four o'clock
Taken himself off , most likely ! ... I expect he was one of those lawyer 's clerks -- confound them ! A nice fool I should have looked if his Honour , Justice Hubert , had said he would receive him ! '' With this reflection the messenger went back to his newspaper , not without having ascertained that it was four o'clock , and therefore he had still an hour to wait before he could have his coffee and cigar at the `` Men of the Robe . '' * * * * * Through the great windows of the Court of Assizes , carefully closed as they were , not a ray of moonlight filtered into the court room . And this obscurity lent an added terror to a silence as profound as the grave , a silence which , with the falling shades of night , assumed possession of the vast hall , where so many criminals had listened to the fatal sentence -- the sentence of death . * * * * * When the Court had risen , the assistants had , as usual , proceeded to put the place in order ; then the police sergeant had made his rounds , and had gone away , double locking the doors behind him .