ten o'clock
he added . `` I never thought I 'd live to take the whole human race in one load . There 's just room for five , as I remember it . Get your things on , and I 'll be ready at the door by ten o'clock . '' Sure enough , at the hour named , the car came purring and crackling from the yard with Lord John at the wheel . I took my seat beside him , while the lady , a useful little buffer state , was squeezed in between the two men of wrath at the back . Then Lord John released his brakes , slid his lever rapidly from first to third , and we sped off upon the strangest drive that ever human beings have taken since man first came upon the earth .