“You mustn’t talk,” she said.

“Why mustn’t I?”

“Because ’tain’t the right thing to do, that’s why.  Now hurry up and get dressed.”

Mary-’Gusta silently wriggled out of her everyday frock, was led to the washstand and vigorously scrubbed.  Then Mrs. Hobbs combed and braided what she called her “pigtails” and tied a bow of black ribbon at the end of each.

“There!” exclaimed the lady.  “You’re clean for once in your life, anyhow.  Now hurry up and put on them things on the bed.”

The things were Mary-’Gusta’s very best shoes and dress; also a pair of new black stockings.

When the dressing was finished the housekeeper stood her in the middle of the floor and walked about her on a final round of inspection.

“There!” she said again, with a sigh of satisfaction.  “Nobody can say I ain’t took all the pains with you that anybody could.  Now you come downstairs and set right where I tell you till I come.  And don’t you say one single word.  Not a word, no matter what happens.”

She took the girl’s hand and led her down the front stairs.  As they descended Mary-’Gusta could scarcely restrain a gasp of surprise.  The front door was open—­the front door—­and the child had never seen it open before, had long ago decided that it was not a truly door at all, but merely a make-believe like the painted windows on the sides of her doll house.  But now it was wide open and Mr. Hallett, arrayed in a suit of black, the coat of which puckered under the arms, was standing on the threshold, looking more soothy than ever.  The parlor door was open also, and the parlor itself—­the best first parlor, more sacred and forbidden even than the “smoke room”—­was, as much of it as she could see, filled with chairs.

Mrs. Hobbs led her into the little room off the parlor, the “back settin’-room,” and, indicating the haircloth and black walnut sofa against the wall, whispered to her to sit right there and not move.

“Mind now,” she whispered, “don’t talk and don’t stir.  I’ll be back by and by.”

Mary-’Gusta, left alone, looked wide-eyed about the little back sitting-room.  It, too, was changed; not changed as much as the front parlor, but changed, nevertheless.  Most of the furniture had been removed.  The most comfortable chairs, including the rocker with the parrot “tidy” on the back, had been taken away.  One or two of the bolt-upright variety remained and the “music chair” was still there, but pushed back into a corner.

Mary-’Gusta saw the music chair and a quiver of guilty fear tinged along her spine; that particular chair had always been, to her, the bright, particular glory of the house.  Not because it was beautiful, for that it distinctly was not; but because of the marvellous secret hidden beneath its upholstered seat.  Captain Marcellus had brought it home years and years before, when he was a sea-going bachelor and made voyages to Hamburg.  In its normal condition it was a perfectly quiet and ugly chair, but there was a catch under one arm and a music box under the seat.  And if that catch were released, then when anyone sat in it, the music box played “The Campbell’s Are Coming” with spirit and jingle.  And, moreover, kept on playing it to the finish unless the catch was pushed back again.