hat Malcolmson, although amused,
was touched. He told her kindly how much he appreciated her interest
in him, and added:

'But, my dear Mrs. Witham, indeed you need not be concerned about me!
A man who is reading for the Mathematical Tripos has too much to think
of to be disturbed by any of these mysterious "somethings", and his
work is of too exact and prosaic a kind to allow of his having any
corner in his mind for mysteries of any kind. Harmonical Progression,
Permutations and Combinations, and Elliptic Functions have sufficient
mysteries for me!' Mrs. Witham kindly undertook to see after his
commissions, and he went himself to look for the old woman who had
been recommended to him. When he returned to the Judge's House with
her, after an interval of a couple of hours, he found Mrs. Witham
herself waiting with several men and boys carrying parcels, and an
upholsterer's man with a bed in a car, for she said, though tables and
chairs might be all very well, a bed that hadn't been aired for mayhap
fifty years was not proper for young bones to lie on. She was
evidently curious to see the inside of the house; and though
manifestly so afraid of the 'somethings' that at the slightest sound
she clutched on to Malcolmson, whom she never left for a moment, went
over the whole place.

After his examination of the house, Malcolmson decided to take up his
abode in the great dining-room, which was big enough to serve for all
his requirements; and Mrs. Witham, with the aid of the charwoman,
Mrs. Dempster, proceeded to arrange matters. When the hampers were
brought in and unpacked, Malcolmson saw that with much kind
forethought she had sent from her own kitchen sufficient provisions to
last for a few days. Before going she expressed all sorts of kind
wishes; and at the door turned and said:

'And perhaps, sir, as the room is big and draughty it might be well to
have one of those big screens put round your bed at night--though,
truth to tell, I would die myself if I were to be so shut in with all
kinds of--of "things", that put their heads round the sides, or over
the top, and look on me!' The image which she had called up was too
much for her nerves, and she fled incontinently.

Mrs. Dempster sniffed in a superior manner as the landlady
disappeared, and remarked that for her own part she wasn't afraid of
all the bogies in the kingdom.

'I'll tell you what it is, sir,' she said; 'bogies is all kinds and
sorts of things--except