Undoubtedly the place was doomed.

There was something eerily tragic about it even on that shining August afternoon, a shadow indefinable of which Olga had been conscious even in her childish days.
She looked over her shoulder several times as she rode in the direction in which her friend had disappeared, but she saw no sign of her.
Finally, reaching the house, she went round to a shed at the back, in which she was accustomed to lodge her bicycle.
Here she was joined by an immense Irish wolf-hound, who came from the region of the stables to greet her.
She stopped to fondle him.

She and Cork were old friends.

As she finally returned to the carriage-drive in front of the house, he accompanied her.
The front door stood open, and she went in through its Gothic archway, glad to escape from the glare outside.

The great hall she thus entered had been the chapel in the days of the monks, and it had the clammy atmosphere of a vault.