ten o'clock
`` How long before we get there ? '' we anxiously asked . `` I have miscalculated , '' said the conductor ; `` we can not get there till five minutes of ten o'clock . '' `` My dear man , '' I cried , `` you might as well turn round and go back ; the audience will be gone long before ten o'clock . '' `` No ! '' said the conductor ; `` at the last depot I got a telegram saying they are waiting patiently , and telling us to hurry on . '' The locomotive seemed to feel it was on the home stretch .