She had forgotten all about the time.
It was Gleave who opened the door, Gleave the bald-headed manservant who had grown old along with his master with the same resentfulness--the ex-prizefighter, sailor, lumberman and adventurer who had thrown in his lot with Cumberland Ludlow, the sportsman, when both were in the full flush of middle age.

His limp, the result of an epoch-making fight in an Australian mining camp, was emphasized by severe rheumatism, and the fretfulness of old age was heightened by his shortness of breath.
He got no further than: "Your grandfather--" "I know," said Joan.

"I'm late again.

And there'll be a row, I suppose.
Well, that will break the monotony, at any rate." Seizing the moment when Gleave was wrestling with his cough, she slipped her letter into her desk, rubbed her face vigorously with her handkerchief and made a dart at the door.

Grandfather Ludlow demanded strict punctuality and made the house shake if it failed him.