Arnold Calvert occupied rooms in Bloomsbury; pleasant old rooms in a house which had been fashioned in Georgian times. It stood in a quiet street undisturbed by the noise of traffic or the shrieking¹ of children at play. Even organ-grinders rarely came that way, as the neighbourhood was not remunerative². Consequently the house was mostly occupied by people of delicate health who disliked noise. Mrs. Varney, the landlady³, was a motherly old person with rather a hard eye. At one time she had been on the stage, and traces of that period appeared in her deliberate movements and slow voice. She always seemed as though she were reciting Shakespeare with appropriate gestures, although she had played but minor⁴ parts in the dramas of the bard⁵.