five o'clock
And to be told that her career as a fashionable beauty had been a failure ! That would be the bitterest pang of all . Soon came luncheon , and Heidseck , and then an afternoon which was gayer than the morning had been , inasmuch as every one babbled and laughed more after luncheon . And then there was five o'clock tea on deck , under the striped Japanese awning , to the jingle of banjos , enlivened by the wit of black-faced minstrels , amidst wherries and canoes and gondolas , and ponderous houseboats , and snorting launches , crowding the sides of the sunlit river , in full view of the crowd yonder in front of the Red Lion , and here on this nearer bank , and all along either shore , fringing the green meadows with a gaudy border of smartly-dressed humanity . It was a gay scene , and Lesbia gave herself up to the amusement of the hour , and talked and chaffed as she had learned to talk and chaff in one brief season , holding her own against all comers . Rood Hall looked lovely when they went back to it in the gloaming , an Elizabethan pile crowned with towers . The four wings with their conical roofs , the massive projecting windows , grey stone , ruddy brickwork , lattices reflecting the sunlight , Italian terrace and blue river in the foreground , cedars and yews at the back , all made a splendid picture of an English ancestral home .