He had had to do with her, years back, at the Board of Trade, and knew her for what she was, extremely dirty, and getting abominably thin just where he would have liked her plump.

Yet, as he lighted a cigar, there came to him a queer feeling--as if he were in the presence of a woman he was fond of.
"I hope to God," he thought, "nothing'll come of these scares!" The car glided on into the long road, swarming with traffic, towards the fashionable heart of London.

Outside stationers' shops, however, the posters of evening papers were of no reassuring order.
'THE PLOT THICKENS.' 'MORE REVELATIONS.' 'GRAVE SITUATION THREATENED.' And before each poster could be seen a little eddy in the stream of the passers-by--formed by persons glancing at the news, and disengaging themselves, to press on again.

The Earl of Valleys caught himself wondering what they thought of it! What was passing behind those pale rounds of flesh turned towards the posters?
Did they think at all, these men and women in the street?
What was their attitude towards this vaguely threatened cataclysm?
Face after face, stolid and apathetic, expressed nothing, no active desire, certainly no enthusiasm, hardly any dread.

Poor devils! The thing, after all, was no more within their control than it was within the power of ants to stop the ruination of their ant-heap by some passing boy! It was no doubt quite true, that the people had never had much voice in the making of war.