nine o’clock
Peter Ruff ate his luncheon alone , and understood . The afternoon wore on , and at night he traveled up to London . He knew better than to waste time by purposeless inquiries . Instead he took the nine o'clock train the next morning to Paris . It was a chamber of death into which he was ushered , dismal -- yet , of its sort , unique , marvelous . The room itself might have been the sleeping apartment of an empress -- lofty , with white paneled walls , adorned simply with gilded lines ; with high windows , closely curtained now , so that neither sound nor the light of day might penetrate into the room . In the middle of the apartment upon a canopy bedside , which had once adorned a king 's palace , lay Madame de Maupassim .