I would not eat one potato or turnip until the
apples had given out. You think I can laugh now; so could you, after you
had got out. But the clock didn't strike, and nobody came, and I was sure
it must be nearly morning I was so faint with hunger and so dizzy from
want of sleep. And then it occurred to me to stumble up the stairs and
try to burst the door open! That lock was loose, it turned very easily!
In an instant I was up the stairs and trying the door. And, lo, and
behold, it opened easily, it was not locked at all! I had only imagined I
heard the click of the lock. And I was free, and the sun was shining,
and I was neither hungry nor dizzy.
"I don't know whether I laughed or cried or mingled both in a state of
ecstasy. But I was too much shaken to go on with my letter, I had to find
a story book and a piece of apple pie to quiet my nerves. The fires were
not out and the clock had only struck ten. But when you ask me how long I
stayed in that cellar I shall tell you one hundred years! Now, isn't that
adventure enough for the first volume?
"Vol. II. Evening. I waited and waited downstairs for somebody to come,
but nobody came except Josie Grey's brother, to say that her mother was
taken ill suddenly and Josie could not come. I suppose Mr. Holmes
expected her to come and so he has gone to Middlefield, and Morris
thought so, too; and so I am left out in the cold, or rather in by the
fire. Mr. Holmes' chamber is the snuggest room in the house, so full of
books that you can't be lonely in it, and then the fire on the hearth
is company.
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