Barnes,
lantern in hand, tiptoed from the room, through the barren front hall
and up the stairs. The stairs creaked abominably. Each creak echoed like
the crack of doom.
At the top of the stairs was another hall, long and narrow, extending
apparently the whole length of the house. At intervals along this hall
were doors. One after the other Thankful opened them. The first gave
entrance to a closet, with a battered and ancient silk hat and a
pasteboard box on the shelf. The next opened into a large room,
evidently the spare bedroom. It was empty. So was the next and the next
and the next. No furniture of any kind. Thankful's hope of finding
a quilt or a wornout blanket, anything which would do to cover her
sleeping and shivering relative, grew fainter with the opening of each
door.
There were an astonishing number of rooms and closets. Evidently this
had been a big, commodious and comfortable house in its day. But that
day was long past its sunset. Now the bigness only emphasized the
dreariness and desolation. Dampness and spider webs everywhere, cracks
in the ceiling, paper peeling from the walls. And around the gables and
against the dormer-windows of these upper rooms the gale shrieked and
howled and wailed like a drove of banshees.
The room at the very end of the long hall was a large one. It was at
the back of the house and there were windows on two sides of it. It was
empty like the others, and Mrs. Barnes, reluctantly deciding that her
exploration in quest of coverings had been a failure, was about to turn
and retrace her steps to the stairs when she noticed another door.
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