“Mis‑ter and Miss‑us Podsnap!”

“My dear,” says Mr. Veneering to Mrs. Veneering, with an air of much friendly interest, while the door stands open, “the Podsnaps.”

A too, too smiling large man, with a fatal freshness on him, appearing with his wife, instantly deserts his wife and darts at Twemlow with:

“How do you do? So glad to know you. Charming house you have here. I hope we are not late. So glad of the opportunity, I am sure!”

When the first shock fell upon him, Twemlow twice skipped back in his neat little shoes and his neat little silk stockings of a bygone fashion, as if impelled to leap over a sofa behind him; but the large man closed with him and proved too strong.