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disappeared, not slowly the way she had come but instantly, like a light being turned off.
    Rose started back. Fearfully she put her hand toward the spot where Mrs. Morrissayhad been standing. There was no one, no thing. Her mind was in a turmoil. At that moment, through the window, she caught sight of something blue and orange moving across the glade.
    “There she is!” Rose spoke aloud in her excitement. “There’s her kerchief!”
    She flew down the stairs and out of the house. But there was no sign of Mrs. Morrissay in the clearing. Rose slumped down against the little hawthorn tree. “It’s true what I wrote Aunt Millicent,” she whispered. “They are mad. And now I think I must be mad, too.”
    She sat there, dejectedly scuffing the leaves with her feet, her mind going over and over what had happened. Her toe struck something metal. Surprised, she sat up straight and pushed at it with her foot. It clinked. She went over on her hands and knees to look. She brushed away the leaves and discovered that there were boards underneath with a metal latch of some sort.
    “It’s a door, a door in the ground. How odd.” Excitedly she began to pull at the vines and thick grass that had grown over the boards, and when she had pulled most of them away she saw that, indeed, it was a door—two doors, in fact, with rusty hook-and-eye latches that secured them together. With much pulling and wrenching she managed to loosen them and slowly, slowly, with a great deal of straining and heaving she pried them open.
    There were steps inside that had been made by cutting away the earth and laying boards across. The boards had all but rotted away, but the earth steps were still there. At the bottom, facing her about three feet away, was another door, upright, also fastened with a hook-and-eye latch. The doorway was so low she had to stoop to get through.
    Inside she found herself in a kind of closet with shelves along the sides on which stood crockery jars and glass sealers. On the floor stood several barrels with lids on them. The place was cold and damp, but it looked to be in use.
    I don’t understand. If Aunt Nan keeps her pickles and things here, why is it so hard to get into?
she thought. She had lifted the lid off one of the crocks and found it full of beets. Another was full of cucumber pickles. She looked up. Someone behind her was blocking the light. Quickly she turned around.
    A girl, smaller but probably about the same age as her, stood at the top of the steps with a jar in her hands. It was the girl from the bedroom with the four-poster bed. She wore quite a long dress made of some rough dark brown material, with a white apron over it. On her feet she had awkward-looking ankle-high boots. She had dark brown hair in one long braid down her back, a plain round freckled face, a small nose, a wide mouth—andbright black eyes. They were blinking at Rose in consternation.
    “Where’d you come from?” she demanded.
    “I … I … what?”
    “You’d best get out of our root cellar.” The girl came down the steps. “Missus will be terrible cross.” She reached up to the top shelf and brought down one of the crocks. All the while she kept turning around to stare nervously at Rose.
    Rose stared back.
    “You’d best come along now.” The girl frowned. “Honest, Missus don’t like having strangers around.” She started back up the steps.
    “Look”—Rose followed the girl—“look, isn’t this—” She’d been going to ask, “Isn’t this Aunt Nan’s root cellar?” but the words never got spoken. At the top of the steps she found herself standing beside a little garden with rows of young plants set out in it. Behind it the creek bubbled merrily and a neat stone path led from the garden to the kitchen door. Pansies and sweet alyssum bloomed along the walk and there were hollyhocks against the back wall of the house. The bricks looked bright and the trim around the windows and the kitchen door was fresh and