 When some of them let loose vicious comments about his wife's snobbish tastes and his out-of-control daughters' recent troubles with the law, it is too much for Ned to take and he flees.The skies darken and rain begins to fall.Amid a downpour at sunset, a shivering, limping Ned staggers home; the tennis court where his daughters were supposedly playing is in disrepair, and his house is locked and deserted, with several windows broken.