ould not analyse--a something which she
concluded must be peculiar to the house. The children were very much
upset. The sight of the dark entrance hall and wide, silent staircases,
bathed in gloom, terrified them.

"Oh, mother!" they cried, clutching hold of Tina Baranoff and dragging
her back, "we can never live here. Take us away at once. Look at those
things. Whatever are they?" And they pointed to the shadows--queerly
shaped shadows--that lay in thick clusters on the stairs and all around
them.

Tina did not know what to say. Her own apprehensions and the only too
obvious terror of the dogs, whom she had literally to drive across the
threshold, and who whined and cringed at her feet, confirming the
children's fears, made it impossible for her to check them. Moreover,
since leaving Moscow the warnings of her friends and relations had often
come back to her. Though Ivan had never ceased to be kind, his conduct
roused her suspicions. During the journey, which he had insisted should
be performed in a droshky, he halted every evening directly the moon
became invisible, and used to disappear regularly between dusk and
sunrise. He would never tell her where he went or attempt to explain the
oddness of his conduct, but when pressed by her would merely say:

"It is a habit. I always like to roam abroad in the night-time--it would
be very bad for my health if I did not."

And this was all Tina could get out of him. She noticed, too, what her
blind infatuation had prevented her observing before, that there was a
fierce expression in his eyes when he set out on these nocturnal
rambles, and that on his return the corners of his mouth and his long
finger-nails were always smeared with blood. Furthermore, she noticed
that although he was concerned about the appetites of herself and the
children, he ate very little cooked food himself--never vegetables or
bread--and would often furtively put a raw piece of meat into his mouth
when he thought no one was looking.

Tina hoped that these irregularities would cease on their arrival at the
chateau, but, on the contrary, they rather increased, and she became
greatly perturbed.

The second night after their arrival, when she had been in bed some time
and was nearly asleep, Tina, between her half-closed eyelids, watched
her husband get out of bed, stealthily open the window, and drop from
the sill. Some hours later she was again aroused. She heard the growl of
a wolf--and immediately