It was fully¹ a week before Mr. Brumley heard anything more of Lady Harman. He began to fear that this shining furry² presence would glorify³ Black Strand⁴ no more. Then came a telegram that filled him with the liveliest anticipations⁵. It was worded: "Coming see cottage Saturday afternoon Harman...."  
On Saturday morning Mr. Brumley dressed with an apparent ease and unusual care....
 
He worked rather discursively⁶ before lunch. His mind was busy picking up the ends of their previous conversation and going on with them to all sorts of bright knots, bows and elegant cats' cradling. He planned openings that might give her tempting⁷ opportunities of confidences if she wished to confide⁸, and artless remarks and questions that would make for self-betrayal if she didn't. And he thought of her, he thought of her imaginatively, this secluded⁹ rare thing so happily come to him, who was so young, so frank and fresh and so unhappily married (he was sure) to a husband at least happily mortal. Yes, dear Reader, even on that opening morning Mr. Brumley's imagination, trained very largely upon Victorian literature and belles-lettres, leapt forward to the very ending of this story.... We, of course, do nothing of the sort, our lot is to follow a more pedestrian route.... He lapsed¹⁰ into a vague series of meditations¹¹, slower perhaps but essentially¹² similar, after his temperate¹³ palatable¹⁴ lunch.
 
He was apprised¹⁵ of the arrival of his visitor by the sudden indignant yaup followed by the general subdued¹⁶ uproar¹⁷ of a motor-car outside the front door, even before Clarence, this time amazingly prompt, assaulted the bell. Then the whole house was like that poem by Edgar Allan Poe, one magnificent texture¹⁸ of clangour.
 
At the first toot of the horn Mr. Brumley had moved swiftly into the bay, and screened partly by the life-size Venus of Milo that stood in the bay window, and partly by the artistic¹⁹ curtains, surveyed the glittering vehicle. He was first aware of a vast fur coat enclosing a lean grey-headed obstinate-looking man with a diabetic complexion²⁰ who was fumbling²¹ with the door of the car and preventing Clarence's assistance. Mr. Brumley was able to remark that the gentleman's nose projected to a sharpened point, and that his thin-lipped mouth was all awry²² and had a kind of habitual²³ compression, the while that his eyes sought eagerly for the other occupant of the car. She was unaccountably invisible. Could it be that that hood²⁴ really concealed²⁵ her? Could it be?...
 
The white-faced gentleman descended²⁶, relieved himself tediously of the vast fur coat, handed it to Clarence and turned to the house. Reverentially Clarence placed the coat within the automobile²⁷ and closed the door. Still the protesting mind of Mr. Brumley refused to believe!...
 
He heard the house-door open and Mrs. Rabbit in colloquy²⁸ with a flat masculine voice. He heard his own name demanded and conceded. Then a silence, not the faintest suggestion of a feminine rustle²⁹, and then the sound of Mrs. Rabbit at the door-handle. Conviction stormed the last fastness of the disappointed author's mind.
 
"Oh damn!" he shouted with extreme fervour.
 
He had never imagined it was possible that Sir Isaac could come alone.