ink of being shut up in a perfectly dark cellar--"

"Is it underground?" interrupted John.

"Jolly well underground I should say!" continued the boy. "Fifty steps
down, and an iron door at the top and the bottom of the stairs, so that
however much you shouted nobody could possibly hear you. And nothing
but slimy black earth to lie upon."

"How do you know it's black if you are in the dark?" asked Betty, so
deeply interested in this terrible tale that she wished to understand
every detail.

"I tell you I know it is black!" said the boy sharply. "Black, and
covered with pools of dirty water. And there are toads all about. If
you don't believe me, though, I won't tell you any more about it."

"Oh, I do believe you! It wasn't that at all," said Betty. "But what
a dreadful woman Mrs. Howard must be! Jane says the village people
think she is quite mad."

"And who is Jane?"

"She is our nurse-maid. But everybody thinks the same. Very likely
Father and Mother do, only they never talk about Mrs. Howard to us."

"I dare say she is mad," said the boy. "I can tell you enough things
about her to make your hair stand on end, although I have only been
here a week."

"But how did you come here, and what is your name? And how old are
you?" asked Madge.

"My name is Lewis Brand, and I was fourteen last Christmas."

"Then you are two years older than me!" cried Madge, this announcement
putting everything else out of her head. "I had no idea you were so
old as that. And you have been at school?"

"Two schools, and now I have been sent to prison here."

"I shall go to school soon," interposed John, who was rather ashamed of
his want of experience before this big boy. John had been kept at home
a little longer than would otherwise have been the case, because his
mother had a romantic idea that the twins were inseparable. It had
lately become apparent, however, that John and Betty were most
affectionate when they did not see too much of each other; and since a
baby-boy had lately appeared in the nursery, Captain West had felt that
his eldest son could be very well spared to go to school.

"Ah, school is bad enough!" said Lewis gloomily. "You wait till you
get there! You'll just jolly well wish you were home again! But," he
broke off suddenly, "do let us begin to play. Talking all the
afternoon is dull work."

It was wonderful how soon the victim of Mrs. Howard's cruelties
recovered his spirits when they