The Story of the Big Front Door | Page 4

way upstairs that night she was waylaid in the dimly lighted hall by three ghostly figures.
"What are you doing out of bed?" she exclaimed.
"Oh, auntie, we want to tell you something! It is about the Brown house. We have been playing Robin Hood in the garden."
"It was a lovely place, and we didn't do any harm, really."
Aunt Zélie listened with just a little bit of a smile till she had heard the whole story. It had been great fun, there could be no doubt of that.
"Was it wrong?" asked Bess anxiously.
"We did not hurt anything, not one bit," Carl insisted.
"Why did you keep it such a secret?"
"That was part of the fun; but I wish we had told you," said Louise.
"Yes, it is nicer to have you know things;" and Bess sighed, relieved now that confession was made.
"It is too late to discuss it to-night, but I want you to think about it and decide for yourselves whether or not it was right."
"Did you know it before we told you?" Carl asked suddenly.
"I only guessed it to-day," she replied, smiling.
CHAPTER II.
IN THE STAR CHAMBER.
There never lived a more genial, kindly man than old Judge Hazeltine, and the house he planned and built reflected, as perfectly as a house could, the character of its owner.
"The front door looks like the Judge," people used to say, laughing as they said it, for he was portly and the door was wide. But they meant more than just that, for there were few, even among the unimaginative, who did not feel drawn to that door. Hospitality shone from every panel, the big fanlight was like a genial sun, and the resemblance to his cheery face and cordial manner was not altogether fanciful.
Of the inside of the house perhaps it is enough to say at present that it kept the promise of the outside.
After the judge's death the old home fell to the share of the younger of his two sons, for the William Hazeltines had already built their fine mansion out on Dean avenue, where Aunt Marcia found things more suited to her fastidious taste than on the quiet street which had ceased to be fashionable.
On the other hand, her brother-in-law declared that he much preferred his large garden and home-like neighborhood to the elegant monotony of her surroundings. The children agreed with their father, and so perhaps, for the matter of that, did Uncle William.
At the top of the house there was a long low room, with five windows looking east, west, and south, which was known as the star chamber. This name had originated with Uncle William in the days when he and his brother Frank played and studied there, as Carl and his sisters did now. On rainy days when the garden was out of the question the children were most likely to be found here.
It was a pleasant place and well suited for any sort of indoor game. Except for a rug or two the floor was bare, and the furniture consisted of an old claw-footed sofa on which at least six people could sit comfortably at one time, a wardrobe, some book-shelves, and a hammock swung across one corner. There may have been a chair or two, but the wide window-sills made pleasanter resting-places. Here in the summer time you looked out into the soft greenness of the maple trees, getting glimpses of the quiet street, but when the branches were bare a fine outlook was to be had all over the neighborhood, and you saw how big houses and little houses stood sociably side by side, while an old gray church kept guard at one corner. Here Bess and Louise romanced over an imaginary family known as "The Carletons," or played dolls with Helen, and here Carl arranged his stamp album and made signals to Ikey across the street. Sometimes their father and uncle would drop in and pretend they were boys once more. Then what delight it was to listen to their stories of boyish pranks!
Aunt Zélie was their most frequent visitor. The days when she kept her dolls and "dressing-up things" in the old wardrobe, which was now put to the same use by her little nieces, were not so very far back in the past, and many of her story books were still to be found on the shelves among later favorites.
Going up to the star chamber on the morning after the excitement over the Brown house, she walked in upon an indignation meeting.
"Just when we wanted to play Crokonole!"
"It is too mean!"
"She might let him come, it spoils all our fun!"
This is what she heard, and she asked in surprise, "What in the world is the matter?"
There was silence for a minute, during which the rain made a great pattering outside; then little Helen,