midnight
Sir Austin had as weak a digestion for wrath , as poor Hippias for a green duckling . Instead of eating it , it ate him . The wild beast in him was not the less deadly because it did not roar , and the devil in him not the less active because he resolved to do nothing . He sat at the springs of Richard 's future , in the forlorn dead-hush of his library there , hearing the cinders click in the extinguished fire , and that humming stillness in which one may fancy one hears the midnight Fates busily stirring their embryos . The lamp glowed mildly on the bust of Chatham . Toward morning a gentle knock fell at his door . Lady Blandish glided in .