"What is?" asked Alf, still incredulous.
"Oh, there's a pleeceman in there, Alf," said the young woman, delightedly.
"Then there ain't much the matter," said Alf, his good temper restored by the consciousness of a ready wit. "They're 'andy enough when they ain't wanted to be, and when they are wanted——" He sought vainly for a means of elaborating his joke. "Now then, where yer shovin'?"
"Shovin' yerself," was the reply; "don't other people want to see same as what you do?"
"THE CROWD STRETCHED NEARLY ACROSS THE ROADWAY, IMPEDING THE TRAFFIC."
For the crowd had already begun to press behind, and, stretching nearly across the roadway, was impeding the traffic. One omnibus, indeed, which had stopped to set down a passenger, remained standing, and the inside passengers had crowded out upon the roof to see what was the matter. From the shops opposite came the assistants, and they stood in the doorways, asking in vain for explanations, which no one could give. Conjecture, however, was frequent; and a butcher's bookkeeper, being a man of action, went off to rouse the nearest fire station.
In a minute more, the nucleus formed by one errand boy on a carrier cycle had collected about it a solid mass, which completely stopped the omnibuses and cabs, and gathered volume and consistency from every wayfarer who came within its influence. Even the errand boy himself, impressed with the seriousness of the situation, was convinced of the nearness of tragedy, and was busily setting forth to those around him what he had seen.
"Stand back, can't you?" cried an officious man upon the outskirts of the crowd on the opposite pavement. "How ridiculously people do act in an emergency! What's the use of crowding round?"
His neighbours looked resentfully at him.