The Damned by Algernon Blackwood

“I’m over forty, Frances, and rather set in my ways,” I said good-naturedly, ready to yield if she insisted that our going together on the visit involved her happiness. “My work is rather heavy just now too, as you know. The question is, could I work there—with a lot of unassorted people in the house?”
“Mabel doesn’t mention any other people, Bill,” was my sister’s rejoinder. “I gather she’s alone—as well as lonely.”