Publisher's Synopsis
Uncle Silas by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu It is a long, narrow room, with two tall, slim windows at the far end, now draped in dark curtains. Dusky it was with but one candle; and he paused near the door, at the left-hand side of which stood, in those days, an old-fashioned press or cabinet of carved oak. In front of this he stopped. He had odd, absent ways, and talked more to himself, I believe, than to all the rest of the world put together. 'She won't understand, ' he whispered, looking at me enquiringly. 'No, she won't. Will she?' Then there was a pause, during which he brought forth from his breast pocket a small bunch of some half-dozen keys, on one of which he looked frowningly, every now and then balancing it a little before his eyes, between his finger and thumb, as he deliberated. I knew him too well, of course, to interpose a word. 'They are easily frightened--ay, they are. I'd better do it another way.' And pausing, he looked in my face as he might upon a picture. 'They
