CHAPTER IX.
THE STORM "There's going to be war," said Benoit, on our doorsteps in July.
"No," said Crillon, who was there, too, "I know well enough there'll be war some day, seeing there's always been war after war since the world was a world, and therefore there'll be another; but just now--at once--a big job like that?
Nonsense! It's not true.

No." Some days went by, tranquilly, as days do.

Then the great story reappeared, increased and branched out in all directions.

Austria, Serbia, the ultimatum, Russia.

The notion of war was soon everywhere.
You could see it distracting men and slackening their pace in the going and coming of work.