five minutes past eight
At Hammersmith they got out , two quite penniless travellers , and after some anxious moments found a taxi . It took them to Putney Hill . Lady Harman descended at the outer gates of her home and walked up the drive in the darkness while Mr. Brumley went on to his club and solvency again . It was five minutes past eight when he entered the hall of his club ... § 6 It had been Lady Harman 's original intention to come home before four , to have tea with her mother and to inform her husband when he returned from the city of her entirely dignified and correct disobedience to his absurd prohibitions . Then he would have bullied at a disadvantage , she would have announced her intention of dining with Lady Viping and making the various calls and expeditions for which she had arranged and all would have gone well . But you see how far accident and a spirit of enterprise may take a lady from so worthy a plan , and when at last she returned to the Victorian baronial home in Putney it was very nearly eight and the house blazed with crisis from pantry to nursery . Even the elder three little girls , who were accustomed to be kissed goodnight by their `` boofer muvver , '' were still awake and -- catching the subtle influence of the atmosphere of dismay about them -- in tears .