about one o'clock in the morning
Sophia took to the servant 's bedroom on the sixth floor . It measured nine feet by seven , and had no window save a skylight ; but Sophia was in a fair way to realize a profit of at least four pounds a week , after paying for everything . On the night when she installed herself in that chamber , amid a world of domestics and poor people , she worked very late , and the rays of her candles shot up intermittently through the skylight into a black heaven ; at intervals she flitted up and down the stairs with a candle . Unknown to her a crowd gradually formed opposite the house in the street , and at about one o'clock in the morning a file of soldiers woke the concierge and invaded the courtyard , and every window was suddenly populated with heads . Sophia was called upon to prove that she was not a spy signalling to the Prussians . Three quarters of an hour passed before her innocence was established and the staircases cleared of uniforms and dishevelled curiosity . The childish , impossible unreason of the suspicion against her completed in Sophia 's mind the ruin of the reputation of the French people as a sensible race .