about midnight
`` There 's less danger than in the water , I think . '' Bill , Tom and Washington arranged to stand the night watch , and , when the professor had examined the engines and given orders about keeping the ship on her course through the air , he retired to his bunk . Jack and Mark soon followed . It must have been about midnight when Mark was awakened by a movement that seemed to come from the storeroom next to where his sleeping place was located . At first he thought he had been dreaming , but , as he found he was wide awake , he knew it was no imagination that had affected him . `` I certainly heard something , '' he said to himself . `` It sounded just as it did the other night .