reading Anna Maria Ortese

I didn't understand much of what I read in the short story La casa del bosco, but I did enjoy this sentence:

Si è parlato anche, con una certa compiacenza, dell'Apocalisse, e i Cavalieri del Cielo spesso hanno animato le notti dei più infelici che spiavvano dietro i vetri di New York, o Londra o Lisbona; ma il mio idraulico, non si è mai veduto.

I'll even give you a late-night translation:

There was also talk, with a certain satisfaction, of the Apocalypse, and the Horsemen of Heaven often stirred the nights of the most unhappy who would peer from behind the windows of New York, or London, or Lisbon; but my plumber was never to be seen.

The rest of the short story wasn't much clearer.