five o'clock
And then it was that the worthy clergyman came to discover that to put three grown-up women into the same house , and to expect them to live together in peace and amity , is about as foolhardy an experiment as to shut up a bulldog , a parrot , and a tom-cat in a cupboard , and expect them to behave like so many lambs . It is now rather more than a year since Vera Nevill came to live in her brother-in-law 's house . Let me waste no further time , but introduce her to you at once . The time of the year is October -- the time of day is five o'clock . In the vicarage drawing-room the afternoon tea-table has just been set out , and the fire just lit , for it is chilly ; but one of the long French windows leading into the garden is still open , and through it Vera steps into the room . There is a background of brown and yellow foliage behind her , across the garden , all aglow with the crimson light of the western sky , against which the outlines of her figure , in its close-fitting dark dress , stand out clearly and distinctly . Vera has the figure , not of a sylph , but of a goddess ; it is the absolute perfection of the female form .