nearly nine o'clock
`` You need not hurry , '' said Mrs. Yeobright . `` It will be better not to get there till after dusk , and then nobody will notice you . Come back here to supper , if it is not too late . '' It was nearly nine o'clock when he began to ascend the vale towards Mistover ; but the long days of summer being at their climax , the first obscurity of evening had only just begun to tan the landscape . At this point of his journey Christian heard voices , and found that they proceeded from a company of men and women who were traversing a hollow ahead of him , the tops only of their heads being visible . He paused and thought of the money he carried . It was almost too early even for Christian seriously to fear robbery ; nevertheless he took a precaution which ever since his boyhood he had adopted whenever he carried more than two or three shillings upon his person -- a precaution somewhat like that of the owner of the Pitt Diamond when filled with similar misgivings .