The day before she had been for a long walk with old Marie through the wood. Neither of them had ever been so far before; but Una had coaxed her old Nurse first up one winding path, then down another—begging her to walk just as far as the bluebells they could see in the distance, or to the tall fir-trees where they could listen to the wood-pigeons cooing overhead, or "just a little further," on the chance of catching a glimpse of the cuckoo they had heard calling all the afternoon—until old Marie had sat down on the stump of a tree, fanning herself with a handkerchief, and declaring that she could walk no more.
"Just a little further—only a little way more, Marie, please," Una begged. "I only want to see if the white flowers over there are the dog-daisies Tom told me about. Such a funny name, isn't it? Daisies which belong to the dogs!" And the little girl laughed merrily.
"No more, no more, Miss Una," the old Frenchwoman said. "You may run on by yourself for a little way, like a good child, if you keep within call." And Marie closed her eyes drowsily—quite overcome with the long walk and the warm afternoon—while Una hunted for birds' nests among the bushes, and added more blossoms to the already large bunch of flowers she had picked as she came along.
She had wandered further away from old Marie than she knew, when she came suddenly to a high, ivy-covered wall, and was able to go no further.
On either side it stretched away from her. The little girl was not able to see where the wall began or where it ended, and she thought that this must be the end of the wood at last, for the wall was so high that she could not see if trees grew on the other side of it.
Presently she began to hunt for birds' nests among the ivy—Tom had told her once that wrens and robins often built in ivy-covered walls—and then it was that she had made the wonderful discovery.
There, in the old brick wall, half hidden by the ivy, was a tiny oak door.
