And yet I well remember that the heavy dew and evening breeze was almost chilly after sunset, and a sort of vault-like feeling about the rooms, which had been for a week or more unused, made us offer no resistance when Keziah began to light a fire.

While she was doing so Eleanor exclaimed, "Let's go and warm ourselves in the kitchen." Any idea of comfort connected with a kitchen was quite new to me, but I followed Eleanor, and made my first acquaintance with the old room where we have spent so many happy hours.
We found the door shut; much, it seemed, to Eleanor's astonishment.

But the reason was soon evident.

As our footsteps sounded on the stone passage there arose from behind the kitchen door an utterly indescribable din of howling, yowling, squealing, scratching, and barking.
"It's the dear boys!" said Eleanor, and she ran to open the door.

For a moment I thought of her brothers (who must, obviously, be maniacs!), but I soon discovered that the "dear boys" were the dogs of the establishment, who were at once let loose upon us _en masse_.