I was let in by a man in livery; who, however, in manners and appearance, looked much more like a workman in disguise than a footman.

He had a very suspicious eye, and he fixed it on me unpleasantly when I handed him my card.
I was shown into a morning-room exactly like other morning-rooms in country houses.
After a long delay the doctor came in, with scientific butchers' sleeves on his arms, and an apron tied round his portly waist.

He apologized for coming down in his working dress, and said everything that was civil and proper about the pleasure of unexpectedly seeing me again so soon.

There was something rather preoccupied, I thought, in those brightly resolute eyes of his; but I naturally attributed it to the engrossing influence of his scientific inquiries.

He was evidently not at all taken in by my story about coming to Barkingham to fish; but he saw, as well as I did, that it would do to keep up appearances, and contrived to look highly interested immediately in my parchment-book.