"I'm going to knock," said Cyril.
"Oh no, we don't want any answer," said Dulcie, "so why do it?"
A backward glance at the steps puzzled her, for they had grown steeper than before and impossible to climb down again, or up, for the matter of that, and the door before which they stood was now at such a height from the ground as to make her feel giddy to look below. She hardly had time to think about it when Cyril raised the knocker and let it go. Instead of the usual sound a knocker makes, a loud laugh rang out, discordant and disconcerting. "You needn't be frightened," he remarked, for his little sister hung back and tightened her grasp of his arm. The next moment the door swung open and there stood on the threshold a very tall man with an enormous bald head. He was clad in a yellow satin dressing-gown, and wore great smoke-coloured spectacles.
"So you've come to see the Wizard," he said blandly. "Pray walk in!"
"So you've come to see the Wizard," he said
"I—I think we'd—we'd rather not, thank you very much," stammered Cyril, very red, whilst Dulcie looked up, pale and wondering. "We're not dressed for visiting," she urged in a loud whisper in her brother's ear.
"But you require an answer, or why knock?" retorted the strange man. "Pray walk in," he repeated. He was so polite.
The door swung behind them, and the trembling twins found themselves alone with the Wizard in a very large cave, where the walls glowed with phosphorescent light, while the further end was hidden in deep gloom.