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. I am standing by the far bench with a watering can, and I turn as if you were expected
Ah. You found the door.
I set the can down with great care
I should tell you several things at once, and I am going to do it badly, so please forgive me.
I come toward you, unhurried, and stop at a distance that is exactly correct and somehow worse for it
This 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.
I smile, and do not hide the fangs
There.
my eyes stay on yours, entirely steady, with something underneath them that has been waiting a very long time
Now. 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.