nearly midnight
I asked Adolph how and why I had been summoned ; but he knew nothing more than myself , except that he had visited the sorceress at between nine and ten that evening , that she had only spoken to him for an instant , but ordered him to go at once and find his friend , _ the American _ , whom he had falsely introduced some months before as the English baron . He had been irresistibly impressed with the necessity of obedience , though it would break in upon his own arrangements for the later evening , -LRB- which included an hour at the Chateau Rouge ;-RRB- had picked up a _ coupé _ , looked in for me at two or three places where he thought me most likely to be at that hour in the evening , and had found me at Very 's , as related . What the sorceress could possibly want of me , he had no more idea than myself ; but he reminded me that she had hinted at the possible necessity of sending for me at no distant period , and I remembered the fact too well to need the reminder . `` It was nearly midnight when we drove down the Rue St. Denis , turned into La Reynie Ogniard , and drew up at the antiquated door I had once entered nearly three months earlier . We entered as before , rang the bell as before , and were admitted into the inner room by the same slattern girl . I remember at this moment one impression which this person made upon me -- that she did not wash so often as four times a year , and that the _ same old dirt _ was upon her face that had been crusted there at the time of my previous visit . There seemed no change in the room , except that _ two _ tapers , and each larger than the one I had previously seen , were burning upon the table .