a quarter to one
`` You must very often come and spend the day with us . '' Then they had driven down to the registry office , all four of them , and in a dark , rather dingy little room , a man with a curiously irritating voice had read aloud something to them from a book . Now they stood outside in the sunshine again , Mabel had kissed Joan , and Uncle John was blinking at her out of old eyes that showed a suspicion of tears in them . A big clock opposite told her the time was a quarter to one ; in an hour and three-quarters Dick would be gone . They had lunch in a little private room at a restaurant close to Victoria Station . Joan tried to eat , and tried to laugh and talk with the others , because Mabel had whispered to her on the way in : `` You 've got to help Dick through the next hour , it is n't going to be easy for him . '' And that had made Joan look at him with new eyes , and she could see that his face was very white , and that he seemed almost afraid to look at her .