one o'clock
More insistent than the roar of the surf , I hear the humming of great angry mosquitoes , and I try to figure out what I should do if I came down with appendicitis and no surgeon within a thousand miles . Lucy chose her thoughts as she would have selected neckties , choosing the pretty ones , tossing the ugly ones aside and never thinking of them again , or , for that matter , of the bill for the pretty neckties that would be sent to her husband . Only very great matters , such as love and death , could have occupied her mind against her will . Toward one o'clock the dance became hilarious . One or two men had the good sense to go home , two or three others had not . One of them -- the King boy -- made quite a nuisance of himself , and to revenge himself for a snub -LRB- greatly exaggerated by the alcoholic mind -RRB- , sought and found the hotel switchboard and in the midst of a fox trot shut off all the lights . But the music went right on , and so did many of the dancers .