So down he went, Jeanne following close after.

“I suppose Houpet and the others will come after us,” said Jeanne, rather anxiously.  But just as she uttered the words a rather shrill crow made both Hugh and her stop short and look up to the top.  They saw Houpet and the others standing round the edge of the hole.  Houpet gave another crow, in which the two chickens joined him, and then suddenly the stone was shut down—­the two children found themselves alone in this strange place, leading to they knew not where!  Jeanne gave a little cry—­Hugh, too, for a moment was rather startled, but he soon recovered himself.

“Jeanne,” he said, “it must be all right.  I don’t think we need be frightened.  See, it is quite light!  The light comes up from below—­down there it must be quite bright and cheerful.  Give me your hand—­if we go down sideways—­so—­we can hold each other’s hands all the way.”

So, in a rather queer fashion, they clambered down the long staircase.  By the time they got to its end they were really quite tired of turning round and round so many times.  But now the view before them was so pleasant that they forgot all their troubles.

They had found a little door at the foot of the stair, which opened easily.  They passed through it, and there lay before them a beautiful expanse of water surrounded by hills; the door which had closed behind them seemed on this side to have been cut out of the turf of the hill, and was all but invisible.  It was light, as Hugh had said, but not with the light of either sun or moon; a soft radiance was over everything, but whence it came they could not tell.  The hills on each side of the water, which was more like a calmly flowing river than a lake, prevented their seeing very far, but close to the shore by which they stood a little boat was moored—­a little boat with seats for two, and one light pair of oars.

“Oh, how lovely!” said Jeanne.  “It is even nicer than the carriage.  Get in, Hugh, and let us row down the river.  The boat must be on purpose for us.”

They were soon settled in it, and Hugh, though he had only rowed once or twice before in his life, found it very easy and pleasant, and they went over the water swiftly and smoothly.  After a while the hills approached more nearly, gradually the broad river dwindled to a mere stream, so narrow and small at last, that even their tiny boat could go no farther.  Hugh was forced to leave off rowing.

“I suppose we are meant to go on shore here,” he said.  “The boat won’t go any farther, any way.”

Jeanne was peering forward:  just before them the brook, or what still remained of it, almost disappeared in a narrow little gorge between the hills.

“Cheri,” said she, “I shouldn’t wonder if the stream gets wider again on the other side of this little narrow place.  Don’t you think we’d better try to pull the boat through, and then we might get into it again?”