If punctuality is the virtue which the world paints it, then Lieutenant Deland was clearly not gifted with that quality, for on the afternoon of the next day the clock on the mantel in the Colonel's library had long ago struck three and was creeping steadily on in the direction of four, and still the lieutenant had not as yet appeared.
The Colonel's usually grave face was grim, and the light of that sudden hope which had made the night so sweet was slowly but gradually dying out of his eyes. His son could not rest a moment, and seemed unable to do anything but pace up and down the long room. Of a sudden came the sound of wheels on the gravel of the drive beneath their window. Both men looked eagerly toward the doorway, where there soon appeared a servant with the announcement that they were needed in the drawing-room.
"Thank God!" said young Digby with a sigh of relief. "The beggar's come at last, has he? All right, Blake, we're coming along at once."
But their hopes were doomed to disappointment for it was not the dapper lieutenant who awaited them, but Mr. Narkom, beaming genially upon them from the chair where he was seated near Mrs. Digby.
"I am sorry you've been kept waiting," he said as he shook hands. "It's all the fault of that idiot Deland. He couldn't make head or tail of the business so I took him off and put a new man on to the job—Mr. George Headland. I expect him down by the next train, and I thought if I could wait here——"
"Why, of course, Mr. Narkom," was the reply. "I didn't expect he would or could discover any solution; it's beyond everybody——"
"We'll give you some tea, Mr. Narkom," gushed Mrs. Digby. "Perhaps your new man will be as amusing as the lieutenant—such a nice boy."
So that was how, when at 4:30 the door opened to admit another arrival, Miss Smith, the children, and all the family were gathered around the tea table. It was, however, Lieutenant Deland who appeared and not the successor the Superintendent had announced.
"Headland couldn't come, Mr. Narkom, so I thought I'd come down and tell you that I was right," that gentleman remarked, casually.