If you are a member of the governing classes of this great Empire it is not an easy thing to approach a house between the Edgware Road and Hyde Park from the North, at half-past nine in the morning it is supremely difficult if you are making for Westminster.
It presupposes being carted at an impossible hour to some place in the North West, and there let loose and making a run for home. And why should any man of position be carted to any place in the North West at dawn? On the whole the best excuse is Paddington Station. Eton is a good place to come from, for the liar comes in at Paddington. It was from Eton, therefore, that the Prime Minister came that morning ... anyhow he was N.W. of the Park before nine. He walked slowly towards the Marble Arch. As he approached Charles Repton’s house he walked somewhat more slowly, but he had timed himself well.
The tall straight figure came out and hailed a cab.
The Prime Minister crossed before him, turned round in amiable surprise, and said: “My dear Repton!”
And Repton greeted, with somewhat less effusion, the Prime Minister.
“I was walking from Paddington,” said the Prime Minister.
“Have you eaten?” said Sir Charles, as he paid the cabman a shilling for nothing.
“Yes, I breakfasted before I started. I was walking down to Westminster. Can’t you come with me?”
Sir Charles found it perfectly easy, and the two men walked through the Park together towards Hyde Park Corner and Constitution Hill.