He knew that, away there to the north, P.
and O.steamers, Messageries Maritimes, and North German Lloyd liners were steadily churning the blue depths _en route_ to Japan or the Straits Settlements.

They carried hundreds of European passengers, men and women, even little children, who were far removed from the knowledge that tragedies such as this Dyak horror lay almost in their path.

People in London were just going to the theater.

He recalled the familiar jingle of the hansoms scampering along Piccadilly, the more stately pace of the private carriages crossing the Park.

Was it possible that in the world of today--the world of telegraphs and express trains, of the newspaper and the motor car--two inoffensive human beings could be done to death so shamefully and openly as would be the fate of Iris and himself if they fell into the hands of these savages! It was inconceivable, intolerable! But it was true! And then, by an odd trick of memory, his mind reverted, not to the Yorkshire manor he learnt to love as a boy, but to a little French inland town where he once passed a summer holiday intent on improving his knowledge of the language.