half after twelve
His heavy eyelids drooped ; slumber 's drowsy vestments trailed lazily athwart the sea of consciousness ... . A slight noise startled him , either the shutting of the door to Stateroom 27 , or the sound of the book dropping from his relaxed grasp . He sat up and consulted his watch . The hour was half after twelve . The ship 's bell sounded remotely a single , doleful stroke . He might have dozed five minutes or fifteen -- long enough at least to leave its tantalising effect of sleep desperately desirable , mockingly elusive , almost grasped , whisked beyond grasping . And with this he was aware of something even less tangible , a sense of something amiss , of something vaguely wrong , as of an evil spirit stalking furtively through the darkened labyrinth of the ship ... as impalpable and ineluctable as miasmic exhalations of a morass ... .