“My grief! I didn't know any of these doors COULD be locked!” she muttered angrily. “They never have been before that I ever heard of.” She stopped before Evadna's window, and saw, through a slit in the green blind, that the old-fashioned bureau had been pulled close before it. “My grief!” she whispered disgustedly, and retraced her steps to the east side, which, being next to the pond, was more secluded. She surveyed dryly a window left wide open there, gathered her brown-and-white calico dress close about her plump person, and crawled grimly through into the sitting-room, where, to the distress of Phoebe's order-loving soul, the carpet was daily well-sanded with the tread of boys' boots fresh from outdoors, and where cigarette stubs decorated every window-sill, and the stale odor of Peaceful's pipe was never long absent. She went first to all the outer rooms, and unlocked every one of the outraged doors which, unless in the uproar and excitement of racing, laughing boys pursuing one another all over the place with much slamming and good-natured threats of various sorts, had never before barred the way of any man, be he red or white, came he at noon or at midnight. Evadna's door was barricaded, as Phoebe discovered when she turned the knob and attempted to walk in. She gave the door an indignant push, and heard a muffled shriek within, as if Evadna's head was buried under her pillow. “My grief! A body'd think you expected to be killed and eaten,” she called out unsympathetically. “You open this door! Vadnie Ramsey. This is a nice way to act with my own boys, in my own house! A body'd think--” There was the sound of something heavy being dragged laboriously away from the barricaded door; and in a minute a vividly blue eye appeared at a narrow crack. “Oh, I don't see how you dare to L-LIVE in such a place, Aunt Phoebe!” she cried tearfully, opening the door a bit wider. “Those Indians--and that awful man--” “That was only Grant, honey. Let me in. There's a few things I want to say to you, Vadnie. You promised to help me teach my boys to be gentle--it's all they lack, and it takes gentle women, honey--” “I am gentle,” Evadna protested grievedly. “I've never once forgotten to be gentle and quiet, and I haven't done a thing to them--but they're horrid and rough, anyway--” “Let me in, honey, and we'll talk it over. Something's got to be done. If you wouldn't be so timid, and would make friends with them, instead of looking at them as if you expected them to murder you--I must say, Vadnie, you're a real temptation; they can't help scaring you when you go around acting as if you expected to be scared. You--you're TOO--” The door opened still wider, and she went in. “Now, the idea of a great girl like you hiding her head under a pillow just because Grant asked old Hagar to apologize!”