midnight
Midnight ; the music had ceased , and the yellow and scarlet lanterns had been plucked from the autumnal hangings . The laughing , smiling , dancing women , like so many Cinderellas , had disappeared , and with them the sparkle of jewels ; and the gallant officers had ridden away to the jingle of bit and spur . Throughout the courtly revel all faces had revealed , besides the happiness and lightness of spirit , a suppressed eagerness for something yet to come , an event surpassing any they had yet known . Promptly at midnight Madame herself had dropped the curtains on the gay scene because she had urgent need of all her military household at dawn , when a picture , far different from that which had just been painted , was to be limned on the broad canvas of her dreams . Darkness and quiet had fallen on the castle , and the gray moon film lay on terrace and turret and tile . In the guardroom , Maurice , his hands and feet still in pressing cords , dozed in his chair . He had ceased to combat drowsiness .