While engrossed in an ancient account of the sinister death of a student obsessed with his own hair, a man leans down to absently pet his dog oblivious of the true nature of the creature crouching beside him.
One of the earliest stories from the Master of Horror - Edgar Allan Poe - The Fall of the House of Usher tells the tale of Roderick and Madeline Usher, ailing siblings who inhabit a haunting mansion that is, as they are, slowly deteriorating.