CONSUL. There are a lot of people living here?
STARCK. Something like ten families, I think, counting those in the rear also. But nobody knows anybody else. There is unusually little gossiping in the house. It seems rather as if everybody were hiding. I have lived here ten years, and during the first two years we had for neighbours a strange family that kept very quiet in the daytime. But at night they began to stir about, and then carriages would come and fetch things away. Not until the end of the second year did I learn that they had been running a private sanatorium, and that what was being taken away at night were dead bodies.
CONSUL. Horrible!
STARCK. And they call it the Silent House.
CONSUL. Yes, there isn't much talking done here.
STARCK. More than one drama has been played here, nevertheless.
CONSUL. Tell me, Mr. Starck, who lives up there on the second floor, right above my brother?
STARCK. Up there, where the light comes through the red shades—a tenant died there during the summer. Then the place stood empty for a month, and a week ago a new family moved in. I haven't seen them. I don't know their name. I don't think they ever go out. Why did you ask, Consul?
CONSUL. Whew—I don't know! Those four red shades look like stage curtains behind which some sanguinary tragedies are being rehearsed—or I imagine so, at least. There is a palm at one of the windows looking like a rod made of wire—you can see the shadow of it on the shade. If only some people were to be seen——
STARCK. I have seen plenty of them, but not until later—at night.