ten o'clock
Humanly speaking , it ca n't be done . Where , then , was the object of this so sedulously dissembled interest ? Lanyard was n't slow to read this riddle to his satisfaction -- in as far , that is , as it was satisfactory to feel still more certain that Roddy 's quarry was another than himself . Despite the lateness of the hour , which had by now turned ten o'clock , the restaurant had a dozen tables or so in the service of guests pleasantly engaged in lengthening out an agreeable evening with dessert , coffee , liqueurs and cigarettes . The majority of these were in couples , but at a table one removed from Roddy 's sat a party of three ; and Lanyard noticed , or fancied , that the man from Scotland Yard turned his newspaper only during lulls in the conversation in this quarter . Of the three , one might pass for an American of position and wealth : a man of something more than sixty years , with an execrable accent , a racking cough , and a thin , patrician cast of features clouded darkly by the expression of a soul in torment , furrowed , seamed , twisted -- a mask of mortal anguish . And once , when this one looked up and casually encountered Lanyard 's gaze , the adventurer was shocked to find himself staring into eyes like those of a dead man : eyes of a grey so light that at a little distance the colour of the irises blended indistinguishably with their whites , leaving visible only the round black points of pupils abnormally distended and staring , blank , fixed , passionless , beneath lashless lids .