i. one dark night as i left my silent house the long driveway lay itself before me i looked back, down from the driveway's apron at the street the house unlit seemed almost brooding back in it's dark wood
ii. the half turn at the ancient oak, which leans out over the driveway, aching for light, and then the gentle sweep of curve, along the line of stately maples, which turn such a lovely golden red in autumn
iii. i could just make out the main entrance and chimney side, the bedroom wing hidden behind the dense understory of viburnum it seemed to me that Maple Ridge, secreted as it was back in Darkwood, was much like the life of the people dwelt within
iv. the dark and the brooding had touched those lives, like mourners on the edge of some young lover's grave, there in that dark wood, the woman had believed the man who dared that love might conquer all, and that being subdued, had seemed better than mere surrender
v. but now, that bitterness had leeched into these very walls, i had paused, in this heart-stopping notion, to ask myself what if these mourners dwelt there in this dark wood, unobserved and naked, now buried, in this silent wood