The arbor was vacant, and itsfloor, table, and circular bench were still damp, and bestrewn withtwigs and the disarray of the past storm. The growth of the gardenseemed to have got quite out of bounds; the weeds had taken advantageof Phoebe's absence, and the long-continued rain, to run rampant overthe flowers and kitchen-vegetables. Maule's well had overflowed itsstone border, and made a pool of formidable breadth in that corner ofthe garden.
The impression of the whole scene was that of a spot where no humanfoot had left its print for many preceding days,--probably not sincePhoebe's departure,--for she saw a side-comb of her own under the tableof the arbor, where it must have fallen on the last afternoon when sheand Clifford sat there.
The girl knew that her two relatives were capable of far greateroddities than that of shutting themselves up in their old house, asthey appeared now to have done. Nevertheless, with indistinctmisgivings of something amiss, and apprehensions to which she could notgive shape, she approached the door that formed the customarycommunication between the house and garden. It was secured within,like the two which she had already tried. She knocked, however; andimmediately, as if the application had been expected, the door wasdrawn open, by a considerable exertion of some unseen person'sstrength, not wide, but far enough to afford her a sidelong entrance.As Hepzibah, in order not to expose herself to inspection from without,invariably opened a door in this manner, Phoebe necessarily concludedthat it was her cousin who now admitted her.
Without hesitation, therefore, she stepped across the threshold, andhad no sooner entered than the door closed behind her.