“Oh,” said Cornelia a trifle relieved, “then I’ll call again,” and hung up the receiver in the face of the repeated question, “Who is this?” Her cheeks were glowing as she emerged from the telephone-booth and hastened out to the street as if she were afraid some one would chase her. That was likely Brand Barlock’s sister on the telephone, and Cornelia had appeared to her like a bold girl calling up her brother and then retreating without giving her name; but it had been the only way. At least, she knew this much, that Brand also was still away. Carey was likely safe; that is, probably nothing had happened to his body, though there was no telling what had happened to his soul on such a wild trip with such companions. But the third day the carpenter took down the parlor partition, and threw the hall and parlor into one; and Cornelia could no longer conceal the interesting changes that had been going on within the old front room. There was a fine big window each side of the big fireplace hole, with a box window-seat under it, and the little “bay” had been put into the long, dark wall of the hallway, with a row of three diamond-paned windows opening just over the staircase. Cornelia had managed to conceal the first bay window, which had been put in the second day, by means of an old curtain tacked across the wall. But, when the third night came, there stood the big new room with all its windows, a place of great possibilities. “Now,” said the carpenter as he stood back and surveyed his finished task, “there’s just two more things I’d like to see you do to this room. You need to break that there staircase with a landin’ about four steps up. You got plenty-a room this side yer dining-room door, an’ ’twould jest strike them three winders fer the landin’. They got a half-circle an’ two long, narrer side winders down to the shop would jest fit around that there front door. Ef you say the word, I’ll put ’em in tomorra. I jest about could do it in a day. But I’d like to turn them stairs around. I certainly would.” So with fear and trembling Cornelia told him to go ahead. He assured her she needn’t worry about the pay, that his mother-in-law and his two cousins’ wives all wanted curtains; and it began to look as if she would be stencilling birds the rest of her natural life; so she had no fear but she would be able to pay him sometime. She was getting five dollars a set for her curtains, and felt quite independent. Perhaps, after all, she would be an interior decorator some day, even if this was a day of small things, scrim curtains instead of rich fabrics and rare hangings. That night, when the children came home, they discovered the changes in the front part of the house, of course; and their sister found them standing in awe on the stairs looking about them as if they had suddenly stepped into a place of enchantment.