She glanced once more at her husband as he entered, and then bent over her cards again.
The night had descended blackly, and the wind moaned eerily round the old house.

Thalassa sat in a straight-backed wooden chair listening to the wind and rain raging outside, and occasionally glancing at his wife, who remained absorbed in her patience.

Half an hour passed in silence, broken only by the rattling of rain on the window, and the loud ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece.

Suddenly the bell of Robert Turold's room rang loudly in its place behind the kitchen door.
It was one of the old wired bells, and it sprang backwards and forwards so violently under the impulse of the unseen pull that the other bells ranged alongside responded to the vibration by oscillating in sympathy.
Thalassa watched them moodily until the sound ceased.

He then left the kitchen with deliberate tread, and stalked upstairs.
The door of his master's study was closed.