midnight
And while she returned to her room with sobs that he heard , he scaled over the wall and , in coming out of the darkness of the foliage , found himself on the deserted road , white with lunar rays . At this first separation , he suffered less than she , because he was going , because it was he that the morrow , full of uncertainty , awaited . While he walked on the road , powdered and clear , the powerful charm of change , of travel , dulled his sensitiveness ; almost without any precise thought , he looked at his shadow , which the moon made clear and harsh , marching in front of him . And the great Gizune dominated impassibly everything , with its cold and spectral air , in all this white radiance of midnight . The parting day , good-byes to friends here and there ; joyful wishes of former soldiers returned from the regiment . Since the morning , a sort of intoxication or of fever , and , in front of him , everything unthought-of in life . Arrochkoa , very amiable on that last day , had offered to drive him in a wagon to Saint-Jean-de-Luz , and had arranged to go at sunset , in order to arrive there just in time for the night train .