The afternoon was begun. London was as it had been for days. The uneasiness and unrest which were now become the common incubus of its inhabitants neither grew nor lessened.
The afternoon papers were merely repetitions of former days. Great financial houses were tottering, rumours of wars were growing every hour, no country was at rest, no colony secure. Over the world lawlessness and rapine were holding horrid revel.
But, and long afterwards, this fact was noticed and commented on by the historians: on this especial winter's afternoon there was no ultra-alarming shock, speaking comparatively, to the general state of things.
In the pale winter sunshine men moved heavily about their business, the common burden was shared by all, but there was no loud trumpet note during those hours.
About four o'clock some carriages drove to Downing Street. In one sat Sir Michael Manichoe, Father Ripon, Harold Spence, and Basil Gortre.
In another was the English Consul at Jerusalem, who had arrived with Spence from the Holy City, Dr. Schmöulder from Berlin, and the Duke of Suffolk.
The carriages stopped at the house of the Prime Minister and the party entered.
Nothing occurred, visibly, for an hour, though urgent messages were passing over the telephone wires.
In an hour's time a cab came driving furiously down the Embankment, round by the new Scotland Yard and St. Stephen's Club, into Parliament Street.