ten o'clock
Something utterly remote from his ordinary life , something that had not waked for years , began faintly to stir in his soul , sending feelers abroad into his brain and heart , shaping queer thoughts and penetrating even into certain of his minor actions . Something exceedingly vital to himself , to his soul , hung in the balance . And , always when he returned to the inn about the hour of sunset , he saw the figures of the townsfolk stealing through the dusk from their shop doors , moving sentry-wise to and fro at the corners of the streets , yet always vanishing silently like shadows at his near approach . And as the inn invariably closed its doors at ten o'clock he had never yet found the opportunity he rather half-heartedly sought to see for himself what account the town could give of itself at night . '' -- _ à cause du sommeil et à cause des chats _ '' -- the words now rang in his ears more and more often , though still as yet without any definite meaning . Moreover , something made him sleep like the dead . It was , I think , on the fifth day -- though in this detail his story sometimes varied -- that he made a definite discovery which increased his alarm and brought him up to a rather sharp climax .