eight o'clock
So , Lily , when she went home , found that her music failed her , all but the one strange little air , ` The river ran between them ; ' and then she left the harpsichord and went into the garden through the glass door , but the flowers had only half their interest , and the garden was solitary , and she felt restless , as if she were going to make a journey , or looking for strange news ; and then she bethought her again of Mrs. Colonel Stafford , that she might have by this time returned from Dublin , and there was some little interest about the good old lady , even in this , that she had just returned by the same road that he had gone away by , that she might have chanced to see him as he passed ; that at least she might happen to speak of him , and to know something of the likelihood of his return , or even to speculate about him ; for now any talk in which his name occurred was interesting , though she did not know it quite herself . So she went down to the King 's House , and did find old Mrs. Stafford at home : and after an entertaining gossip about some ` rich Nassau damask , ' at Haughton 's in the Coombe , that had taken her fancy mightily , and how she had chosen a set of new Nankeen plates and fine oblong dishes at the Music Hall , and how Peter Raby , the watchman , was executed yesterday morning , in web worsted breeches , for the murder of Mr. Thomas Fleming , of Thomas-street , she did come at last to mention Devereux : and she said that the colonel had received a letter from General Chattesworth , ` who by-the-bye , ' and then came a long parenthesis , very pleasant , you may be sure , for Lily to listen to ; and the general , it appeared , thought it most likely that Devereux would not return to Chapelizod , and the Royal Irish Artillery ; and then she went on to other subjects , and Lily staid a long time , thinking she might return to Devereux , but she did not mention him again . So home went little Lily more pensive than she came . It was near eight o'clock , when who should arrive at the door , and flutter the crows in the old elms with an energetic double knock , but Aunt Rebecca , accompanied by no less a personage than Dr. Toole in full costume , and attended by old Dominick , the footman . The doctor was a little bit ruffled and testy , for having received a summons from Belmont , he had attended in full blow , expecting to prescribe for Aunt Rebecca or Miss Gertrude , and found , instead , that he was in for a barren and benevolent walk of half a mile on the Inchicore road , with the energetic Miss Rebecca , to visit one of her felonious pensioners who lay sick in his rascally crib . It was not the first time that the jolly little doctor had been entrapped by the good lady into a purely philanthropic excursion of this kind . But he could not afford to mutiny , and vented his disgust in blisters and otherwise drastic treatment of the malingering scoundrels whom he served out after his kind for the trouble and indignity they cost him .