After their enthusiastic march away from Mrs. Wadman's house, Toby and Trim "recollected their business lay the other way; so they faced about and marched up streight to Mrs. Wadman's door." Trim lifts the knocker, holds it for a minute. Bridget is behind the door "with her finger and her thumb upon the latch." Mrs. Wadman is sitting "breathless behind the window-curtain of her bed-chamber, watching their approach." "Trim! said my uncle Toby — but as he articulated the word, the minute expired, and Trim let fall the rapper." Uncle Toby whistles "Lillabullero." The door opens instantly, and Tristram says, "Let us go into the house."
Chapter 18 and Chapter 19 are blank pages, Chapter 20 begins with a large sprinkling of asterisks, and then we hear Uncle Toby saying to Mrs. Wadman: " — You shall see the very place, Madam." Mrs. Wadman blushes and blushes, and "for the sake of the unlearned reader," Tristram translates her blushes. More asterisks follow, and Toby says to Trim, " — I believe it is in the garret." Trim goes off. Returning to the sofa, Uncle Toby tells Mrs. Wadman, "You shall lay your finger upon the place." "I will not touch it, however, quoth Mrs. Wadman to herself."
The author realizes that there is a "mist which hangs upon these three pages," and he will try to dispel it and clear up everything. He asks the reader to "give me all the help you can."
There are "fifty different ends . . . for which a woman takes a husband," Tristram says, illustrating his point by the "imagery" of Slawkenbergius: a string of asses laden with panniers containing different things. One has empty bottles, the second tripes, the third "trunk-hose and pantofles," and so on; a lady examines the whole string of beasts until she comes to the one that carries "it." She "looks at it — considers it — samples it — measures it — stretches it." And what is it, asks the reader, but neither Slawkenbergius nor Tristram is willing to answer. "We live in a world beset on all sides with mysteries and riddles," Tristram adds soothingly.
