The Green Door | Page 6

her more like a bag than anything else; and for outside wraps she had--of all things--a homespun blanket pinned over her head. Her great-great-grandmother and her great-great-aunts were all fitted out in a similar fashion. Goodwife Hopkins, however, had a great wadded hood and a fine red cloak.
There was never any fire in the meeting-house, and the services lasted all day, with a short recess at noon, during which they went into a neighboring house, sat round the fire, warmed their half frozen feet, and ate cold corn-cakes and pan-cakes for luncheon. There were no pews in the meeting-house, nothing but hard benches without backs. If Letitia fidgetted, or fell asleep, the tithing-men rapped her. Letitia would never have been allowed to stay away from meeting, had she begged to do so, but she never did. She was afraid to stay alone in the house because of Indians.
Quite often there was a rumor of hostile Indians in the neighborhood, and twice there were attacks. Letitia learned to load the guns and hand the powder and bullets.
She grew more and more homesick as the days went on. They were all kind to her, and she became fond of them, especially of the great-great-grandmother of her own age, and the little great-great-aunts, but they seldom had any girlish sports together. Goodwife Hopkins kept them too busily at work. Once in a while, as a special treat, they were allowed to play bean-porridge-hot for fifteen minutes. They were not allowed to talk after they went to bed, and there was little opportunity for girlish confidences.
However, there came a day at last when Captain Hopkins and his wife were called away to visit a sick neighbor, some twelve miles distant, and the four girls were left in charge of the house. At seven o'clock the two younger went to bed, and Letitia and her great-great-grandmother remained up to wait for the return of their elders, as they had been instructed. Then it was that the little great-great-grandmother showed Letitia her treasures. She had only two, and was not often allowed to look at them, lest they wean her heart away from more serious things. They were kept in a secret drawer of the great chest for safety, and were nothing but a little silver snuff-box with a picture on the top, and a little flat glass bottle, about an inch and a half long.
"The box belonged to my grandfather, and the bottle to his mother. I have them because I am the eldest, but I must not set my heart on them unduly," said Letitia's great-great-grandmother.
Letitia tried to count how many "greats" belonged to the ancestors who had first owned these treasures, but it made her dizzy. She had never told the story of the little green door to any of them. She had been afraid to, knowing how shocked they would be at her disobedience. Now, however, when the treasure was replaced, she was moved in confidence, and told her great-great-grandmother the story.
"That is very strange," said her great-great-grandmother, when Letitia had finished. "We have a little green door, too; only ours is on the outside of the house, in the north wall. There's a spruce tree growing close up against it that hides it, but it is there. Our parents have forbidden us to open it, too, and we have never disobeyed."
She said the last with something of an air of superior virtue. Letitia felt terribly ashamed.
"Is there any key to your little green door?" she asked meekly.
For answer her great-great-grandmother opened the secret drawer of the chest again, and pulled out a key with a green ribbon in it, the very counterpart of the one in the satin-wood box.
Letitia looked at it wistfully.
"I should never think of disobeying my parents, and opening the little green door," remarked her great-great-grandmother, as she put back the key in the drawer. "I should think something dreadful would happen to me. I have heard it whispered that the door opened into the future. It would be dreadful to be all alone in the future, without one's kins-folk."
"There may not be any Indians or catamounts there," ventured Letitia.
"There might be something a great deal worse," returned her great-great-grandmother severely.
After that there was silence between the two, and possibly also a little coldness. Letitia knitted and her great-great-grandmother knitted. Letitia also thought shrewdly. She had very little doubt that the key which she had just been shown might unlock another little green door, and admit her to her past which was her ancestors' future, but she realized that it was beyond her courage, even if she had the opportunity, to take it, and use it provided she could find the second little green door. She had been so frightfully punished for disobedience, that she dared not risk