midnight
When she forced him to make appointments he sent telegrams to her at the last moment to put himself off ; and his landlady -LRB- the first three months of his appointment he was spending in rooms -RRB- had orders to say he was out when Mildred called . She would waylay him in the street and , knowing she had been waiting about for him to come out of the hospital for a couple of hours , he would give her a few charming , friendly words and bolt off with the excuse that he had a business engagement . He grew very skilful in slipping out of the hospital unseen . Once , when he went back to his lodgings at midnight , he saw a woman standing at the area railings and suspecting who it was went to beg a shake-down in Ramsden 's rooms ; next day the landlady told him that Mildred had sat crying on the doorsteps for hours , and she had been obliged to tell her at last that if she did not go away she would send for a policeman . `` I tell you , my boy , '' said Ramsden , `` you 're jolly well out of it . Harry says that if he 'd suspected for half a second she was going to make such a blooming nuisance of herself he 'd have seen himself damned before he had anything to do with her . '' Philip thought of her sitting on that doorstep through the long hours of the night .