ten o’clock
`` Wait till it is quite dark , and we 'll play him a comedy that shall fool him finely . '' Accordingly , ten minutes later , the fishwife , with a vim that delighted the usurer , organized for the innocent porter the comedy of a _ monsieur _ who would not , out of politeness , let her accompany him to the door ; she herself with equal politeness insisting . Appearing to conduct the sham physician into the street gate she pretended that the wind had blown out of her lamp , and under pretext of relighting it she put out that of Perrache . All this racket , accompanied by exclamations and a bewildering loquacity , was so briskly carried out that the porter , if summoned before the police-court , would not have hesitated to swear that the doctor , whose arrival he had witnessed , left the house between nine and ten o'clock . When the two accomplices were thus in tranquil possession of the field of operations Madame Cardinal hung up her rabbit 's - hair shawl before the window to exclude all possible indiscretion on the part of a neighbor . In the Luxembourg quarter life quiets down early . By ten o'clock all the sounds in the house as well as those out of doors were stilled , and Cerizet declared that the moment had come to go to work ; by beginning at once they were certain that the sleeper would remain under the influence of the drug ; besides , if the booty were found at once , Madame Cardinal could , under pretence of a sudden attack on her patient , which required her to fetch a remedy from the apothecary , get the porter to open the street gate for her without suspicion .