four o'clock
This , in the event , he but imperfectly achieved : he dropped into a chair in the great dim void of the club library , with nobody , up or down , to be seen , and there after a while , closing his eyes , recovered an hour of the sleep he had lost during the night . Before doing this indeed he had written -- it was the first thing he did -- a short note , which , in the Christmas desolation of the place , he had managed only with difficulty and doubt to commit to a messenger . He wished it carried by hand , and he was obliged , rather blindly , to trust the hand , as the messenger , for some reason , was unable to return with a gage of delivery . When at four o'clock he was face to face with Kate in Mrs. Condrip 's small drawing-room he found to his relief that his notification had reached her . She was expectant and to that extent prepared ; which simplified a little -- if a little , at the present pass , counted . Her conditions were vaguely vivid to him from the moment of his coming in , and vivid partly by their difference , a difference sharp and suggestive , from those in which he had hitherto constantly seen her . He had seen her but in places comparatively great ; in her aunt 's pompous house , under the high trees of Kensington and the storied ceilings of Venice .