eight
o'clock
The next morning there took place in a few hours a great change in the temperature . It moderated rapidly . The frost on the windows and the ice-ridges in the roads did not soften yet , since the sun was overcast by heavy clouds , but the terrible rigor and tension of the cold was relaxed , and men could breathe without constraint . At eight o'clock , when Jim Otis and Madelon started for Ware Centre , there was a white film of fallen snow over the distant hills and scattering flakes drove in advance of the storm . A mile out of Kingston it snowed hard . `` Had n't you better have that extra shawl mother put in over your shoulders ? '' Jim Otis suggested .