Chapter 12
Dr. Seward's Diary18 September.—I drove at once to Hillingham and arrived early.
Keeping my cab at the gate, I went up the avenue alone. I knocked
gently and rang as quietly as possible, for I feared to disturb
Lucy or her mother, and hoped to only bring a servant to the door.
After a while, finding no response, I knocked and rang again, still
no answer. I cursed the laziness of the servants that they should
lie abed at such an hour, for it was now ten o'clock, and so rang
and knocked again, but more impatiently, but still without
response. Hitherto I had blamed only the servants, but now a
terrible fear began to assail me. Was this desolation but another
link in the chain of doom which seemed drawing tight round us? Was
it indeed a house of death to which I had come
