There did not seem any excuse just then for prolonging this interview. Wolf’s mind hurried backwards and forwards like a rat trying to find a hole into a pantry. He thought, “Would they let her show me the way to the Three Peewits?” and then immediately afterwards he thought, “They’ll send the boy, and I’ll never get rid of him!”

In the end he went off with an abruptness that was almost rude. He patted Lob on the head, nodded at the stonecutter, plunged into the eyes of Gerda as a diver plunges into water, and strode away down Chequers Street.

It was not long before he was seated at a spotless white cloth in the commercial dining-room of the famous West Country inn. In front of him rose a massive mahogany sideboard, which served as a sort of sacred pedestal for the ancient silver plate of three generations of sagacious landlords. In the centre of this silver were two symbolic objects⁠—an immense uncut ham, adorned with a white paper frill, and a large half-eaten apple-tart.