nine o’clock in the evening
This belief that some soldiers were approaching was so general that the idles of the Cours Sauvaire repaired to the Nice road , in order to meet and hear the regimental band . But they returned at nightfall disappointed , having seen nothing ; and then a feeling of vague alarm began to disturb the townspeople . At the town-hall , the Provisional Commission had talked so much , without coming to any decision , that the members , whose stomachs were quite empty , began to feel alarmed again . Rougon dismissed them to dine , saying that they would meet afresh at nine o'clock in the evening . He was just about to leave the room himself , when Macquart awoke and began to pommel the door of his prison . He declared he was hungry , then asked what time it was , and when his brother had told him it was five o'clock , he feigned great astonishment , and muttered , with diabolical malice , that the insurgents had promised to return much earlier , and that they were very slow in coming to deliver him . Rougon , having ordered some food to be taken to him , went downstairs , quite worried by the earnestness with which the rascal spoke of the return of the insurgents .