about three o'clock in the morning
And here once more , he thought , though it was no more than a guess -- yet he thought that already the running of chariot-wheels was audible -- the tumult of the hosts of God gathering about the camp of the saints -- he thought that already beyond the bars of the dark Gabriel set to his lips the trumpet of doom and heaven was astir . He might be wrong at this time , as others had been wrong at other times , but neither he nor they could be wrong for ever ; there must some day be an end to the patience of God , even though that patience sprang from the eternity of His nature . He stood up , as down the pale moonlit path a hundred yards away came a pale figure of one who rode , with a leather bag strapped to his girdle . It would be about three o'clock in the morning that the priest awoke in his little mud-walled room next to that of the Holy Father 's , and heard a footstep coming up the stairs . Last evening he had left his master as usual beginning to open the pile of letters arrived from Cardinal Corkran , and himself had gone straight to his bed and slept . He lay now a moment or two , still drowsy , listening to the pad of feet , and an instant later sat up abruptly , for a deliberate tap had sounded on the door . Again it came ; he sprang out of bed in his long night-tunic , drew it up hastily in his girdle , went to the door and opened it .