eleven o'clock
W -- neither understood nor relished all this . But the more angry and mystified he became , the louder laughed the company and the freer became their jests . At last , in a passion , he swore at us lustily , and leaving the barroom , in high dudgeon , took his horse from the stable and rode off . It was past eleven o'clock . The night was cold , and a ride of two miles made W -- sober enough to understand that he had been rather drunk , and was still a good deal `` in for it ; '' and that it would n't exactly do for his wife to see him just as he was . So he rode a mile past his house , -- and then back again , at a slow trot , concluding that by this time the good woman was fast asleep . And so she was .