Why couldn't they come?
He wanted to escape from this dark and dismal drive; these hanging laurels, the cold little road, with its chilly lamps.

An old and tottering woman, her nose nearly touching her chin and her fingers in black mittens, opened at last and led Olva into the very blackest and closest little hall that he had ever encountered.

The air was thick and musty with a strangely mingled smell of burning wood, of faded pot-pourri, of dried skins.

The ceiling was low and black, and the only window was one of a dull red glass that glimmered mournfully at a distance.

The walls were hung with the strangest things, prizes apparently that the late Dr.Craven had secured in China--grinning heathen gods, uncouth weapons, dried skins of animals.