seven o'clock
It was easy enough for _ her _ . She knew that her husband , a major-general , was safe behind the lines on the staff of a high command . She had fled from the ennui of a childless home to enter into the eventful life of the war hospital . The major 's wife had been sitting in the garden with the gentlemen ever since seven o'clock , always on the point of leaving , quite ready to go in her hat and jacket , but she let herself be induced again and again to remain a little longer . She kept up her flirtatious conversation in the gayest of spirits , as if she had no knowledge of all the torments she had seen during the day in the very house against which she was leaning her back . The sad little woman breathed a sigh of relief when it grew so dark that she could move away from the frivolous chatterbox unnoticed . And yet in spite of her titillating conversation and the air of importance with which she spoke of her duties as a nurse , the Frau Major was penetrated by a feeling that , without her being conscious of it , raised her high above herself .