eight o'clock
After dinner Smithson and Montesma sat on deck , smoking their cigars , and lazily watching the lights on sea , and the lights on shore ; these brilliant in the foreground , those dim in the distance . ` You can telegraph to your Rio Janeiro friend to-morrow morning , if you like , ' said Smithson , presently , ` and tell him to send a first-rate skipper and crew . Lady Lesbia has made up her mind to see St. Malo Regatta , and with such a sacred charge I ca n't be too careful . ' ` I 'll wire before eight o'clock to-morrow , ' answered Montesma , ` You have decided wisely . Your respectable English Wilkinson is an excellent man -- but nothing would surprise me less than his reducing your _ Cayman _ to matchwood in the next gale . ' That strange scene in the old house at Fellside made a profound impression upon Lord Hartfield . He tried to disguise his trouble , and did all in his power to seem gay and at perfect ease in his wife 's company ; but his mind was full of anxiety , and Mary loved him too well to be for a moment in doubt as to his feelings .