three o'clock in the morning
`` Betty , did you call me ? '' Polly O'Neill inquired , turning over sleepily and trying to pierce the darkness so as to get a view of her companion . Now that she was coming to her senses , she could feel Betty 's body straining close up against her own and her lips almost touching her ear . It was between two and three o'clock in the morning and the two friends had been sleeping together in Betty Ashton 's old-fashioned four-post bed , hung with blue curtains that opened only for a space of several feet in the center of the two sides . The room was dark and cold , for there was no light burning and the sky outside held the blackness that often precedes the dawn . A window was open , letting in sudden gusts of freezing air . `` You are n't ill , are you ? ''