twenty minutes past eleven
By eleven , everybody in the house was asleep . It truly seemed as if the treacherous element knew there had arisen a grand opportunity for devastation . At a quarter past eleven a slight stealthy crackle made itself heard amid the increasing moans of the night wind ; the heap glowed brighter still , and burst into a flame ; the flame sank , another breeze entered it , sustained it , and it grew to be first continuous and weak , then continuous and strong . At twenty minutes past eleven a blast of wind carried an airy bit of ignited fern several yards forward , in a direction parallel to the houses and inn , and there deposited it on the ground . Five minutes later another puff of wind carried a similar piece to a distance of five-and-twenty yards , where it also was dropped softly on the ground . Still the wind did not blow in the direction of the houses , and even now to a casual observer they would have appeared safe . But Nature does few things directly .