"It's a capital suit," said he.
"Perfectly disgraceful," said she. "Look at your elbow."
"Ordinary wear and tear."
"Particularly tear." And while she was speaking Sir Peter had rubbed the worn place into a jagged hole. Sir Peter sighed. He was much attached to that tweed suit; it knew his ways, and had adapted itself to all the little eccentricities of his figure. After five years there is a certain intimacy between a man and his suit. However, there was no blinking the fact—the suit was doomed. Sir Peter's man seized the occasion for a general overhauling of his master's wardrobe, with the result that Sir Peter had to go up by an early train the next morning to consult Mr. Vance, his tailor.
Sir Peter was being measured up and down and all round him, while Mr. Vance stood by, note-book in hand, and took minutes of his case.
"A little wider round the waist, Vance, since you made my first coat for me thirty years ago."
Sir Peter was swaying on his toes, and supporting himself by a finger-tip laid on the shoulder of Vance's man.
"Not quite so long ago as that, Sir Peter."
"Must be, must be; you've been here more than thirty years."
Sir Peter prided himself on his memory, and was a stickler for the actual fact.