Julie was seized that afternoon with a panic over that door.
She was in her sitting-room, seated by the window with her church paper in her lap. The wind blew fitfully in, bringing her the scent of roses from her little plot. She wanted to go out and work around the bushes, but she did not think that was right on Sunday; so after drifting discreetly about the garden, inspecting each plant and little clump of blossoms, she had retired indoors, and settled herself with the Sunday Record, which she subscribed to dutifully, and which she usually held in her lap on Sabbath afternoons, but which she rarely read.
She was half asleep over it now, when suddenly the thought of that unlocked door at the head of her stairs leaped in her mind, startling her broad awake.
“Oh, my soul! That door’s unlocked,” she thought. She felt all at once exposed, as though some one—Elizabeth Bixby, for instance—might run unexpectedly in on her when she was undressed.
“I got to lock it,” she breathed. “I got to lock it ’fore that woman moves in. She’ll be runnin’ down on me every minute if I don’t.”
She ran up the stairs and slammed the door shut; but when her hand felt for the key, there was none in the lock. She jerked the door open and looked on the other side; it was not there either. “My soul! The key’s lost,” she cried in despair. “I got to find a key. I got to lock that door ’fore she gets here.” She hurried downstairs, and found a box of odd keys; returning with them she began trying one after another, haste and anxiety growing upon her, and her hand so unsteady that the keys made a small chattering against the lock. At any moment she felt the stillness of the rooms might dissolve and Elizabeth Bixby’s crushing personality be upon her. Indeed, now she heard some one coming up the outside stairway. Breathlessly she peeped forth through the vista of rooms, and waited. But it was only Aunt Sadie’s familiar gray head that came into view. She pushed upon the door, and caught sight of Julie.
“My lands! Is that you, Julie? Well, I thought I heard somebody up here,” she cried.
“Has that woman taken the rooms?” Julie demanded.
“Yes, they plan to move in, in the mornin’. Now what’s scared you, Julie?”
“I—I can’t find a key to this door,” Julie said weakly.