ten o’clock
When the fourteen persons were seated , and the usual compliments were over , Madame Hochon presented her goddaughter Agathe and Joseph . Joseph sat in his armchair all the evening , engaged in slyly studying the sixty faces which , from five o'clock until half past nine , posed for him gratis , as he afterwards told his mother . Such behavior before the aristocracy of Issoudun did not tend to change the opinion of the little town concerning him : every one went home ruffled by his sarcastic glances , uneasy under his smiles , and even frightened at his face , which seemed sinister to a class of people unable to recognize the singularities of genius . After ten o'clock , when the household was in bed , Madame Hochon kept her goddaughter in her chamber until midnight . Secure from interruption , the two women told each other the sorrows of their lives , and exchanged their sufferings . As Agathe listened to the last echoes of a soul that had missed its destiny , and felt the sufferings of a heart , essentially generous and charitable , whose charity and generosity could never be exercised , she realized the immensity of the desert in which the powers of this noble , unrecognized soul had been wasted , and knew that she herself , with the little joys and interests of her city life relieving the bitter trials sent from God , was not the most unhappy of the two . `` You who are so pious , '' she said , `` explain to me my shortcomings ; tell me what it is that God is punishing in me . ''