It used to be that if you drove your own Rolls-Royce Phantom, people would assume that you either couldn’t afford a chauffeur or had sacked him for some unforgiveable indiscretion of a rather personal and domestic nature possibly leading to divorce or, worse still, marriage. Not so the smaller but much lither 2010 Ghost, which Rolls-Royce pitched as the most driver-orientated car it had ever made. True, smaller is a relative term when you’re describing a 216.6-inch long car that still offers sumptuous limousine comfort and gentleman’s club accommodation that is very nearly as spacious as the Phantom’s, should you wish to sit in the rear. This is a car that spans both realms—the choice is yours. Something that may have an influence on that is the performance. Powered by a 536 HP twin-turbo direct-injection 6.6L V12, courtesy of Rolls-Royce’s parent company BMW, the Ghost hits 60 MPH in 4.7 seconds on the way to a limited 155 MPH—enough said. Another factor is the interior, which is more intimate and cossetting in feel compared with the Phantom’s plutocrat bluster. If we started on the detail of the natural grain leather and lustrous handcrafted veneers, we’d run out of space. It’s better simply to say, as car connoisseur Jeremy Clarkson wrote: “It really is noticeably better inside than anything from Mercedes, Audi or Jaguar. It is therefore worth the extra outlay.” And that’s the point. In 2010, when this fine 28,200-mile Ghost was made, its base price was $247,000, though in reality, most examples sold in the U.S. were optioned to $300,000 or more, approaching three-quarters of the Phantom. On the other hand the Ghost was nearly twice the money of parent company BMW’s flagship 7 Series. It had to justify that, and it did. This Ghost, with its satin silver hood that evokes the legendary Silver Ghost of 1906—which famously completed a 15,000-mile endurance run, including 27 trips between London and Glasgow—most certainly goes that extra mile.