English Summer by Raymond Chandler

I don't remember what time it was when I got back to the Crandalls' cottage. I had to put a time on it afterward, for a reason, but I never really knew. The English summer afternoons last, like the English themselves, forever. I knew that Old Bessie was back because I could hear her humming monotone in the kitchen, like a fly caught in a pane of glass.

Perhaps even the almost infinite hour of tea had not been laid away.