1 Steps came running along the outer passage; the key turned, Bessie and Abbot entered.
2 Leah, make a little hot negus and cut a sandwich or two: here are the keys of the storeroom.
3 And she produced from her pocket a most housewifely bunch of keys, and delivered them to the servant.
4 Nor was it unwarranted: in five minutes more the grating key, the yielding lock, warned me my watch was relieved.
5 First she went to see if the hall-door was fastened; having taken the key from the lock, she led the way upstairs.
6 I experienced a strange feeling as the key grated in the lock, and the sound of his retreating step ceased to be heard.
7 I sought the key of the side-door in the kitchen; I sought, too, a phial of oil and a feather; I oiled the key and the lock.
8 He still waited; he held a key in his hand: approaching one of the small, black doors, he put it in the lock; he paused, and addressed me again.
9 For a moment they stood grouped together at the other extremity of the gallery, conversing in a key of sweet subdued vivacity: they then descended the staircase almost as noiselessly as a bright mist rolls down a hill.
10 The crimson curtain hung before the arch: slight as was the separation this drapery formed from the party in the adjoining saloon, they spoke in so low a key that nothing of their conversation could be distinguished beyond a soothing murmur.
11 It is excusable, for she had a hard life of it: but still it was dangerous; for when Mrs. Poole was fast asleep after the gin and water, the mad lady, who was as cunning as a witch, would take the keys out of her pocket, let herself out of her chamber, and go roaming about the house, doing any wild mischief that came into her head.
12 Mr. Rivers came up as, having seen the classes, now numbering sixty girls, file out before me, and locked the door, I stood with the key in my hand, exchanging a few words of special farewell with some half-dozen of my best scholars: as decent, respectable, modest, and well-informed young women as could be found in the ranks of the British peasantry.