a few minutes before eight o'clock
And as he pulled , his very heart seemed parched with nervousness . Was it real that he was going to her , or only some fantastic trick of Fate , a dream from which he would wake to find himself alone again ? He passed the dove-cot at last , and kept on till he could round into the backwater and steal up under cover to the poplar . He arrived a few minutes before eight o'clock , turned the boat round , and waited close beneath the bank , holding to a branch , and standing so that he could see the path . If a man could die from longing and anxiety , surely Lennan must have died then ! All wind had failed , and the day was fallen into a wonderful still evening . Gnats were dancing in the sparse strips of sunlight that slanted across the dark water , now that the sun was low .