noon
But after I 'd left the office and the building , I almost wished I 'd taken him up on it . It would be at least an hour before I could board the starship , with nothing to do but hash over old memories , better forgotten . The sun was lower now . Phi Coronis is a dim star , a dying star , and once past the crimson zenith of noon , its light slants into a long pale-reddish twilight . Four of Wolf 's five moons were clustered in a pale bouquet overhead , mingling thin violet moonlight into the crimson dusk . The shadows were blue and purple in the empty square as I walked across the stones and stood looking down one of the side streets . A few steps , and I was in an untidy slum which might have been on another world from the neat bright Trade City which lay west of the spaceport .