The door creaked open with a noise that must have sounded throughout
the empty house. I recollected then that it was impossible to keep it
shut without locking it. The landlord had long ago ceased to concern
himself with his tumble-down property.

I caught at the door-edge, missed it and, tripping over a rent in the
cheap mat that lay against the door inside, stumbled against the
table-edge and clung there.

And even after I had caught at it, and stayed my fall, that infernal
door went creaking, creaking backward till it brought up against the
wall.

The room was completely dark, except for a little patch of light high
up on the bedroom wall, which came through the hole the workmen had
made when they began demolishing the building. I hesitated a moment;
then I drew a match from my pocket and rubbed it softly into a flame
against my trouser leg.

I reached up to the gas above the table, turned it on, and lit the
incandescent mantle, lowering the light immediately. But even then
there was no sound from behind the curtains.

They hung down close together, so that I was able to see only the
gas-blackened ceiling above them and, underneath, the lower edge of the
bed linen, and the bed-frame at the base, with its enamelled iron feet,
The sheets hung straight, as though the bed had not been occupied; but,
though there was no sound, I knew Jacqueline was at the back of the
curtains.