John Ingerfield, of Lavender Wharf, after walking two-thirds of Creek
Lane, muttering to himself with his eyes on the ground, stops in the
middle of the road and laughs; and one small boy, who tells the story
to his dying day, sees him and hears him, and runs home at the top of
his speed with the wonderful news, and is conscientiously slapped by
his mother for telling lies.

All that day Anne works like a heroine, John helping her, and
occasionally getting in the way. By night she has her little
hospital prepared and three beds already up and occupied; and, all
now done that can be done, she and John go upstairs to his old rooms
above the counting-house.

John ushers her into them with some misgiving, for by contrast with
the house at Bloomsbury they are poor and shabby. He places her in
the arm-chair near the fire, begging her to rest quiet, and then
assists his old housekeeper, whose wits, never of the strongest, have
been scared by the day's proceeding, to lay the meal.

Anne's eyes follow him as he moves about the room. Perhaps here,
where all the real part of his life has been passed, he is more his
true self than amid the unfamiliar surroundings of fashion; perhaps
this simpler frame shows him to greater advantage; but Anne wonders
how it is she has never noticed before that he is a well-set,
handsome man. Nor, indeed, is he so very old-looking. Is it a trick
of the dim light, or what? He looks almost young. But why should he
not look young, seeing he is only thirty-six, and at thirty-six a man
is in his prime? Anne wonders why she has always thought of him as
an elderly person.