There are no “diggings” in American cities.  The alternatives for small incomes are grim enough—­rooms in a boarding-house where meals are served, or in a room-house where no meals are served—­not even breakfast.  Rich people live in palaces, of course, but Jim had nothing to do with “sich-like.”  His horizon was bounded by boarding-houses and room-houses; and, owing to the necessary irregularity of his meals and hours, he took the latter.

It was a large, gaunt-looking place in a side street, with dirty windows and a creaking iron gate, but the rooms were large, and the one he selected and paid for in advance was on the top floor.  The landlady looked gaunt and dusty as the house, and quite as old.  Her eyes were green and faded, and her features large.

“Waal,” she twanged, with her electrifying Western drawl, “that’s the room, if you like it, and that’s the price I said.  Now, if you want it, why, just say so; and if you don’t, why, it don’t hurt me any.”

Jim wanted to shake her, but he feared the clouds of long-accumulated dust in her clothes, and as the price and size of the room suited him, he decided to take it.

“Anyone else on this floor?” he asked.

She looked at him queerly out of her faded eyes before she answered.

“None of my guests ever put such questions to me before,” she said; “but I guess you’re different.  Why, there’s no one at all but an old gent that’s stayed here every bit of five years.  He’s over thar,” pointing to the end of the passage.

“Ah!  I see,” said Shorthouse feebly.  “So I’m alone up here?”

“Reckon you are, pretty near,” she twanged out, ending the conversation abruptly by turning her back on her new “guest,” and going slowly and deliberately downstairs.

The newspaper work kept Shorthouse out most of the night.  Three times a week he got home at 1 a.m., and three times at 3 a.m.  The room proved comfortable enough, and he paid for a second week.  His unusual hours had so far prevented his meeting any inmates of the house, and not a sound had been heard from the “old gent” who shared the floor with him.  It seemed a very quiet house.

One night, about the middle of the second week, he came home tired after a long day’s work.  The lamp that usually stood all night in the hall had burned itself out, and he had to stumble upstairs in the dark.  He made considerable noise in doing so, but nobody seemed to be disturbed.  The whole house was utterly quiet, and probably everybody was asleep.  There were no lights under any of the doors.  All was in darkness.  It was after two o’clock.

After reading some English letters that had come during the day, and dipping for a few minutes into a book, he became drowsy and got ready for bed.  Just as he was about to get in between the sheets, he stopped for a moment and listened.  There rose in the night, as he did so, the sound of steps somewhere in the house below.  Listening attentively, he heard that it was somebody coming upstairs—­a heavy tread, and the owner taking no pains to step quietly.  On it came up the stairs, tramp, tramp, tramp—­evidently the tread of a big man, and one in something of a hurry.