five in
the afternoon
Near the water-taps , in the pale light falling through the gratings , they came upon the blocks ; and there they remained in rapture watching the tripe men , who , in aprons stiffened by gory splashings , broke the sheep 's heads one after another with a blow of their mallets . They lingered there for hours , waiting till all the baskets were empty , fascinated by the crackling of the bones , unable to tear themselves away till all was over . Sometimes an attendant passed behind them , cleansing the cellar with a hose ; floods of water rushed out with a sluice-like roar , but although the violence of the discharge actually ate away the surface of the flagstones , it was powerless to remove the ruddy stains and stench of blood . Cadine and Marjolin were sure of meeting Claude between four and five in the afternoon at the wholesale auction of the bullocks ' lights . He was always there amidst the tripe dealers ' carts backed up against the kerb-stones and the blue-bloused , white-aproned men who jostled him and deafened his ears by their loud bids . But he never felt their elbows ; he stood in a sort of ecstatic trance before the huge hanging lights , and often told Cadine and Marjolin that there was no finer sight to be seen . The lights were of a soft rosy hue , gradually deepening and turning at the lower edges to a rich carmine ; and Claude compared them to watered satin , finding no other term to describe the soft silkiness of those flowing lengths of flesh which drooped in broad folds like ballet dancers ' skirts .