a quarter past one
The light of his candle cast a flickering halo around him -- but did not penetrate the gloomy distance . He at last halted before his door , gave a scrutinizing glance around the embayed recess , and opened the door half expectantly . But the room was empty as he had left it . It was a quarter past one . He threw himself on the bed without undressing , and fixed his eyes alternately on the door and his watch . Perhaps the unwonted seriousness of his attitude struck him , but a sudden sense of the preposterousness of the whole situation , of his solemnly ridiculous acceptance of a series of mere coincidences as a foregone conclusion , overcame him , and he laughed . But in the same breath he stopped .