The door stood open, and there was a lamp in the small entry.

Before entering, she glanced up at the lintel and saw that the ancient arms of the Serra were roughly sculptured in the old marble, and she knew that she was on the threshold of her home.
It was more like a gloomy dungeon than the princely castle of which she had dreamed.

That, indeed, was what it had been through many ages, and nothing else.

She wondered where the great staircase could be where the poor ghost of Queen Joanna sat and shrieked at midnight on the twelfth of May.

It was near the day, and not being at all timid, she smiled at the thought, as she went in.