" When I heard Jone say trap my soul
lifted itself and I knew there was hope for us. The stiffness melted
right out of the landlady, and she began to look soft and gummy.
"If you want to take a drive in a four-in-hand coach, sir," she said,
"there's two or three of them starts every morning from Trafalgar
Square, and it's not too late now, sir, if you go over there
immediate."
"Go?" said Jone, throwing himself into a chair, "I said, order one to
come. Where I live that sort of vehicle comes to the door for its
passengers."
The woman looked at Jone with a venerative uplifting of her eyebrows.
"I can't say, sir, that a coach will come, but I'll send the boy. They
go to Dorking, and Seven Oaks, and Virginia Water--"
"I want to go to Virginia Water," said Jone, as quick as lightning.
"Now, then," said I, when the woman had gone, "what are you going to do
if the coach comes?"
"Go to Virginia Water in it," said Jone, "and when we come back we can
go to the hotel. I made a mistake, but I've got to stand by it or be
called a greenhorn."
I was in hopes the four-in-hand wouldn't come, but in less than ten
minutes there drove up to our door a four-horse coach which, not having
half enough passengers, was glad to come such a little ways to get some
more.
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