She entered, not without half-ecstatic tremors. It was an underground passage! She traversed twelve or fifteen feet of the narrow corridor, where earth showed between rough planking, and came to another door. This one sagged half-way open, revealing a fair-sized chamber, earth-walled also behind its planks, and with a heavily timbered ceiling, big beams in its corners and at intervals along the sides, and a window with a batten shutter opposite the entrance. She stood a moment, enraptured, the candle flame going up very straight and sickly in that unaired space. Then she went almost reverently across the floor of beaten earth, set down her candle and pulled at the rusty hasp of the shutter. It came back suddenly with a creak. Daylight streamed in—sunlight—checkered by a strong lattice of naked woodbine stems. Between these she peered. There was the spring, with the sheen dancing on its waters as it pulsed away into the asequia. She must be standing inside of the steep green mound by the willows, the “mountain” up which Burch had proposed to drive the new carriage. This window must pierce its slope, masked by the woodbine. She had in fact come upon the forgotten cyclone cellar of the ranch house. In a daze of delight, she looked about her. “Oh, oh!” she whispered under her breath, then flew to bring in an old broom from the cellar outside, and with it some cloths; swept and wiped away the accumulated dust. Her mind was clamorous with plans. Rose Marie and Captain Snow would be the only companions she could have here, the only sharers of the secret whose discretion might be trusted; and the place must be made fit for the great white cat’s fastidious fancy, the doll’s cambric daintiness. There was a big box for the table, a smaller one for a chair, and Burchie’s disused high-chair to prop the doll in. At one side was a shelf with some empty bottles and cans on it. These she replaced by an armload of her favorite books from the library. She made a game of this, though there was nobody in the house but stolid Sam Kee, who never asked any questions. It was delightful to pile up the things she wanted taken down, then scout and see that “the coast was clear,” catch them up and run with them, outwitting espionage, evading pursuit. When all was done she surveyed the chamber and its furnishings with satisfaction. Here was the place to read, to make up stories, to dream and act those she read or made up. In short, here was a new stage—secret, safe, solitary—on which the never-ending, always-changing drama might go forward. Here was innocent escape from the world about her, well-loved, comfortable, but too definite, too importunate to permit the dream—the blessed and beautiful dream—which would undoubtedly come true in such a place as this.