.

Here in the dining-room I look about and see the chairs standing the length of the wall, and I am reminded of the aged grandmother, grand-aunts and aunts who always come at a certain hour and seat themselves in them.

Why are they not here now?
At this moment I would like to feel their protecting presence about me.

Probably they are upstairs in their rooms on the second floor; between them and me there is the dim stairway, the stairway that I people with shadowy beings the thought of which makes me tremble.

.