We mounted, after that, a long and gentle hill, from whose sides the trees fell away, till, on the summit, there was none. But here, sunk deep in the crest, was, as I could discern, an ancient gravel pit, whose slopes were rough with brake and brush to a giddy distance down. “Come,” he whispered, and clasped my hand secure. We descended by a path, that was no path to me, and, at the bottom, stooped under a very thicket of bush, and gained once more a sense of space and movement, but so deadly close-shut that for a little I dared not stir. “Come,” whispered my companion again. “It is nothing but a cleft in the hill, but so overgrown above that no mortal would guess it there.” Still I dared not move. When suddenly I felt his arm about me, and his lips on mine. Then I started to myself with a shock of anger. “Is this to be a brother?” I cried. “What else,” he murmured, “to give his little sister confidence.” The low laugh with which he said it made my blood fire. I could have struck him in my fury. “Go on!” I said, in a repressed voice. “I have come so far; I must follow, I suppose.” “Will you not let me lead you?” “No.” “You may stumble in the dark.” “Not to the fall you think.” “I am sorry.” “Very well. Go on.” He went before, submissively. The gully cut straight, like a giant furrow, through the hill. It was narrow and pitch-dark, sodden here and there with dripping water, and always smelling like a vault. Not once in its entire length, so far as I could see, did the dense mat of overgrowth thin to that texture that a star of all the hosts above was visible. At last he stopped so suddenly that I near fell against him. “Hush!” he whispered, “we are at the end. Can you see enough to follow me?” “Yes,” I said; “my eyes are opened now.” He had hard work, I knew, to suppress a chuckle over my tragic tone. “Well, keep them so,” said he; and, elbowing up a great pad of foliage, beckoned to me to pass. I obeyed, holding my skirts from him, and in a moment discovered myself in the open once more. We had emerged, it seemed, high on the near perpendicular side of another pit, or cutting. Right beneath us, shouldering the very steep on which we were perched, was the thatched roof of a cottage, an open skylight in the midst gaping at us scarce ten feet below. So close did it invite us, in the bewildering starlight, that I was near springing, on the thought, to gain its shelter. But my companion restrained me. “Wait,” he whispered drily. “A little of your discretion, please.” Doubtful of me, he let go his hold reluctantly, and stooping once more under the curtain of foliage, dragged out a ladder, which was concealed behind, and which he now, with infinite precaution, lowered through the skylight till it rested. “Now,” he said, “climb down, while I hold it firm.”