The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Lock and Key Library by Julian Hawthorne, Ed.: stories, when carefully sifted of all exaggerations of flying
conjecture, had settled themselves into something like this: The
Lehfeldts had retired to rest at a quarter before ten, as was their
custom. They had seen Lieschen go into her bedroom for the night,
and had themselves gone to sleep with unclouded minds. From this
peaceful security they were startled early in the morning by the
appalling news of the calamity which had fallen on them.
Incredulous at first, as well they might be, and incapable of
believing in a ruin so unexpected and so overwhelming, they
imagined some mistake, asserting that Lieschen was in her own room.
Into that room they rushed, and there the undisturbed bed, and the
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