text:  Behind the door by which the Queen-mother had left her son's apartment was a narrow stone corridor communicating with a small winding staircase by which she mounted to her own suite of rooms upon the first floor; but when she had gained the summit avoiding the secret entrance opening into her own chamber she proceeded along one of the many hidden passages by which she was accustomed to gain not only those wings of the palace inhabited by her different children but almost every other part of the building unseen and unannounced