midnight
When they reached the spot , however , difficulties of every description presented themselves . First , there was the question of wood ; fortunately a laborer , who had been repairing the road , had gone home and left his wheelbarrow behind him ; Lapoulle quickly reduced it to fragments with the heel of his boot . Then there was no water to be had that was fit to drink ; the hot sunshine had dried up all the pools of rain-water . True there was a pump at the Tour a Glaire , but that was too far away , and besides it was never accessible before midnight ; the men forming in long lines with their bowls and porringers , only too happy when , after waiting for hours , they could escape from the jam with their supply of the precious fluid unspilled . As for the few wells in the neighborhood , they had been dry for the last two days , and the bucket brought up nothing save mud and slime . Their sole resource appeared to be the water of the Meuse , which was parted from them by the road . `` I 'll take the kettle and go and fill it , '' said Jean .