The dim little passage led past two grimly closed doors painted rusty red to two half-open doors with dull glass in their panels.

Outside, in the street from which they had mounted by stone steps, a shower of sleet had begun to fall.

Hilary shut the door, but the cold spirit of that shower had already slipped into the bleak, narrow house.
"This is the apartment, m'm," said the landlady, opening the first of the rusty-coloured doors.

The room, which had a paper of blue roses on a yellow ground, was separated from another room by double doors.
"I let the rooms together sometimes, but just now that room's taken--a young gentleman in the City; that's why I'm able to let this cheap." Cecilia looked at Hilary.

"I hardly think---" The landlady quickly turned the handles of the doors, showing that they would not open.
"I keep the key," she said.