“It ill becomes us,” rebuked Grandma Padgett, “to give place to wrath after escaping from peril. But if this is the trap he sets for his house on the hill, I hope he has been caught in it himself sometime!”
“Where'll we go now?” Corinne wailed, having considered it was time to begin crying. “I'm drownded, and my teeth knock together, I'm gettin' so cold!”
They paused at the top of the hill, Corinne still lamenting.
“I don't want to stop here,” said Grandma Padgett, adding, “but I suppose we must.”
The house was large and weather-beaten; its gable-end turned toward the road. The “feefty famblies” had left no trace of domestic life. Grass and weeds grew to the lower windows. The entrance was at one side through a sea of rank growths.
“It looks like they's ghosts lived here,” pronounced Robert dismally.
“Don't let me hear such idle speeches!” said Grandma Padgett, shaking her head. “Spooks and ghosts only live in people's imaginations.”
“If they got tired of that,” said Robert, “they'd come to live here.”
“The old house looks like its name was Susan,” wept Corinne. “Are we goin' to stay all night in this Susan house, ma?”
Her parent stepped resolutely from the carriage, and Bobaday hastened to let down some bars. He helped his grandmother lead the horses into a weedy enclosure, and there unhitch them from the carriage. There was a shed covered with straw which served for a stable. The horses were watered—Robert wading to his neck among cherry sprouts to a curb well, and unhooking the heavy bucket from its chain, after a search for something else available. Then leaving the poor creatures to browse as best they could, the party prepared to move upon the house. Aunt Corinne came out of the wet carriage.