"Ha! Learning to use your thinking-machine, eh?" laughed the Guide. "But think again, unless you are pining to haul burdens."
"Let's get out of this vault with the boards and talk of machines upstairs!" said Hilda, stooping to take a long board.
Elena was close behind her and she also picked up a plank. A pile of kindling wood lay in Hilda's path and she found Nita and Jane in her way if she turned aside, so she endeavoured to climb over the wood. This would have been all right if the ceiling of the cellar had not been so low; as it was, the end of the board that tipped way up in front and down in the back, struck overhead, and threw Hilda backward. The board fell on the kindlings while Hilda stumbled over Elena, who was intent upon getting her plank to the cellar-door. Hilda's sudden impact made Elena drop her burden. Jane dodged the plank but Nita had no time, so the end of the board came down on her toe.
"Wouw! wough! Oo-hoo!" yelled Nita, dancing on one foot while she held the other foot in both hands.
Elena had bumped her head on some short boards Zan was about to carry out, and the expressions on both Elena's and Nita's faces were so funny that the others had to laugh although they immediately apologised for the lack of self-control.
"Well, I just guess you wouldn't see anything funny in your feet!" whined Nita, still holding her toe.
"We were not laughing at your funny feet, but at your ridiculous face!" retorted Jane.
"Perhaps we will all use more caution in our next attempt to get out of this," ventured Miss Miller, skirting about the girls and reaching the area steps with her lumber.
As no further sympathy was vouchsafed the two girls, they soon followed their companions up from the cellar. After all the extra lumber was piled up on the back porch, Miss Miller invited the labourers to rest under the front oak tree.