six o'clock
Could n't she be sure , even if she had , that he would come early rather than late , and might n't she have left a message for him on the chance ? Going out that way a few minutes before he was to come had even a little the air of a thing done on purpose to offend him ; as if she had been so displeased that she had taken the nearest occasion of giving him a sign she meant to break with him . But were these the things Julia did and was that the way she did them -- his fine , proud , delicate , generous Julia ? When six o'clock came poor Nick felt distinctly resentful ; but he stayed ten minutes longer on the possibility that she would in the morning have understood him to mention that hour . The April dusk began to gather and the unsociability of her behaviour , especially if she were still rumbling round the Park , became absurd . Anecdotes came back to him , vaguely remembered , heard he could n't have said when or where , of poor artists for whom life had been rendered difficult by wives who would n't allow them the use of the living female model and who made scenes if they encountered on the staircase such sources of inspiration . These ladies struck him as vulgar and odious persons , with whom it seemed grotesque that Julia should have anything in common .