In this story, there is a strong sense of dread, but also one of passivity and inertia.

Both the dread and the inertia seem to come from the setting of the story, which is one of British, middle-class conventionality and comfort. Billy is served tea and cookies in the landlady’s cozy parlor, a ritual with which he is probably familiar, even if the town of Bath is strange to him. He is also soothed by his “small but charming” bedroom in the boardinghouse, and by the person of the landlady herself, who reminds him of his friends’ mothers (Lines 203-04). Her familiarity allows Billy to discount some of her odder and more alarming pronouncements as mere “dottiness,” and to write her off as a harmless eccentric (itself a British tradition).

The landlady’s hints about her eventual plans for Billy are not subtle. She reminisces over the soft skin and beauty of her two previous lodgers, both of whom happened to be young men like Billy himself. She tells Billy that he is “the perfect age,” and at one point even tells him that her two previous lodgers “never left” (Line 408).