SOLVED. Juvenile Fantasy. Boy helps girl escape from boarding house by copying key. [s]

[David]

Kind of a dark, brooding juvenile fiction series. Joan Aiken-style, maybe.

I remember two scenes, possibly from different books in the series:

1) An adolescent boy is in a dungeon-like chamber peering down into a hole in the floor, probably a drain. He either just finished or is about to use the drain system to sneak in or out of the dungeon, which is probably part of a castle.

2) A girl is shut up in a boarding house where she's poorly treated. She befriends a boy from the outside, who one night brings her a bar of soap. She presses the key to the front door into the soap and gives the soap back. He carves a wooden copy of the key by fitting it into the soap mold. They escape successfully.

Thanks in advance.

[Jenny]

The second could be The Wolves of Willoughby Chase which is a Joan Aiken

[Lobstergirl, au gratin]

David, are you still looking for this or did you find it?

[David]

The second scene is definitely The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. Thanks, Jenny.

The first scene I described, I'm still looking for. Any thoughts on this?
It kind of reminds me of the scene in Ladyhawke, sneaking through the sewers into the cathedral. But it was definitely a book I'm trying to remember.

[Kris]

David, if the first scene is from a different book series (or book), please create a new thread for it. And we'll mark this thread as Solved.

[David]

Ok. New one is created. I don't know how to mark this one as solved but it sounds like you do. Thanks.

[Kris]

Glad you found your second book, David. I marked your thread as Solved by clicking the small "edit" link after the header/ topic title. (This only works on the full Desktop website.)

New thread for the first book is here -- https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...