“Gentilla,” said Susan, staring at the schoolhouse door, “it’s open!”
Never before had Susan seen the schoolhouse door unlocked. Many times had she shaken it and rattled the knob, and all of no avail. But now the door actually stood ajar, and, with a push that sent it wide open, Susan, followed by Gentilla, stepped over the threshold.
The air in the schoolroom was close and warm, and dust lay thick upon the floor and danced in the beams of sunlight that filtered through the grimy window-panes.
Susan walked about, surveying the battered desks covered with scratches and ink-spots and ornamented with initials cut into the wood. The door of the rusty stove stood open, and within lay a heap of torn papers. The faded maps were not interesting, and Susan began to think the schoolroom more attractive when peeped at from the porch than when actually within it.
“Let’s go outside,” said she to Gentilla, who had followed her about like Mary’s lamb. “Then we’ll sit down and eat our lunch.” The lunch basket, guarded by Flip and Snowball, had been left on the porch steps.
Susan turned the knob of the schoolhouse door, which had swung shut behind them, and pulled. The door wouldn’t open. Susan tugged until she grew red in the face.
“You try, Gentilla,” said she.
Gentilla obligingly gave a pull, and toppled over backward upon the floor.
“Don’t cry,” said Susan, helping her to her feet. “We will just climb out of the window.”
But the windows, swollen and stiff, were no more accommodating than the door.