There were dead white ashes on the hearth, and the silence was grimly kept by the dumb household gods.
His nervousness increased.

So vividly did his memory people the streets and shops and houses that the air was vibrant with sound,--low-toned conversations, shouts, calls, laughter, the voices of children, the creaking of wagons, pounding hammers, the clangour of many works; yet all muffled away from him, as if coming from some phantom-land.

His eyes, too, were kept darting from side to side by vague forms that flitted privily near by, around corners, behind him, lurking always a little beyond his eyes, turn them quickly as he would.

Now, facing the street, he shouted, again and again, from sheer nervousness; but the echoes came back alone.
He recalled a favourite day-dream of boyhood,--a dream in which he became the sole person in the world, wandering with royal liberty through strange cities, with no voice to chide or forbid, free to choose and partake, as would a prince, of all the wonders and delights that boyhood can picture; his own master and the master of all the marvels and treasures of earth.

This was like the dream come true; but it distressed him.