five in the afternoon
`` Your leg is broken above the ankle ; you will not move these six weeks . Where do you suppose you are ? '' Till then I had no notion that it was five minutes since I went into the closet . When she told me the time , five in the afternoon , I groaned in the lowest depths . For , in my breast pocket in that innocent coat , which I could now see lying on the window-seat , were the duplicate despatches to Mr. Mason , for which , late the night before , I had got the Secretary 's signature . They were to go at ten that morning to Wilmington , by the Navy Department 's special messenger . I had taken them to insure care and certainty .