ten o'clock
Keeping my cab at the gate , I went up the avenue alone . I knocked gently and rang as quietly as possible , for I feared to disturb Lucy or her mother , and hoped to only bring a servant to the door . After a while , finding no response , I knocked and rang again ; still no answer . I cursed the laziness of the servants that they should lie abed at such an hour -- for it was now ten o'clock -- and so rang and knocked again , but more impatiently , but still without response . Hitherto I had blamed only the servants , but now a terrible fear began to assail me . Was this desolation but another link in the chain of doom which seemed drawing tight around us ? Was it indeed a house of death to which I had come , too late ?