s. Winter, taking another key fully as large as
the first, proceeded to push open a heavy door and disclose a steep
flight of slippery stone steps leading downwards into the cellars,
Madge had the comfort of feeling that at all events she was seeing the
most interesting part of the house. The bedrooms, or even attics,
could not be as thrilling as that yawning chasm beneath her feet into
which she was now about to plunge.

"Poor old Doctor Freeman set a great store on his collection of wine,"
observed Mrs. Winter as she slowly went down the cellar steps, feeling
with her hands along the wall, for the bit of candle that Madge carried
in front gave a very insufficient light, and she was terribly afraid of
slipping. However, her nervousness did not prevent her from giving
Madge a long account of the sale that had taken place after Dr.
Freeman's death, and of the large sums of money that people gave for
his treasured collections of wine.

"And to my thinking he would have been much wiser to drink it himself,
poor gentleman!" she concluded. "But each one knows what he likes
best, and if he preferred the look of the bottles to the taste of what
was in them--well, 'twas his own to do what he liked with!"

Madge did not listen very attentively to Mrs. Winter's somewhat
rambling discourse. By this time they had reached the bottom step, and
another large key having been produced the last heavy door was opened
with a loud creak. To any young lady who had read as many fairy-tales
as Madge, the situation irresistibly suggested a subterranean cavern,
in which unlimited gold was stored away by thrifty dwarfs.

"And there really is a lot of money there," thought Madge; "five
shillings and sevenpence might easily be called a heap of
treasure--with a little pretending. But I do wish Betty and John were
here to help to discover it! We should have so much more fun."

Mrs. Winter was not a very satisfactory companion on an adventurous
expedition. She was kindness itself--nobody could have been more
good-natured,--but she did not seem quite to enter into the spirit of
the thing. The dark mysterious cavern remained to her nothing but Dr.
Freeman's empty wine-cellar; and it evidently never occurred to her for
a moment that there was anything to be gained by calling the candle-end
a torch! Life in the nursery and schoolroom at home had afforded Madge
comparatively few opportunities for real adventure; and when one
suddenly fell ac