five o’clock
She hired a pair of candelabra and ordered several additional dishes as a kind of substitute for the marquis . The table was laid in the yellow drawing-room , in order to impart more solemnity to the occasion . The Hotel de Provence had supplied the silver , the china , and the glass . The cloth had been laid ever since five o'clock in order that the guests on arriving might feast their eyes upon it . At either end of the table , on the white cloth , were bouquets of artificial roses , in porcelain vases gilded and painted with flowers . When the habitual guests of the yellow drawing-room were assembled there they could not conceal their admiration of the spectacle . Several gentlemen smiled with an air of embarrassment while they exchanged furtive glances , which clearly signified , `` These Rougons are mad , they are throwing their money out of the window . ''