twelve o'clock
`` You see , sir , '' he said , `` this is a very peculiar coast . We 'd be all right if we were once out , but getting away from it in a cockle-shell like that -- well , to be frank , sir , it wants doing . '' I left Captain Goyles with the assurance that he would watch the weather as a mother would her sleeping babe ; it was his own simile , and it struck me as rather touching . I saw him again at twelve o'clock ; he was watching it from the window of the `` Chain and Anchor . '' At five o'clock that evening a stroke of luck occurred ; in the middle of the High Street I met a couple of yachting friends , who had had to put in by reason of a strained rudder . I told them my story , and they appeared less surprised than amused . Captain Goyles and the two men were still watching the weather .