The bus was like a bronco. Would they be able to stay on it? In the darkness of the tunnel she lost the image of Lietta in her blue bathing suit and found herself at the same age, herself and other children she had played with, in Mexico, at the time her father was building bridges and roads. The beginning was the whistling by which her mother called her in from playing. She had a powerful whistle. The children could hear it, no matter how far they went. Their playground was a city beneath the city, which had been partly excavated to build a subway like the American subway, and then abandoned. Cities in other centuries, once buried in lava, which ran underneath the houses, gardens, streets. Where it ran under streets there were grilles to catch the rainwater, but most of the time these grilles only served to bring in a diffuse light. People walked over them without knowing they were walking over another city. The neighborhood children had brought mats, candles, toys, shawls, and lived there a life which because of its secrecy seemed more intense than any above the ground. They had all been forbidden to go there, had been warned of wells, sewers, underground rivers.

The children all stayed together and never ventured farther than the lighted passageways. They were fearful of getting lost.

From all the corners of the underground city Lillian could hear her mother calling when it was time to come home. She had never imagined she might disregard her mother's whistle. But one day she was learning from a Mexican playmate how to cut animals and flowers out of paper for a fiesta, and was so surprised by the shapes that appeared that when the whistle came, she decided not to hear it. Her brothers and sisters left. She went on cutting out ships, stars, lanterns, suns, and moons. Then suddenly her candle gave out.

Trailing all her streams of paper with her, she walked toward the opening that gave onto their garden wall, trusting in her memory. But the place was dark. Under her feet the clay was dry and soft. She walked confidently, until she felt the clay growing wet. She did not remember any wet clay in the places where they played. She became frightened. She remembered the stories about wells, rivers, sewers. The knowledge that people were walking about free right above her head, without knowing that she was there, augmented her fear. She had never known the exact meaning of death. But at this moment, she felt that this was death. Right above her her family was sitting down to dinner. She could faintly hear voices. But they could not hear her. Her brothers and sisters were sworn to secrecy and would not tell where she was.