about nine o'clock
`` That 's right , '' said Dodds in the half-patronizing tone he had used all along . `` Be here directly after breakfast then , and you shall have first innings ; that 's a bargain . '' `` I wo n't forget , '' said Hal in a delighted tone . `` I expect I shall be up here about nine o'clock . '' It was a very melancholy little quartette that presently emerged from the bushes , and took its way home through the woods and the fields . `` I never should have believed it of Hal -- never ! '' said Helen , quite forgetting that she had always warned the others of what they might expect .