While shaking hands he observed that I was taller than he had
expected; and this, absurdly enough, is all I remember of the
interview, except that the room had two empty bookcases, one on
either side of the chimney-breast; that the fading of the wallpaper
above the mantelpiece had left a patch recording where a clock had
lately stood (I conjectured that it must be at Greenwich, undergoing
repairs); that Mrs. Stimcoe produced a decanter of sherry--a wine
which Miss Plinlimmon abominated--and poured her out a glassful, with
the remark that it had been twice round the world; that Miss
Plinlimmon supposed vaguely "the same happened to a lot of things in
a seaport like Falmouth;" and that somehow this led us on to Mr.
Stimcoe's delicate health, and this again to the subject of damp
sheets, and this finally to Mrs. Stimcoe's suggesting that Miss
Plinlimmon might perhaps like to have a look at my bedroom.

The bedroom assigned to me opened out of Mrs. Stimcoe's own.
("It will give him a sense of protection. A child feels the first
few nights away from home.") Though small, it was neat, and,
for a boy's wants, amply furnished; nay, it contained at least one
article of supererogation, in the shape of a razor-case on the
dressing-table. Mrs. Stimcoe swept this into her pocket with a turn
of the hand, and explained frankly that her husband, like most
scholars, was absent-minded. Here she passed two fingers slowly
across her forehead. "Even in his walks, or while dressing, his
brain wanders among the deathless compositions of Greece and Rome,
turning them into English metres--all cakes especially"--she must
have meant alcaics--"and that makes him leave things about."

I had fresh and even more remarkable evidence of Mr. Stimcoe's