"You can leave the hat with me."
She moved slowly away. "Stop!" he cried; "have you got such a thing as a band-box?"
"I think I might 'ave, sir; if I could lay my 'and on it."
"Lay your hand on it, then, and bring it to me."
She brought it. An enormous band-box, but brown, which was a good colour. He lowered the hat into it with care and shut the lid on it, reverently, as if he were committing some sacred emblem to its shrine.
He sat at his writing-table, tried to work and accomplished nothing. His heart waited for the stroke of nine.
At nine there came to his summons the little, lean, brown man, Rose's uncle. Eldred, who was a groom, was attired with excessive horsiness. He refused to come further into the room than its threshold, where he stood at attention, austerely servile, and respectfully despotic.
The interview in all points resembled Tanqueray's encounter with Mrs. Eldred; except that the little groom, who knew his world, was even more firmly persuaded that the gentleman was playing with his Rose.
"And we can't 'ave that, sir," said Eldred.
"You're not going to have it."