five o'clock
Cicely Drane was terribly hard to settle . There was that girl , -- all the more dangerous because , being charming and little , a man would be more apt to treat her as a good comrade than if she were charming and tall , -- who was with him all the time . And how she would be with him , Dora 's imagination readily perceived , because she knew how she herself would be with him under the circumstances . Before breakfast in the dewy grass , gathering apples ; during work hours , talking through the open window as he chanced to pass ; after five o'clock , walks in the orchard , walks over the farm , in the woods everywhere , and always those two together , because there were four of them . How much worse it was that there were four of them ! And the evenings , moonlight , starlight ; on the piazza ; good-night on the stairs -- it was maddening to think of . But , nevertheless , she thought of it hour after hour , with no other result than to become more and more convinced that she was truly in love with a man who had never given any sign that he loved her , and that there was every reason to believe that when he gave a sign that he loved , it would be to another woman , and not to her .