Four o'clock in the morning
In fact she had finally to take herself seriously to task about the folly of scaring herself to death about such a purely fanciful danger , before she could go to sleep . She woke hours after with a stifled scream , for her mother was standing in the door of the room , half dressed , the candle she held revealing a pale and frightened face , while the words Desire heard were : `` Quick , get up and dress , or you 'll be murdered in bed ! An army of Shayites is in the village . '' `` Four o'clock in the morning courage , '' that steadiness of nerve which is not shaken when , suddenly roused from the relaxation and soft languor of sleep , one is called to face pressing , deadly , and undreamed of peril in the weird and chilling hour before dawn , was described by Napoleon as a most rare quality among soldiers , and such being the case it is hardly to be looked for among women . With chattering teeth and random motions , half-distraught with incoherent terrors , Desire made a hasty , incomplete toilet in the dark of her freezing bedroom , and ran downstairs . In the living-room she found her mother and the smaller children with the negro servants and Keziah Pixley , the white domestic . Downstairs in the cellar her father and Jonathan were at work burying the silver and other valuables , that having been the first thought when a fugitive from the tavern where the rebels had first halted , brought the alarm .