four o’clock
-- But if you want satisfaction , I am ready for you , '' he added , glancing at a collection of small arms and foils stacked in a corner , the armory of the modern warrior . `` That was still further from my intention , sir . I have come to speak to the editor . '' `` Nobody is ever here before four o'clock . '' `` Look you here , Giroudeau , old chap , '' remarked a voice , `` I make it eleven columns ; eleven columns at five francs apiece is fifty-five francs , and I have only been paid forty ; so you owe me another fifteen francs , as I have been telling you . '' These words proceeded from a little weasel-face , pallid and semi-transparent as the half-boiled white of an egg ; two slits of eyes looked out of it , mild blue in tint , but appallingly malignant in expression ; and the owner , an insignificant young man , was completely hidden by the veteran 's opaque person . It was a blood-curdling voice , a sound between the mewing of a cat and the wheezy chokings of a hyena .