The Tucks were right it was best if no one knew about the spring. She would keep the secret.

“Never had a case like this before that I know of, and I been in charge going on fifteen years.”

“ I want the wood and you want the child. It’s a trade. A simple, clear-cut trade.”

“Listen, Ma and Pa and Miles, they don’t know how to enjoy it, what we got. Why, heck, Winnie, life’s too enjoy yourself, isn’t it?”

“I know where they’ve taken the little girl.”

“It’s a wheel, Winnie. Everything’s a wheel, turning and turning, never stopping.”

After a few minutes, however, it was clear to Winnie that there was at least one rule: As long as there was food to eat, there was no conversation.

The parlor came next where three armchairs and an elderly rocker stood about aimlessly, like strangers at a party, ignoring each other.

It was amazing, then, to climb a long hill, to see ahead another hill? And beyond that the deep green of a scattered pine forest.

Closing the gate on her oldest fears as she had closed the gate of her own fenced yard, she discovered the wings she’d always wished she had.