On the next landing, I discovered a large bedroom with shuttered windows, an unmade bed, and one of Mr. Babcock’s tall hats, and across from it a smaller chamber, bright yellow with white trimmings, containing Mary’s trunk and her knitting basket. I shook my head as I shut the door, the soft noise almost startling. The yellow room was obviously for guests, but who was I to deny Mary, who had left home and family for the sake of my uncle and me? Quiet pressed against my ears and I began to hurry down the steps. Where was everyone? On the second floor, I found a small room with a convenience, the curtain moving slightly with the breeze that came through a broken pane of glass — poor Mr. Babcock, I must have given him quite a start — and then I found my room. There was no question that it was mine, because it had so obviously been my grandmother’s. The furniture was dark, tall, and heavy, nothing like the airy style in the rest of the house, the wallpaper only slightly brightened by the lighter shades of pink in a pattern that tended closer to red.
