six o'clock
He had planned an elaborate high tea for six o'clock or thereabouts , and a good roaring supper to come on about eleven . Being a bachelor of rather retiring habits , the whole of the preparations devolved upon himself and his trusty man and familiar , Robert Creedle , who did everything that required doing , from making Giles 's bed to catching moles in his field . He was a survival from the days when Giles 's father held the homestead , and Giles was a playing boy . These two , with a certain dilatoriousness which appertained to both , were now in the heat of preparation in the bake-house , expecting nobody before six o'clock . Winterborne was standing before the brick oven in his shirt-sleeves , tossing in thorn sprays , and stirring about the blazing mass with a long-handled , three-pronged Beelzebub kind of fork , the heat shining out upon his streaming face and making his eyes like furnaces , the thorns crackling and sputtering ; while Creedle , having ranged the pastry dishes in a row on the table till the oven should be ready , was pressing out the crust of a final apple-pie with a rolling-pin . A great pot boiled on the fire , and through the open door of the back kitchen a boy was seen seated on the fender , emptying the snuffers and scouring the candlesticks , a row of the latter standing upside down on the hob to melt out the grease . Looking up from the rolling-pin , Creedle saw passing the window first the timber-merchant , in his second-best suit , Mrs. Melbury in her best silk , and Grace in the fashionable attire which , in part brought home with her from the Continent , she had worn on her visit to Mrs. Charmond 's .