There was no fireplace, no
furniture; there was nothing: besides the cobwebs
and the dust, the four men were the only objects
there which were not a part of the structure.
Strange enough they looked in the yellow light
of the candle. The one who had so reluctantly
alighted was especially spectacular--he might have
been called sensational. He was of middle age,
heavily built, deep-chested and broad-shouldered.
Looking at his figure, one would have said that he
had a giant's strength; at his features, that he
would use it like a giant. He was clean-shaven, his
hair rather closely cropped and grey. His low fore-
head was seamed with wrinkles above the eyes, and
over the nose these became vertical. The heavy black
brows followed the same law, saved from meeting
only by an upward turn at what would otherwise
have been the point of contact. Deeply sunken be-
neath these glowed in the obscure light a pair of
eyes of uncertain colour, but obviously enough too
small. There was something forbidding in their ex-
pression, which was not bettered by the cruel mouth
and wide jaw. The nose was well enough, as noses
go; one does not expect much of noses. All that was
sinister in the man's face seemed accentuated by an
unnatural pallor--he appeared altogether bloodless.
The appearance of the other men was sufficiently
commonplace: they were such persons as one meets
and forgets that he met.
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