nearly twelve
o’clock
The same witness had made a _ post-mortem _ examination of the body of Richard Johnson , and had then suspected the method by which he had been murdered . The murder itself , according to the theory of the prosecution , was committed in the following manner : Cranley , disguised as a sailor -LRB- the disguise in which he was finally taken -RRB- , had been in the habit of meeting Johnson , and being tattooed by him , in a private room of the _ Hit or Miss _ tavern , in Chelsea . On the night of February 7th , he met him there for the last time . He left the tavern late , at nearly twelve o'clock , telling the landlady that `` his friend , '' as he called Johnson , had fallen asleep upstairs . On closing the establishment , the landlady , Mrs. Gullick , found the room , an upper one , with dormer windows opening on the roof , empty . She concluded that Johnson -- or Shields , as she called him -- had wakened , and left the house by the back staircase , which led to a side-alley . This way Johnson , who knew the house well , often took , on leaving .