about
midday
`` As he , Lord , who does not forget , has an account to settle with you and your servant , Light-in-Darkness , '' commented Harût in an unpleasant and suggestive tone . Then after we had taken a few measurements and Ragnall , who understands such matters , had drawn a rough sketch of the place in his pocket-book to serve as data for our proposed scheme of fortifications , we pursued our journey back to the town , where we had left all our stores and there were many things to be arranged . It proved to be quite a long ride , down the eastern slope of the mountain which was easy to negotiate , although like the rest of this strange hill it was covered with dense cedar forests that also seemed to me to have defensive possibilities . Reaching its foot at length we were obliged to make a detour by certain winding paths to avoid ground that was too rough for the camels , so that in the end we did not come to our own house in the Town of the Child till about midday . Glad enough were we to reach it , since all three of us were tired out with our terrible night journey and the anxious emotions that we had undergone . Indeed , after we had eaten we lay down and I rejoiced to see that , notwithstanding the state of mental excitement into which the discovery of his wife had plunged him , Ragnall was the first of us to fall asleep . About five o'clock we were awakened by a messenger from Harût , who requested our attendance on important business at a kind of meeting-house which stood at a little distance on an open place where the White Kendah bartered produce .