eleven o'clock in the morning
He had suffered her to make her first appearance on any stage without the comfort of his voice or the applause of his hand ; saying to himself that the man who could do the more could do the less and that such an act of fortitude was a proof he should keep straight . It was not exactly keeping straight to run over to London three months later and , the hour he arrived , scramble off to Balaklava Place ; but after all he pretended only to be human and aimed in behaviour only at the heroic , never at the monstrous . The highest heroism was obviously three parts tact . He had not written to his young friend that he was coming to England and would call upon her at eleven o'clock in the morning , because it was his secret pride that he had ceased to correspond with her . Sherringham took his prudence where he could find it , and in doing so was rather like a drunkard who should flatter himself he had forsworn liquor since he did n't touch lemonade . It is a sign of how far he was drawn in different directions at once that when , on reaching Balaklava Place and alighting at the door of a small detached villa of the type of the `` retreat , '' he learned that Miss Rooth had but a quarter of an hour before quitted the spot with her mother -- they had gone to the theatre , to rehearsal , said the maid who answered the bell he had set tinkling behind a stuccoed garden-wall : when at the end of his pilgrimage he was greeted by a disappointment he suddenly found himself relieved and for the moment even saved . Providence was after all taking care of him and he submitted to Providence .