five o'clock in the evening
My companions were undoubtedly curious . Pamfilo said that I was going to meet my amica at Siena ; La Panormita supposed that I regretted some bouncing girl of Certaldo . But I was soaring now to such a height that I cared nothing . We entered the Porta Camollia at half-past five o'clock in the evening , and trailed up the steep Via di Citta , between houses like solemn cliffs , and in the midst of a throng which , in the dusk of that narrow pass , seemed like dense clouds , lit up by innumerable moons , to our lodging at an inn called Le Tre Donzelle . These moons I found out were the wide straw hats of the lovely daughters of Siena , sisters of Aurelia , companions of her maiden hours ! It made my heart jump into my throat to see in the doorway of the inn a girl of her own tender and buoyant shape , to hear her very tones , with that caressing fall which never failed to move me , and to see the quick turn of a crowned head exactly in her own manner . Before many hours were over I found myself stabbed more or less vividly by every young woman I met .