between Edward's visit and the Steele's arrival, by which time Lucy had already received a letter from him addressed to Exeter. It's possible to work this out from clues JA provides in mentioning timescales eg last week, the next day, in November etc. Ellen Moody's calendar for S&S is a good source for this and you don't have to agree with her theory about which year it is to track the rough timescale between events as given by JA. Ellen Moody cites the evidence as pointing to 12 days between Edward leaving Longstaple and Mrs Jennings meeting Lucy in Exeter. (I wouldn't advise anyone looking at this if you are new to the book as there are spoilers in the evidence).

We don't know where Longstaple is other than near Plymouth, which is 40 miles from Exeter and was on a daily stage coach route. It almost doesn't matter how they managed it because JA tells us that they were in Longstaple with Edward and then fairly soon afterwards that they were in Exeter. To me that seems like 'hurrying'!