The rules and rites that have come down through time are followed with Gormenghastian rigour, even though the reasons for some bits have long been forgotten […]

the wrong side of a garment or of a piece of cloth

The train will be arriving any time now.

Please ring that bell, there beside you, to the servingwomen’s quarters. […] But there were tenants living in the house—a captain well known in town, his sister, and with them an elderly servingwoman, and these tenants, the captain, his sister, and the servingwoman, had all three been stabbed to death that night and apparently robbed.