a quarter past ten o'clock
Again and again our good father remonstrated with us in his mild way for our erratic behaviour and the continual interruption of his work which arose from it . At last , however , the tea was brought , and the tea was taken , the curtains were drawn , the lamps lit , and after another interminable interval the prayers were read and the servants dismissed to their rooms . My father compounded and swallowed his nightly jorum of toddy , and then shuffled off to his room , leaving the two of us in the parlour with our nerves in a tingle and our minds full of the most vague and yet terrible apprehensions . It was a quarter past ten o'clock by the parlour timepiece when my father went off to his room , and left Esther and myself together . We heard his slow steps dying away up the creaking staircase , until the distant slamming of a door announced that he had reached his sanctum . The simple oil lamp upon the table threw a weird , uncertain light over the old room , flickering upon the carved oak panelling , and casting strange , fantastic shadows from the high-elbowed , straight-backed furniture . My sister 's white , anxious face stood out in the obscurity with a startling exactness of profile like one of Rembrandt 's portraits .