text: > go downward
  Extremely spacious. It is its best with a half-dozen servants in livery. The floor is Italian marble, and a small door to the west is concealed by yellow silk hangings.
  
  The main staircase ascends to the corridor on the second floor, and a smaller version leads down into the dim basement. Doors also open north and northeast.
  
  On the wall is one of those mechanical clocks that pop open on the hour, allowing the ingenious internal figures out to play.
  
  Just on the quarter-hour the cuckoo clock opens up its door and a mechanical bird flies forward. It sings a brief warbling tune, then withdraws into its little door.
  
  > Go east
  West is the wall of the kitchen. Most of the space along the wall is planted with herbs -- bay, parsley, stalks of mint -- left of the open doorway. To its right is only a drainage ditch, catching the outflow of a pipe that comes through the wall.
  
  In one corner of the plot is the well, drilled many deep feet; in another is the antique sundial.
  
  A tangle of climbing roses covers almost completely the wall and door of a shed to the southeast.
  
  You can also see a dark wooden box (in which are an mirror inset inside the box (providing light), a pearl necklace and an old letter) here.
  
  > take dark wooden box
  Taken.
  
  In your hunger, you dream of creme caramel, elegantly centered in its pool of sweet liquid and garnished with three-- no, make it four-- fresh raspberries. Or perhaps thinly-sliced venison, cold from the roast.
  
  > search the inset mirror
  In the mirror you see reflected a chocolate leaf and a desk. Around the edges you can make out other indications of Marie's Chamber.
  
  > link the chocolate leaf to the roses
  (the roses)
  You valiantly try to link the two objects, but they are just a little too different. Maybe if they looked more alike.
  
  > Reverse link chocolate leaf to roses
  (the roses)
  You valiantly try to link the two objects, but they are just too dissimilar.
  
  Reverse links are even pickier than regular links that way.
  
  > Sf5
  Ok.
  
  > read Dyes
  (first taking On Vegetable Dyes)
  
  (putting the sword into the sack to make room)
  Taken.
  
  You flip through the pages, becoming transfixed by a discussion of how the Celts, supposedly, were wont to dye clothing in a decoction of powdered lichen and stale piss, brewed together for three weeks and then strained.
  
  But beside this pleasant concoction there are references to others, such as onion skin boiled in water to produce a pleasant yellow.
  
  > continue
  You flip through the pages, becoming transfixed by a discussion of how the Celts, supposedly, were wont to dye clothing in a decoction of powdered lichen and stale piss, brewed together for three weeks and then strained.
  
  But beside this pleasant concoction there are references to others, such as onion skin boiled in water to produce a pleasant yellow.
  
  > fill the teapot with the water from well
  (first taking the hinge-lidded teapot)
  (putting the blue bottle into the sack to make room)
  Taken.
  
  You put some water in the hinge-lidded teapot. This fills the hinge-lidded teapot to the brim.
  
  > take the onion skin
  (putting the cooked andouillettes into the sack to make room)
  Taken.
  
  > take the cup
  (putting the plate into the sack to make room)
  Taken.
  
  > put Tea on the spindle
  (first taking the Tea Recipe)
  (putting The Lavori d'Aracne into the sack to make room)
  Taken.
  
  The spindle is shaped to hold exactly one cylinder at a time.
  
  > take Andouillettes from the spindle
  (putting the dark wooden box into the sack to make room)
  It takes a bit of wiggling to get the cylinder to come free, but you extricate it without too much difficulty.
  
  > put Tea on the spindle
  The cylinder slips into place with a satisfying click, as though some mechanism has engaged.
  
  > look at the dial
  A dial which can be rotated to show one word at a time, labeled 'SHAPE'. Currently the word showing is LEAF.
  
  In your hunger, you imagine in great clarity creme caramel, elegantly centered in its pool of sweet liquid and garnished with three-- no, make it four-- fresh raspberries. Or perhaps thinly-sliced venison, cold from the roast.
  
  > turn the dial
  You turn the dial gently with one finger, and it clicks around to display the setting ROSE.
  
  > turn the dial
  You turn the dial gently with one finger, and it clicks around to display the setting FISH.
  
  > continue
  You turn the dial gently with one finger, and it clicks around to display the setting SHOE.
  
  > Continue
  You turn the dial gently with one finger, and it clicks around to display the setting HEART.
  
  > Continue
  You turn the dial gently with one finger, and it clicks around to display the setting NONE.
  
  > put Chocolate on the spindle
  (the Chocolate Recipe on the spindle)
  (first taking the Chocolate Recipe)
  (putting On Vegetable Dyes into the sack to make room)
  Taken.
  
  The cylinder slips into place with a satisfying click, as though some mechanism has engaged.
  
  > Open contraption
  That's already open.
  
  > put Chocolate in the contraption
  (the Chocolate Recipe in the delicate contraption)
  (first taking the Chocolate Recipe)
  It takes a bit of wiggling to get the cylinder to come free, but you extricate it without too much difficulty.
  
  The cylinder slips into place with a satisfying click, as though some mechanism has engaged.
  
  > Go southwest
  You can go only east, west or down.
  
  > Go west
  Stripped of the clutter it once possessed, the room still offers a charming view through the north window of the old grounds, and the way out is to the east. The wallpaper and floorboards are still as fine as ever.
  
  Hanging on the wall is an elegant gilt-wood mirror, reflecting light from the celestial bauble over the ground before it.
  
  Her desk remains, pushed against the wall.
  
  You can also see a chocolate leaf here.