a quarter to nine
In a very , very quiet way , quite under the rose , so to speak , Mr. Hegner sometimes went in for small money-lending transactions . He would give loans on jewellery , and even on `` curios '' and good furniture ; always , however , in connection with an account which had , maybe , run a little too long -- never as a separate transaction . The old-fashioned chain of 18-carat gold , which he had just hung with a joking word round his pretty wife 's slender neck , had been the outcome of one of these minor activities . It was now a quarter to nine ; and suddenly there came the sound of loud , rather impatient knocking on the locked and barred front door of the shop . A frown gathered over Mr. Hegner 's face ; it transformed his good-looking , generally genial , countenance into something which was , for the moment , very disagreeable . `` What can that be ? '' he said to his wife .