five o'clock
`` So 't is , so 't is , Seth , an ' it ai n't right an ' I know it . I ai n't a-goin ' ter do so no more ; now see ! '' And she bravely turned her back on the cradle and walked , head erect , toward the attic stairs . John came at five o'clock . He engulfed the little old man and the little old woman in a bearlike hug , and breezily demanded what they had been doing to themselves to make them look so forlorn . In the very next breath , however , he answered his own question , and declared it was because they had been living all cooped up alone so long -- so it was ; and that it was high time it was stopped , and that he had come to do it ! Whereupon the old man and the old woman smiled bravely and told each other what a good , good son they had , to be sure !