nine o'clock
No other person with his forgiveness can mediate between you and yourself . Until you have been in such a fix , you ca n't imagine , perhaps , how curiously impertinent it sounds to hear talk about somebody else forgiving you for ruining yourself . It is like mocking . '' The nine o'clock bell pealed out from the mill tower . `` I am trespassing on your kindness , but I have only a few more words to say . The ancients had a beautiful fable about the water of Lethe , in which the soul that was bathed straightway forgot all that was sad and evil in its previous life ; the most stained , disgraced , and mournful of souls coming forth fresh , blithe , and bright as a baby 's . I suppose my absurd misunderstanding arose from a vague notion that the blood of Christ had in it something like this virtue of Lethe water .