a
quarter past one
`` You extravagant puss , you ! dear , dear , who 'd have a daughter ? '' Isabel gave him a rather hasty though warm embrace -LRB- she was terribly afraid that his conscience would prick him and that he would take the second note away again -RRB- , and flew out of the window faster than she had come in . The clock was striking a quarter past one , and she had to scamper down to Chapman 's to buy the dress , and a length of lilac ribbon for a sash , and a packet of bronze hairpins , and be back in time to lay the cloth for two o'clock lunch . If it is only for idle hands that Satan finds mischief , he could not have had much satisfaction out of Isabel Stafford . Soon after four Mrs. Clowes stepped from her car , shook out her soft flounces , and led the way across the lawn , Lawrence Hyde in attendance . The vicarage was an old-fashioned house too large for the living , its long front , dotted with rosebushes , rising up honey-coloured against the clear green of a beech grove .