ten o'clock
Reply . Helbeck , Bannisdale . '' The station-master stared at the message . It was , of course , long after hours , and Mr. Helbeck -- whose name he knew -- must have had considerable difficulty in sending the message from Marsland , where the station would have been shut before ten o'clock , after the arrival of the last train . Another click -- and the rattle of the signal outside . The express was at hand . He was not a man capable of much reasoning at short notice , and he had already drawn a number of unfavourable inferences from the conduct of the two people who had just been hanging about the station .