eleven
o'clock
A rough-looking man , with grizzled beard , with eyes generally bloodshot , his shoulders stooping -- naturally the miserable are always suspected where law is conscious of its injustice . Two years ago he was beset for a time with the same restlessness , and took night-walks in the same directions ; the habit wore away , however . Now it possessed him even more strongly . Between ten and eleven o'clock , when the children were in bed , he fell into abstraction , and presently , with an unexpected movement , looked up as if some one had spoken to him -- just the look of one who hears a familiar voice ; then he sighed , and took his hat and went forth . It happened sometimes when he was sitting with his friends Mr. and Mrs. Eagles ; in that case he would make some kind of excuse . The couple suspected that his business would take him to the public-house , but John never came back with a sign about him of having drunk ; of that failing he had broken himself . He went cautiously down the stone stairs , averting his face if anyone met him ; then by cross-ways he reached Gray 's Inn Road , and so westwards .