With A Heavy Sigh, I Knocked Slowly But Decidedly At The
Crazy Door.
I saw the curly head of a boy glance for a moment
against the broken window.
There was a stir within, but no one
answered our summons. Emilia was rubbing her hands together, and
beating a rapid tattoo with her feet upon the hard and glittering
snow, to keep them from freezing.
Again I appealed to the inhospitable door, with a vehemence which
seemed to say, "We are freezing, good people; in mercy let us in!"
Again there was a stir, and a whispered sound of voices, as if
in consultation, from within; and after waiting a few minutes
longer - which, cold as we were, seemed an age - the door was
cautiously opened by a handsome, dark-eyed lad of twelve years of
age, who was evidently the owner of the curly head that had been
sent to reconnoitre us through the window. Carefully closing the
door after him, he stepped out upon the snow, and asked us coldly
but respectfully what we wanted. I told him that we were two ladies,
who had walked all the way from Douro to see his mamma, and that we
wished very much to speak to her. The lad answered us, with the ease
and courtesy of a gentleman, that he did not know whether his mamma
could be seen by strangers, but he would go in and see. So saying he
abruptly left us, leaving behind him an ugly skeleton of a dog, who,
after expressing his disapprobation at our presence in the most
disagreeable and unequivocal manner, pounced like a famished wolf
upon the sack of good things which lay at Emilia's feet; and our
united efforts could scarcely keep him off.
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