Billy gets off the train a 9:00 and it is a cold starry night.
Billy - "Excuse me, but is there a fairly cheap hotel not too far away from here."
The porter pointed down the road
Porter - "Try the bell and dragon, they might take you in. Its a quarter of a mile along the other side."
Billy - "Thank you"
Billy picked u his suitcase and started walking to the bell and dragon.
Billy saw one house that was lit up with a sign that said "Bed and breakfast"
Billy looked through the window.
Billy turned togo the pub but he saw the sign flashing.
Billy walked up the steps to the front door and pressed the bell.
Before billy took his finger off of the button a woman opened the door smiling.
Women - "Please come in" and stepped aside holding the door open.
Billy - “I saw the notice in the window.” 
Women - “Yes, I know.” 
Billy - “I was wondering about a room.”
Women - “It's all ready for you, my dear.” 
Billy - “I was on my way to The Bell and Dragon, but the notice in your window just happened to catch my eye.”
Women - “My dear boy, why don't you come in out of the cold?”
Billy - “How much do you charge?” 
Women - “Five and sixpence a night, including breakfast. If that is too much then perhaps I can reduce it just a tiny bit. Do you desire an egg for breakfast? Eggs are expensive at the moment. It would be sixpence less without the egg.”
Billy - “Five and sixpence is fine, I should like very much to stay here.” 
Women - “I knew you would. Do come in.”
Billy took off his hat and stepped in.
Women - “Just hang it there, and let me help you with your coat.”
Women - “We have it all to ourselves.”
The women smiled at him over her shoulder as she led the way upstairs. 
Women - “You see, it isn’t very often I have the pleasure of taking a visitor into my little nest.” 
Billy - “I should've thought you’d be simply swamped with applicants.”
Women - “Oh, I am, my dear, I am, ofcourse I am. But the trouble is that I'm inclined to be just a teeny weeny bit choosy and particular – if you see what I mean.”
Billy - “Ah, yes.”
Women - “But I’m always ready. Everything is always ready day and night in this house just on the off-chance that an acceptable young gentleman will come along. And it is such a pleasure, my dear, such a very great pleasure when now and again I open the door and I see someone standing there who is just exactly right.”
The women stopped halfway up the stairs and turned and looked at Billy.
Women - “Like you.”
The women's blue eyes travelled slowly all the way down the length of Billy's body, to his feet, and then up again.
They got to the first floor.
Women - “This floor is mine.” 
They got to the second floor.
Women - “And this one is all yours. Here’s your room.  I do hope you’ll like it.”
She took him into a small but charming front bedroom, switching on the light as she went in.
Women - “The morning sun comes right in the window, Mr Perkins. It is Mr Perkins, isn’t it?”
Billy - “No, It’s Weaver.”
Women - “Mr Weaver. How nice. I’ve put awaterbottle between the sheets to air them out, Mr Weaver. It’s such a comfort to have a hot water-bottle in a strange bed with clean sheets, don’t you agree? And you may light the gas fire at any time if you feel chilly.”
Billy - “Thank you, Thank you ever so much.”
Billy noticed that the bedspread had been taken off the bed and that the bedclothes had been neatly turned back on one side, all ready for someone to get in.
Women - “I’m so glad you appeared, I was beginning to get worried.”
Billy - “That’s all right, You mustn’t worry about me.”
Billy put his suitcase on the chair and started to open it.
Women - “And what about supper, my dear? Did you manage to get anything to eat before you came here?” 
Billy - “I’m not a bit hungry, thank you, I think I’ll just go to bed as soon as possible because tomorrow I’ve got to get up rather early and report to the office.”
Women - “Very well, then. I’ll leave you now so that you can unpack. But before you go to bed, would you be kind enough to pop into the sitting-room on the ground floor and sign the book? Everyone has to do that because it’s the law of the land, and we don’t want to go breaking any laws at this stage in the proceedings, do we?”
The women walked out of the room quickly, waving and then closed the door.
Billy unpacked his suitcase, washed his hands and went into the living room.
Billy saw the guestbook open and started to read the guests.
Billy thought that he recognised the names, Christopher Mulholland and Gregory Temple.
The woman walked up behind him.
Woman - “Such charming boys”
Billy - “They sound somehow familiar.”
Woman - “They do? How interesting.”
Billy - “I’m almost positive I’ve heard those names before somewhere. Isn’t that queer? Maybe it was in the newspapers. They weren’t famous in any way, were they? I mean famous cricketers or footballers or something like that?”
The woman put the tea tray on the low table in front of the sofa.
Woman - “Famous, Oh no, I don’t think they were famous. But they were extraordinarily handsome, both of them, I can promise you that. They were tall and young and handsome, my dear, just exactly like you.”
