three o'clock
Thus accoutred , and walking with the confident tread of such a character , and with the supple freedom of a woman who had habitually walked in her girlhood , bare-foot and bare-legged , on the brown sea-sand , Madame Defarge took her way along the streets . Now , when the journey of the travelling coach , at that very moment waiting for the completion of its load , had been planned out last night , the difficulty of taking Miss Pross in it had much engaged Mr. Lorry 's attention . It was not merely desirable to avoid overloading the coach , but it was of the highest importance that the time occupied in examining it and its passengers , should be reduced to the utmost ; since their escape might depend on the saving of only a few seconds here and there . Finally , he had proposed , after anxious consideration , that Miss Pross and Jerry , who were at liberty to leave the city , should leave it at three o'clock in the lightest-wheeled conveyance known to that period . Unencumbered with luggage , they would soon overtake the coach , and , passing it and preceding it on the road , would order its horses in advance , and greatly facilitate its progress during the precious hours of the night , when delay was the most to be dreaded . Seeing in this arrangement the hope of rendering real service in that pressing emergency , Miss Pross hailed it with joy . She and Jerry had beheld the coach start , had known who it was that Solomon brought , had passed some ten minutes in tortures of suspense , and were now concluding their arrangements to follow the coach , even as Madame Defarge , taking her way through the streets , now drew nearer and nearer to the else-deserted lodging in which they held their consultation .