four in the afternoon
But in all Cally 's invisible collection , then or thenceforward , there was never a scene that she saw so vividly as this : herself standing silent by the newel-post in the wide hall ; her father , distinct and genial in the light through the open door , observing to Mr. V.V. that hard words buttered no parsnips , as the fellow said ; and V.V. , half-smiling at her over papa 's broad shoulder , and saying to her with his eyes that of course this was the way it was meant to be , all along . Her Last Day , in this History ; how she wakes with a Wonder in her Heart , has her Banquet laid at the Board of the Cooneys , dreams back over the Long Strange Year ; finally how she learns Something that not Everybody Knows : what it is like at the End of the World . A morning in October , and she had waked to fare forth and capture , by hook or by crook , the most eligible parti who was ever likely to swim into her ken . Another morning in October , and all her waking horizon seemed filled by the knowledge that , at half-past four in the afternoon , she would meet and talk of cheroot factories with a man so little eligible that he trusted the crows to bring his raiment . In the wide world was there another person whose life 's pendulum , in a twelvemonth , had swung so wildly far ? Eight o'clock now , by the little clock on the mantel : eight hours and a half to Mr. Pond 's meeting for workers at the old Dabney House . One need n't be an astronomer to calculate that .