midnight
` No young woman in the Lake country would think of being without a waterproof . ' Mary was duly provided , and with the help of the groom put herself into a snug little tartan Inverness , while Hartfield sent the cart spinning along twelve miles an hour . They were at Fellside before the storm developed its full power , but the sky was leaden , the landscape dull and blotted , the atmosphere heavy and stifling . The thunder grumbled hoarsely , far away yonder in the wild gorges of Borrowdale ; and Mary and her husband made up their minds that the tempest would come before midnight . Lady Maulevrier was suffering from the condition of the atmosphere . She had gone to bed , prostrate with a neuralgic headache , and had given orders that no one but her maid should go near her . So Lord Hartfield and his wife dined by themselves , in the room where Mary had eaten so many uninteresting dinners _ tête-à-tête _ with Fräulein ; and in spite of the storm which howled , pelted , and lightened every now and then , Mary felt as if she were in Paradise .