about three o'clock
He was like a beautiful spotted snake that was often caught menacing something precious , but you could put him down anywhere after punishment or imprisonment and he would slide on his same slippery way and still be a spotted , deadly snake . When Gardley left the camp that Monday morning following the walk home with Margaret from the Sabbath service , he fully intended to be back at the school-house Monday by the time the afternoon rehearsal began . His plans were so laid that he thought relays from other camps were to guard the suspected ground for the next three days and he could be free . It had been a part of the information that Forsythe had given the stranger that Gardley would likely pass a certain lonely crossing of the trail at about three o'clock that afternoon , and , had that arrangement been carried out , the men who lay in wait for him would doubtless have been pleased to have their plans mature so easily ; but they would not have been pleased long , for Gardley 's men were so near at hand at that time , watching that very spot with eyes and ears and long-distance glasses , that their chief would soon have been rescued and the captors be themselves the captured . But the men from the farther camp , called `` Lone Fox '' men , did not arrive on time , perhaps through some misunderstanding , and Gardley and Kemp and their men had to do double time . At last , later in the afternoon , Gardley volunteered to go to Lone Fox and bring back the men . As he rode his thoughts were of Margaret , and he was seeing again the look of gladness in her eyes when she found he had not gone yesterday ; feeling again the thrill of her hands in his , the trust of her smile !