“It’s the room right in front of you when you get to the top,” she explained.
She opened the door; he went in, she closed the door behind him, and he found himself in what seemed a pitch-black cupboard. But, as he moved forward, his foot struck against a step, and he began cautiously to mount a narrow, boxed-in staircase, until his outstretched hand touched a door.
He pushed it open, and found himself in a well lighted corridor, and, facing him, a white painted door. And behind that door he heard some one sobbing, in a low, wailing voice.
He stopped, rather at a loss. Then, because he would not go back, he went forward, and knocked.
“Who is it?” cried a voice.
“I came to see Mrs. Jones,” Ross replied casually.
There was a moments silence; then the door was opened by the loveliest creature he had ever seen in his life. He had only a glimpse of her, of an exquisite face, very white, with dark and delicate brows and great black eyes, a face childlike in its soft, pure contours, but terribly unchildlike in its expression of terror and despair.
“Wait!” she said. “Go in and wait!”
She brushed past him, with a flutter of her filmy gray dress and a breath of some faint fragrance, and vanished down the back stairs.
Ross went in as he was instructed, and stood facing the door, waiting with a certain uneasiness for some one to come. But nobody did come, and at last he turned and looked about him.