five o'clock
What did it matter whether he were confirmed or not ? What did anything matter except to get through the next year and be finished with Haverton House ? He was more sullen than ever during the week , but on Saturday he had the satisfaction of bowling Mr. Palmer in the first innings of a match and in the second innings of hitting him on the jaw with a rising ball . The next day he rose at five o'clock on a glorious morning in early June and walked rapidly away from Slowbridge . By ten o'clock he had reached a country of rolling beech-woods , and turning aside from the high road he wandered over the bare nutbrown soil that gave the glossy leaves high above a green unparagoned , a green so lambent that the glimpses of the sky beyond seemed opaque as turquoises amongst it . In quick succession Mark saw a squirrel , a woodpecker , and a jay , creatures so perfectly expressive of the place , that they appeared to him more like visions than natural objects ; and when they were gone he stood with beating heart in silence as if in a moment the trees should fly like woodpeckers , the sky flash and flutter its blue like a jay 's wing , and the very earth leap like a squirrel for his amazement . Presently he came to an open space where the young bracken was springing round a pool .