midnight
Mortal hatred seems to deepen and dilate into something diabolical in these perverted animosities . The mystery of their origin -- their capacity for evolving latent faculties of crime -- and the steady vitality with which they survive the hearse , and speak their deep-mouthed malignities in every new-born generation , have associated them somehow in my mind with a spell of life exceeding and distinct from human and a special Satanic action . My chamber , as I have mentioned , was upon the third storey . It was one of many , opening upon the long gallery , which had been the scene , four generations back , of that unnatural and bloody midnight duel which had laid one scion of this ancient house in his shroud , and driven another a fugitive to the moral solitudes of a continental banishment . Much of the day , as I told you , had been passed among the grisly records of these old family crimes and hatreds . They had been an ill-conditioned and not a happy race . When I heard the servant 's step traversing that long gallery , as it seemed to the in haste to be gone , and when all grew quite silent , I began to feel a dismal sort of sensation , and lighted the pair of wax candles which I found upon the small writing table .