midnight
`` The town 's got you , Billy , '' said Jack . `` All right , '' said William . `` I 'm going to buy a cottage on Lake Ronkonkoma next summer . '' At midnight Jack raised his window and sat close to it . He caught his breath at what he saw , though he had seen and felt it a hundred times . Far below and around lay the city like a ragged purple dream . The irregular houses were like the broken exteriors of cliffs lining deep gulches and winding streams .