three o'clock
`` They understand that there will be one here in a day or two if we need it , '' said Browne with a sly grin . `` That 's the bluff we 've worked . '' He looked around for his wife , and , finding that she had gone inside , politely waved his hand to the Englishman and followed . At three o'clock , Britt returned with the recalcitrant servants -- or at least the `` pick '' of them , as he termed the score he had chosen from the hundred or more . He seemed to have an Aladdin-like effect over the horde . It did not appear to depress him in the least that from among the personal effects of more than one peeped the ominous blade of a kris , or the clutch of a great revolver . He waved his hand and snapped his fingers and they herded into the servants ' wing , from which in a twinkling they emerged ready to take up their old duties .