Foster was so relieved that he began to boast. "It was neat! I yanked that old jalopy up till it hit the top, bang! And then I yanked it down till it hit the bottom, bang! And then I yanked it up again, and I bet that old jalopy never went so fast before. It was neat, wasn't it, Dave?"
"Ye-es," Davey said. "But I guess we better never do it again."
"Nope," said Foster soberly, remembering the pitch-black shaft. "I guess we better never."
"But why in the world do you suppose Mrs. Brace-Gideon had a dumb-waiter landing in her bedroom?" Portia asked. "And why did she hide it with that picture?"
"Mrs. Brace-Gideon was a lady of leisure," her mother said. "She probably took her breakfast in bed. The dumb-waiter would bring her tray up each morning, nice and hot, from the kitchen pantry."
"And the painting, no doubt, was put there to conceal a plain functional door with what she considered to be a thing of beauty," said Mr. Blake, studying the picture.
Portia thought of the dumb-waiter and the sheep-lady, and Baron Bloodshed, and the crystal chandelier, and all the other curious or lovely things they had discovered.
"What a place!" she said thoughtfully. "You know what this house is, Mother? Daddy? It is a house of astonishment!"