eleven o'clock
The building was very full , -- and it was difficult to see where , if any strangers did arrive , they could be accommodated . Miss Eden , in her capacity as organist , was still playing the opening voluntary , but , despite the fact that there was no apparent disturbance of the usual order of things , there was a certain air of hushed expectancy among the people which was decidedly foreign to the normal atmosphere of St. Rest . The village lasses looked at each other 's hats with keener interest , -- the lads fidgeted with their ties and collars more strenuously , and secreted their caps more surreptitiously behind their legs , -- and the most placid-looking personage in the whole congregation was Josey Letherbarrow , who , in a very clean smock , with a small red rose in his buttonhole , and his silvery hair parted on either side and just touching his shoulders , sat restfully in his own special corner not far from the pulpit , leaning on his stick and listening with rapt attention to the fall and flow of the organ music as it swept round him in soft and ever decreasing eddies of sound . The bells ceased , and eleven o'clock struck slowly from the church tower . At the last stroke , the Reverend John entered the chancel in his plain white surplice , spotless as new-fallen snow,-and as he knelt for a moment in silent devotion , the voluntary ended with a grave , long , sustained chord . A pause , -- and then the ` Passon ' rose , and faced his little flock , his hand laid on the open ` Book of Common Prayer . ' `` When the wicked man turneth away from his wickedness that he hath committed and doeth that which is lawful and right , he shall save his soul alive . ''