nine o'clock
Peter Ruff ate his luncheon alone and understood . The afternoon wore on , and at night he travelled 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 , marvellous . The room itself might have been the sleeping apartment of an Empress -- lofty , with white panelled 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 bedstead which had once adorned a king 's palace , lay Madame de Maupassim .