After dinner, which seemed a more solemn affair than usual, the little girl could stand it no longer. To her questions Ellen could give no satisfactory answers, so, watching an opportunity, when Uncle Justus was taking his afternoon nap and when Aunt Elizabeth had gone to some meeting, Edna stole up to the storeroom, whose window was diagonally opposite to that of Louis' room. After a moment's hesitation she tapped on the window; there was no response from Louis' room. Then Edna decided to write a note and slip it under his door. This she managed to do. "I am going to the storeroom, open your window," was what she wrote, and the note served its purpose, for when the storeroom window was raised there stood Louis before his window.
"O, Louis," cried Edna. "Can't you get out?"
"No," was the reply.
"O, dear, I wish you could. I have such a lot to tell you. What are you shut up for? What did you do?"
Louis looked sullen. "I didn't do anything."
"O!" said Edna. "Are you sure? Then why did they shut you up?"
"Just for hatefulness," replied Louis. "I wasn't doing a thing."
This seemed a dreadful state of affairs, and Edna hardly knew what to think. "I wish I could let you out," she said, sympathetically, "but I can't."
Louis stood with downcast eyes, hammering with his knife upon the sill.
"Are you sure you haven't done anything?" persisted Edna.