“Little Master, I am taking you where you will be safe. It is a place that Monsieur your grandfather loved, and it was built by the Lisle Saint Frère whom you have always loved to think about. Come with me, and mind your steps well, for we are going down a secret stairway into a hidden room.” As he spoke, Dian led Lisle across the cellar, and stooping at the seventh stone, pressed it and it opened. Down, down into the gloom below them, the last Lisle Saint Frère followed Dian the shepherd, down to the cellar built by the first Lisle Saint Frère, deep in the heart of the earth! CHAPTER XX LISLE SEEKS ADVENTURE Light from the green lanthorn and from two candles on the shelf flickered on the tapestry in the hidden cellar, bringing out unexpected gleams of rose and blue in its faded grey weaving. At one end of the long, strange room was a heap of rugs and velvet draperies and some blankets and there was a big tiger skin on the rough stone floor. A table covered with a crimson brocaded cloth stood near the chest. Dian had found some boards in the upper cellar and had thrown them down the secret slide. With these he had made the table and he was now making a sort of bed. He was stooping over his work, his red locks falling about his shoulders, his chisel and wooden nails beside him on the floor. Lisle sat on the chest watching him, his hands clasped about his knees. It was five days since Dian had rescued him from the baker’s shop. At first he had not been able to take an interest in anything except the facts that the shepherd had told him that first day, when they were safe in the hidden cellar, that his mother was a prisoner in the house of his Great-aunt Hortense, that the old lady herself had died, and that Rosanne was safe with Humphrey Trail, who had rescued her the night that Lisle had been abducted. Lisle had slept in a sort of stupor all the next day, rousing only to take the soup or milk which Dian fed him. He had muttered about a cake with spun sugar, and a mouse. Toward evening he had become himself again, eager to hear all that Dian had to tell him, and plying the shepherd with questions. Les Vignes—was all going well there? Marie Josephine, was she happy? Had they endured the winter without discomfort? Dian had answered all as best he could. He had told of Neville’s arrival in disguise and of the expected arrival of a messenger from the comtesse who never came. He told of the long winter evenings around Mother Barbette’s fire, and of how it had come to him, as he crossed the meadow one night, that he should go to Paris. He did not dwell too much on the danger they all were in, but Lisle seemed to grasp it. “You see, I’ve known the danger all winter, Dian. I’ve known it was there since the Tuileries were taken. I’ve known it all along since then. We must not stay here in this hidden room. We must be up and out!” he had said impulsively.