nine o'clock
`` Really and truly I do n't mind . I do n't care if my ear _ does _ ache . `` It 's my eyes is crying , not me . '' * * * * * At nine o'clock , when they were all sitting down to dinner , Nicky sent for his father and mother . Something had happened . Crackers , he said , had been going off in his ears , and they hurt most awfully . And when it had done cracking his earache had gone away .