two in the morning
And Lesley was left to her own reflections . Although she went early to bed she did not sleep soon or soundly . There was not much traffic along the street in which her father lived , but the bells of St. Pancras rang out the hours and the quarters with painful tunelessness , and an occasional rumble of wheels would startle her into wakeful terror . At half-past two in the morning she heard the opening and shutting of the front door , and her father 's footsteps on the stairs as he came up to bed . There seemed to her something uncanny in these nocturnal habits . The life of a journalist , of a literary man , of anybody who did any definite work in the world at all , was quite unknown to her . She came down to breakfast at nine o'clock , feeling weary and depressed .