midnight
And a minute later she was not in the carriage , and a policeman near the lighted entrance of the club shouted in a detestable voice to Panteleimon : `` What are you stopping for , you crow ? Drive on . '' Startsev drove home , but soon afterwards returned . Attired in another man 's dress suit and a stiff white tie which kept sawing at his neck and trying to slip away from the collar , he was sitting at midnight in the club drawing-room , and was saying with enthusiasm to Ekaterina Ivanovna . `` Ah , how little people know who have never loved ! It seems to me that no one has ever yet written of love truly , and I doubt whether this tender , joyful , agonising feeling can be described , and any one who has once experienced it would not attempt to put it into words . What is the use of preliminaries and introductions ?