about seven at night
He reflected pathetically over his ambitious designs for the future ; he should not now become the hero and spokesman of his native place of Bangor , Maine ; he should not , as he had fondly anticipated , move on from office to office , from honour to honour ; he might as well divest himself at once of all hope of being acclaimed President of the United States , and leaving behind him a statue , in the worst possible style of art , to adorn the Capitol at Washington . Here he was , chained to a dead Englishman doubled up inside a Saratoga trunk ; whom he must get rid of , or perish from the rolls of national glory ! I should be afraid to chronicle the language employed by this young man to the Doctor , to the murdered man , to Madame Zéphyrine , to the boots of the hotel , to the Prince 's servants , and , in a word , to all who had been ever so remotely connected with his horrible misfortune . He slunk down to dinner about seven at night ; but the yellow coffee-room appalled him , the eyes of the other diners seemed to rest on his with suspicion , and his mind remained upstairs with the Saratoga trunk . When the waiter came to offer him cheese , his nerves were already so much on edge that he leaped half-way out of his chair and upset the remainder of a pint of ale upon the table-cloth . The fellow offered to show him to the smoking-room when he had done ; and although he would have much preferred to return at once to his perilous treasure , he had not the courage to refuse , and was shown downstairs to the black , gas-lit cellar , which formed , and possibly still forms , the divan of the Craven Hotel . Two very sad betting men were playing billiards , attended by a moist , consumptive marker ; and for the moment Silas imagined that these were the only occupants of the apartment .