“You don’t mean to say you’re going down—there!” and Belle, with a dramatic gesture, pointed to the dark opening.
“Why shouldn’t we go down there?” asked Paul. “It’s nothing but a cellar.”
“Cellar!” ejaculated Jack. “We’ll find this more than a cellar I’m thinking!”
“Well, the steps are just like cellar stairs,” said Paul.
“Except they’re of stone,” added Walter, “and that passage isn’t going to prove as prosaic as a cellar, I’m thinking.”
“How did you come to open it, Jack?” asked Hazel.
“That’s what I can’t tell you,” was the answer. “It seemed to open of itself when the axe, or something, hit on the hidden spring. It’s a secret door to a secret passage, and the land knows what we may find at the end.”
“Why, it’s just like in a book or a play!” gasped Belle.
“More like a play,” said Cora. “They have sliding doors like this on the stage where the spirits appear and disappear.”
“That’s it!” cried Jack, as if an idea had suddenly come to him.