Kate knelt by that box, and idly began constructing a house. She had always adored building with blocks when she was a little girl, and now the old fascination seized her; besides, she was putting off the minute when she would open the door of that last room.
But as she completed the second wall of the house she turned suddenly and looked over her shoulder. Had she heard something? A rustling, like a dress coming down the hall and pausing at the door of the playroom? Whom did she expect to see bending down at the low door and looking in at her where she sat on the floor building with blocks like a little girl? Strangely, it was not the sixteen-year-old Katherine she had been imagining as her companion whom she pictured stooping down at that door to look in. It was Katherine’s mother, Kate’s grandmother, who had died when Katherine was still a little girl playing with blocks. Only she would not look like an ordinary grandmother, of course. For she had died when she was only twenty-four. She was a young woman, very graceful, very gentle, lovely.
Of course she wasn’t really there at the door, wondering who had come in her baby’s stead to play in the playroom. Of course she wasn’t there with a spray of syringa flower at her belt. It was just Kate’s vivid imagination. She was sensible enough to know that. The rustling of her dress had been the leaves of the drenched apple tree boughs against the window pane tossed by a rainy breeze. And the syringa scent had followed Kate up here and even down into the little playroom.
It was a low little room, so low that Kate could but just stand up straight in it. And it was entirely bare except for the shelves with their treasure trove of toys, the box of blocks, and the lilliputian chairs. But for all that the room was alive to Kate now. It was almost giddy with life. And it was a life that did not concern her. She was an intruder. She became uneasy as intruders are uneasy.
But she was not driven away precipitately. She stayed long enough to replace the blocks in their place coolly. Then, still coolly, she stood up and went out of the playroom, closing the door softly after her.
In the hall, however, she allowed herself to hurry. The door to the last room, the study, was ajar. Had the figure of Kate’s imagination gone on ahead to that room—the young mother? For an instant Kate hesitated with her fingers on the knob.
“Psha! What are you afraid of! Silly!”
Downstairs, the hall door, which she had left open, blew shut with a bang, A fresh downpour of rain rattled on the shingles just above her head. (There was no attic above this part of the house.) Kate’s impulse was to run down and secure at least the staying open of the front door, so that she might have an unimpeded exit in case of panic. The door fastened open, she would come back and have the fun of discovering for herself Elsie’s secret which was the mystery of the orchard house.
But Kate did not follow her impulse. Instead, she squared her shoulders, lifted her head a little defiantly, and pushed back that last door. She stepped in.
“Oh! Oh!” But it was not a shriek. It was just a soft “oh! oh!” of purest astonishment. For the room was occupied; but not by the ghost of her grandmother.