My spirits revived, and I began mentally to arrange my plans for the next day.

The prospect of dinner, too, after my cold drive was wonderfully comforting.

Perhaps (thought I), there is good wine in this inn; it is just the house wherein travellers find, or boast that they find, forgotten bins of Burgundy or Teneriffe.

When my landlord returned to conduct me to the Blue Room, I followed him down to the first landing in the lightest of spirits.
Therefore, I was startled when, as the landlord threw open the door and stood aside to let me pass, _it_ came upon me again--and this time not as a merely vague sensation, but as a sharp and sudden fear taking me like a cold hand by the throat.

I shivered as I crossed the threshold and began to look about me.