Billy looked at the book.
Billy - “Look here, This last entry is over two years old.”
Woman -  “It is?”
Billy - “Yes, indeed. And Christopher Mulholland’s is nearly a year before that  more than three years ago.”
The woman shook her head.
Women - “Dear me,“I would never have thought it. How time does fly away from us all, doesn’t it, Mr Wilkins?” 
Billy - “It’s Weaver,W-e-a-v-e-r.”
The woman sat down on the sofa and cried.
Woman - “Oh, ofcourse it is! How silly of me. I do apologise. In one ear and out the other, that’s me, Mr Weaver.”
Billy - “You know something? Something that’s really quite extraordinary about all this?”
Woman - “No, dear, I don’t.”
Billy - “Well, you see – both of these names, Mulholland and Temple, I not only seem to remember each one of them separately, so to speak, but somehow or other, in some peculiar way, they both appear to be sort of connected together as well. As though they were both famous for the same sort of thing, if you see what I mean – like … like Dempsey and Tunney, for example, or Churchill and Roosevelt.”
Woman - “How amusing, But come over here now, dear, and sit down beside me on the sofa and I’ll give you a nice cup of tea and a ginger biscuit before you go to bed.” 
Billy watched the woman as she fussed about with cups and saucers.
Billy - “I’m almost positive it was in the newspapers I saw them, I’ll think of it in a second. I’m sure I will.”
Billy - “Now wait a minute, wait just a minute. Mulholland ... Christopher Mulholland ... wasn’t that the name of the Eton schoolboy who was on awalking-tour through the West Country, and then all of a sudden ...”
Woman - “Milk? And sugar?”
Billy - “Yes, please. And then all of a sudden ...”
Woman - “Eton schoolboy? “Oh no, my dear, that can’t possibly be right because my Mr Mulholland was certainly not an Eton schoolboy when he came to me. He was a Cambridge undergraduate. Come over here now and sit next to me and warm yourself in front of this lovely fire. Come on. Your tea’s all ready for you.”
The woman patted the empty place beside her on the sofa, and she sat there smiling at Billy and waiting for him to come 380 over.
Billy crossed the room slowly and sat down on the edge of the sofa. 
The woman placed his teacup on the table in front of him.
Woman - “There we are, How nice and cosy this is, isn’t it?”
They both started sipping their tea and didn't speak for a minute. But the woman was looking at Billy.
Woman - “Mr Mulholland was a great one for his tea, Never in my life have I seen anyone drink as much tea as dear, sweet Mr Mulholland.”
Billy - “I suppose he left fairly recently.”
Woman - “Left? “But my dear boy, he never left. He’s still here. Mr Temple is also here. They’re on the third floor, both of them together.”
Billy slowly put his cup down on the table.
The woman smiled at Billy and put her hand on his knee.
Woman - “How old are you, my dear?”
Billy - “Seventeen.”
Woman - “Seventeen! Oh, it’s the perfect age! Mr Mulholland was also seventeen. But I think he was a trifle shorter than you are, in fact I’m sure he was, and his teeth weren’t quite so white. You have the most beautiful teeth, Mr Weaver, did you know that?”
Billy - “They’re not as good as they look, “They’ve got simply masses of fillings in them at the back.”
Woman - “Mr Temple, of course, was a little older, Mr Temple, of course, was a little older”
Billy - “A what?”
Woman - “His skin was just like a baby’s.”
Billy took a sip of his tea and then put it back down in the saucer.
Billy waited for her to say something and stared into the corner of the room.
Billy - “That parrot, You know something? It had me completely fooled when I first saw it through the window from the street. I could have sworn it was alive.”
Woman - “Alas, no longer.”
Billy - “It’s most terribly clever the way it’s been done, It doesn’t look in the least bit dead. Who did it?”
Woman - “I did.”
Billy - “You did?”
Woman - “Of course, and have you met my little Basil as well?”
The women looked at the dachshund.
Billy touched the dogs back and it was cold.
Billy - “Good gracious me, How absolutely fascinating.”
Billy stared at the woman.
Billy - “It must be most awfully difficult to do a thing like that.”
Woman - “Not in the least, I stuff all my little pets myself when they pass away. Will you have another cup of tea?”
Billy - “No, thank you”
Woman - “You did sign the book, didn’t you?”
Billy - “Oh, yes.”
Woman - “That’s good. Because later on, if I happen to forget what you were called, then I can always come down here and look it up. I still do that almost every day with Mr Mulholland and Mr . . .Mr...” 
Billy - “Temple, Gregory Temple. Excuse my asking, but haven’t there been any other guests here except them in the last two or three years?”
The woman looked at him in the corner of her eye.
Woman - “No, my dear, only you."