Part I, Chapter 1 Summary

The narrator is talking to an inspector about a boarder who has lived at her boarding house for twelve years. She describes to the inspector how this young man arrived on her doorstep carrying an enormous suitcase. He is awkward and painfully shy. She interrogates the young man to help her decide whether or not he was worthy to live in her boarding house.

Her first impression is favorable. She thinks he might be a law clerk or a solicitor. He wears a too-big black overcoat on his scrawny frame and a large black hat over his fuzzy blond hair. He tells her that he is a painter, and she is not impressed by this because she doesn't think painting pictures is steady, honest work, but he shows her his bank book, which has a large sum in it...