six o'clock
Good-by . '' And Madeleine strode down the street as if the furies pursued her . Madeleine was spared the ordeal of confession ; it was six weeks before she saw her husband again . He telegraphed at six o'clock that he had a small-pox patient and could not subject her to the risk of contagion . The disease most dreaded in San Francisco had arrived some time before and the pest house outside the city limits was already crowded . The next day yellow flags appeared before several houses . Before a week passed they had multiplied all over the city .