Good evening. Welcome to the Just Sleep podcast. I'm Tasia, your host.

Every week, I will read you an old story to help you relax

of the stressful day behind you and drift off to sleep.

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Tonight, I will be reading a Christmas ghost story.

Mr. Huffam by Hugh Walpole.

So lie down, close your eyes, and let me read you a story.

One.

Once upon a time, it doesn't matter when it was, except that it was long after the Great War.

Young Tubby Winslow was in the act of crossing Piccadilly

just below Hatchard's bookshop. It was three days before Christmas, and there had been a frost,

a thaw, and then a frost again. The roads were treacherous, traffic nervous and irresponsible,

while against the cliff-like indifference of brick and mortar,

a thin, faint snow was falling from a primrose-colored sky. Soon it would be dusk, and the lights would come out.

Then things would be more cheerful. It would, however, take more than lights to restore Tubby's cheerfulness. Rubicund

a face and alarmingly stout of body for a youth of 23. He just then the spirit of a damp

face towel. For only a week ago, Diana Lane Fox had refused to consider for a moment the

possibility of marrying him.

I like you, Tubby, she had said.

...