nine
at night
One day in his second week the detective met him in a nook of the stairs , on his descent , and told him sternly that next time he 'd be reported to Mr. Macy . Dalyrimple felt like an errant schoolboy . Unpleasant facts came to his knowledge . There were `` cave-dwellers '' in the basement who had worked there for ten or fifteen years at sixty dollars a month , rolling barrels and carrying boxes through damp , cement-walled corridors , lost in that echoing half-darkness between seven and five-thirty and , like himself , compelled several times a month to work until nine at night . At the end of a month he stood in line and received forty dollars . He pawned a cigarette-case and a pair of field-glasses and managed to live -- to eat , sleep , and smoke . It was , however , a narrow scrape ; as the ways and means of economy were a closed book to him and the second month brought no increase , he voiced his alarm .