ten
o'clock
Flint 's two companies were making the best of their isolation , and found , as is not utterly uncommon , quite a few maids and matrons among the households of the absent soldiery quite willing to be consoled and comforted . There were bright lights , therefore , further along the edge of the steep , beyond those of the hospital , and the squeak of fiddle and drone of ` cello , mingled with the plaintive piping of the flute , were heard at intervals through the silence of the wintry night . No tramp of sentry broke the hush about the little rift between the heights -- the major holding that none was necessary where there were so many dogs . Most of the soldiers ' families had gone to the dance ; all of the younger children were asleep ; even the dogs were still , and so , when at ten o'clock Esther tiptoed from the children 's bedside and stood under the starlight , the murmur of the Platte was the only sound that reached her ears until , away over at the southwest gate the night guards began the long-drawn heralding of the hour . `` Ten o'clock and all 's well '' it went from post to post along the west and northward front , but when Number Six , at the quartermaster 's storehouse near the southeast corner , should have taken up the cry where it was dropped by Number Five , afar over near the flagstaff , there was unaccountable silence . Six did not utter a sound . Looking up from the level of `` Sudstown , '' as it had earlier been named , Esther could see the black bulk of the storehouse close to the edge of the plateau .