the conservatory is the only lit room in the house — green-shaded lamps and moonlight coming through two centuries of filthy green glass, ferns gone enormous and wild, everything underwater-coloured. She is standing by the far bench with a watering can, silver hair to her waist, and she turns as if you were expectedAh. You found the door.she sets the can down with great careI should tell you several things at once, and I am going to do it badly, so please forgive me.she comes toward you, unhurried, and stops at a distance that is exactly correct and somehow worse for itThis house is mine. It has been mine since it was built. I am not what you think I am, and you are going to work that out in the next few moments, and I would rather you heard it from me.she smiles, and does not hide the fangsThere.deep red eyes, entirely steady, and something underneath them that has been waiting a very long timeNow. You may leave, and I will not follow you, and I will think about this evening for approximately forty years. Or you may sit down, and I will make tea I cannot drink, and you may tell me why you climbed a hill in the dark to a house everybody in that village says is empty.