midnight
Everything was old and grand , and full of storied interest . And there , on the wall , was the crest of the house -- the uplifted hand grasping a dagger -- and the motto , in old Norman French , `` Strike once , and strike well . '' It is a very fine thing to be a baronet -- a Kingsland of Kingsland , with fifteen thousand a year , and the finest old house in the county ; but if Death will stalk grimly over your threshold and snatch away the life you love more than your own , then even that glory is not omniscient . For this wintery midnight , while Sir Jasper Kingsland walks moodily up and down -- up and down -- Lady Kingsland , in the chamber above , lies ill unto death . An hour passes -- the clock in the turret and the buhl toy on the stone mantel toll solemnly one . The embers drop monotonously through the grate -- a dog bays deeply somewhere in the quadrangle below -- the wailing wind of coming morning sighs lamentingly through the tossing copper-beeches , and the roar of the surf afar off comes ever and anon like distant thunder . The house is silent as the tomb -- so horribly silent that the cold drops start out on the face of the tortured man .