What mood is created in the first nine paragraphs of "The Monkey's Paw"?

Mood is defined as the way an author intends the reader to feel while reading the text. To determine the mood of a text, one must examine the author's diction and tone to determine the emotional atmosphere surrounding the events contained within.
In the first nine paragraphs of W. W. Jacobs's "The Monkey's Paw," the White family are together inside their home as they await the arrival of a guest. Significant examples of word choice in this part of the story include the following: "cold," "perils," "fatal," "grimly," "violence," "beastly," and "guilty." Each of these words has a negative connotation. Therefore, it can reasonably be inferred that the mood of this passage is somewhat negative.
However, the majority of the words used are for describing the game of chess Mr. White and his son are playing by the fireside while Mrs. White knits "placidly" nearby, just before the guest arrives. This contrast between the negative diction and the mundane scene calls into question whether the mood is truly negative.
On the one hand, one could argue that the slightly discontented mood of Mr. White foreshadows the story's mysterious events. On the other hand, one could assert that the mood of the story in these paragraphs is ambivalent at best, suggesting that Jacobs might want the reader to be slightly unaware of the dark turn the story will soon take.