midnight
Ten minutes were sufficient for a round of the different quarters . Eph was in none of them . The searchers returned to the furnace , and with them came Gerald Heath . `` I met Eph yonder where the paths cross , not a hundred yards from here , a little past midnight , '' Gerald said . `` He was terribly excited . That was after he had tried in vain to telegraph a crazy message . Evidently his delusion , that his whole life was condensed into a brief space , had driven him to a frenzy .