midnight
Those who came by way of the sewer had performed ablutions in the queer toilet room that once had been a secret vault for the storing of feudal plunder . What air there was came from the narrow ventilator that burrowed its ways up to the shop of William Spantz , or through the chimney-hole in the ceiling . Olga Platanova sat far down the side , a moody , inscrutable expression in her dark eyes . She sat silent and oppressed through all the acrid , bitter discussions which carried the conclave far past the midnight hour . In her heart she knew that these men and women were already thinking of her as a regicide . It was settled -- it was ordained . At Spantz 's right lounged Peter Brutus , a lawyer -- formerly secretary to the Iron Count and now his sole representative among these people .