midnight
Bulldog John had gone on doggedly courting , and butterfly Lane had taken to seeing too much convivial company in Heydon Hey and Castle Barfield , and there was a fear in Bertha 's mind that if her influence had not been permanent , it had at least started the young man on a track likely to prove disastrous . These emotional people , quick to feel and quick to forget , are hardly to be dealt with without danger . Lane 's dissipations must have been graver than even rumour gave them discredit for being . His midnight junketings had made a ghost of him , and to see him at any moment when he thought himself unobserved was to wonder how long such a mournful and broken young gentleman could possibly rouse himself to fill the part of King even in a rustic Bohemia . Autumn was on the land . The corn-shocks were standing in the stubbled fields , and the night air was full of gossamer , which twined itself about the faces of all wayfarers . Rural work had gone on merrily all day , and when the sun set silence fell , and darkness like a warm shroud .