midnight
Sometimes the light played on the white folds of Antonina 's dress ; sometimes over the bright surface of Hermanric 's cuirass , which he had removed and laid by his side on the ground ; sometimes over his sword , and his hands , as they rested on it ; but it was not sufficiently powerful or lasting to illuminate the room , the walls and corners of which it left in almost complete darkness . The thunder still pealed from without , but the rain and wind had partially lulled . The night hours had moved on more swiftly than our narrative of the events that marked them . It was now midnight . No sound within the room reached Antonina 's ear but the quick rattling of the door-latch , shaken in its socket by the wind . As one by one the moments journeyed slowly onward , it made its harsh music with as monotonous a regularity as though it were moved by their progress , and kept pace with their eternal march . Gradually the girl found herself listening to this sharp , discordant sound , with all the attention she could have bestowed at other times on the ripple of a distant rivulet or the soothing harmony of a lute , when , just as it seemed adapting itself most easily to her senses , it suddenly ceased , and the next instant a gust of wind , like that which had rushed through the open door on the breaking of the rotten bar , waved her hair about her face and fluttered the folds of her light , loose dress .