eight o’clock
What is the breakfast hour ? '' `` Nine o'clock , '' replied Olbinett , mechanically . The stranger tried to pull out his watch to see the time ; but it was not till he had rummaged through the ninth pocket that he found it . `` Ah , well , '' he said , `` it is only eight o'clock at present . Fetch me a glass of sherry and a biscuit while I am waiting , for I am actually falling through sheer inanition . '' Olbinett heard him without understanding what he meant for the voluble stranger kept on talking incessantly , flying from one subject to another . `` The captain ?