midnight
One appreciates sheets after months of pilgrimage , and one appreciates a good meal after having eaten nothing for a long while better than sand-goose roasted at the camp fire . More than the pleasure of the table was the pleasure of conversation with one speaking in his native language . Béclère 's mind interested him ; it was so steady , it looked towards one point always . That was his impression when he left his host after a talk lasting till midnight ; and , thinking of Béclère and his long journey to him , he sat by his window watching stars of extraordinary brilliancy , and breathing a fragrance rising from the tropical garden beneath him -- a fragrance which he recognised as that of roses ; and this set him thinking that it was the East that first cultivated roses ; and amid many memories of Persia and her poets , he threw himself into bed , longing for sleep , for a darkness which , in a few hours , would pass into a delicious consciousness of a garden under exquisite skies . His awakening was even more delightful than he anticipated . The fragrance that filled his room had a magic in it which he had never known before , and there was a murmur of doves in the palms and in the dovecot hanging above the dog-kennel . As he lay between sleeping and waking , a pair of pigeons flew past his window , their shadows falling across his bed .