nine o'clock
Lawyer Peabody wired that Captain Cyrus Whittaker was at his home in Ostable , sick in bed , and threatened with pneumonia . Captain Cy , hurrying homeward in response to the attorney 's former telegram , had reached Boston the day of the blizzard . He had taken the train for Bayport that afternoon . The train had reached Ostable after nine o'clock that night , but could get no farther . The captain , burning with fever and torn by chills , had wallowed through the drifts to his lawyer 's home and collapsed on his doorstep . Now he was very ill and , at times , delirious . For two weeks he lay , fighting off the threatened attack of pneumonia .