The idea gave me the creeps, for I have a horror of death. I tried to forget the sheds, and resolutely watched the house. A soundless hour went by, and I was feeling hungry, but I did not think of departing. My Waterbury told me it was half-past two o'clock. At three, I began to wonder at the silence of the place. At four, I was suspecting the place to be deserted. The shadows were lengthening to the day's close, and I was chewing my handkerchief to assuage my famished appetite when of a sudden I heard a curious noise. It was hoarse, guttural, chattering, and it seemed to issue from the sheds, which I had fancied to be morgues. I listened with every sense on strain. The noise increased, and subsided at intervals, sometimes it became a perfect babel, and harsh animal-like cries quivered through the din. My curiosity became a plague, but I no longer doubted that the place was tenanted, and I dared not explore. The queer sounds I have attempted to describe, lasted about twenty minutes, and then all was still again. I did not know what to think. Were wild animals confined in those sheds? I was still wondering when I heard footfalls on the gravel path, rapidly approaching the house from the lane. A moment later I saw Sir William Venner striding through the twilight. His face was quite expressionless. He marched up to the porch, and disappeared. As I heard neither knock nor sound of bell, I concluded that he had entered with a latch-key. More than ever determined to remain, I fought my appetite as best I could for the next three hours. By then it was quite dark, and the glow of lamps appeared through the green blinds, covering the windows of the house. Feeling wretchedly stiff and cramped, and cold to my bones, I stood up and rubbed my limbs. When the circulation was restored, I crept out of the covert, where I had lain so long and stealthily approached the line of sheds. Their back walls were of blank stone, and showed me nothing; moreover, although of different size and height, all were attached together, and also to the house. I skirted the rear, and turned the corner. Still no window, but before me stretched an asphalted court-yard. Peering round the second corner, I saw into the hospital's kitchen, through the open back door. It was lighted up, and a comfortable fire burned in a large stove, before which stood a covered spit. A wrinkled old woman sat before a table kneading some pastry with her fingers. An old, grey-bearded man sat in a distant corner, his knees crossed, his arms folded. He was smoking a pipe, and the light glistened on his bald pate. It made rather a pretty picture, that kitchen, with its Darby and Joan interior. I considered it a while, and then glanced along the face of the mysterious sheds, only once more to be baffled. It consisted of a blank wall, pierced only with an occasional padlocked door.