Five o'clock
I do n't know what the Senior Surgeon was trying to figure out . It was just four days later from a rolling , musty-cushioned hack that the Senior Surgeon disembarked at his own front gate . Even though a man likes home no better than he likes -- tea , few men would deny the soothing effect of home at the end of a long fussy railroad journey . Five o'clock , also , of a late June afternoon is a peculiarly wonderful time to be arriving home , -- especially if that home has a garden around it so that you are thereby not rushed precipitously upon the house itself , as upon a cup without a saucer , but can toy visually with the whole effect before you quench your thirst with the actual draught . Very , very deliberately , with his clumsy rod-case in one hand , and his heavy grip in the other , the Senior Surgeon started up the long , broad gravel path to the house . For a man walking as slow as he was , his heart was beating most extraordinarily fast . He was not accustomed to heart-palpitation .