"It's as dark as a pocket, but I see two things like balls of fire,--that's Goliath up on a beam, I suppose. It isn't far to the ground. Here goes!" She slipped in, feet first, let herself down, hung on to the sill a moment, then disappeared from view. "Oh, Joyce!" gasped Cynthia, sticking her head through the opening into the dark, "where _are_ you?" "Right here!" laughed Joyce from below. "Trying to light the candle. Come along! The stones of the wall are like regular steps, you can put your feet on 'em!" "Oh, but the _mice_, and the _spiders_, and--and all sorts of things!" groaned Cynthia. "I'm afraid of them!" "Nonsense! _they_ can't hurt you!" replied Joyce, unsympathetically. "If you don't come soon, I'm going on. I'm so impatient to see things, I can't wait. You'd better hurry up, if you're coming." "But it isn't _right_! It's trespassing!" cried Cynthia, making her last stand. Joyce scorned to argue further along this line. "We talked that all over before. Good-by! I'm off! I've got the candle lit." Cynthia suddenly surrendered. "Oh, wait, wait! I'm coming!" She adopted Joyce's mode of ingress, but found it scarcely as easy as it looked, and her feet swung in space, groping wildly for the steps described. "I'm stuck! I can't move! Oh, why am I so fat and clumsy!" she moaned. Joyce laughed, placed her companion's feet on a ledge, and hauled her down, breathless, cobwebby, and thoroughly scared. [Illustration: A flight of stairs could be dimly discerned] The lighted candle threw but a feeble illumination on the big, bare space they stood in. The beams overhead were thick with cobwebs hanging like gray portieres from every projection. Otherwise the inclosure was clear except for a few old farm implements in a distant corner. As Joyce raised the candle over her head, a flight of stairs could be dimly discerned. "This way!" she ordered, and they moved toward it cautiously. At that moment, there came from behind them a sudden scratching and scrambling, and then a thud. Both girls uttered a low, frightened shriek and clung together. But it was only Goliath, disturbed in his hiding-place. They turned in time to see him clambering through the window. "Joyce, this is horrid!" gasped Cynthia. "My heart is beating like a trip-hammer. Let's go back." "It's lovely!" chuckled Joyce. "It's what I've always longed for. I feel like Christopher Columbus! I wouldn't go back now for worlds! And to think we've neglected such a mystery at our front doors, as you might say, all these years!" And she dragged the protesting Cynthia toward the cellar stairs. CHAPTER II IN SEARCH OF ADVENTURE