midnight
When the Major and Miss Lucy went to bed that night , he slipped out of the house and walked through the yard and across the pike , following the little creek half unconsciously toward the Deans ' , until he could see the light in Margaret 's window , and there he climbed the worm fence and sat leaning his head against one of the forked stakes with his hat in his lap . He would probably not see her again . He would send her word next morning to ask that he might , and he feared what the result of that word would be . Several times his longing eyes saw her shadow pass the curtain , and when her light was out , he closed his eyes and sat motionless -- how long he hardly knew ; but , when he sprang down , he was stiffened from the midnight chill and his unchanged posture . He went back to his room then , and wrote Margaret a letter and tore it up and went to bed . There was little sleep for him that night , and when the glimmer of morning brightened at his window , he rose listlessly , dipped his hot head in a bowl of water and stole out to the barn . His little mare whinnied a welcome as he opened the barn door .