midday
But she liked to pretend that she was indistinguishable from the rest , and that when a wet day drove her to the Underground or omnibus , she gave and took her share of crowd and wet with clerks and typists and commercial men , and shared with them the serious business of winding-up the world to tick for another four-and-twenty hours . Thus thinking , on the particular morning in question , she made her away across Lincoln 's Inn Fields and up Kingsway , and so through Southampton Row until she reached her office in Russell Square . Now and then she would pause and look into the window of some bookseller or flower shop , where , at this early hour , the goods were being arranged , and empty gaps behind the plate glass revealed a state of undress . Mary felt kindly disposed towards the shopkeepers , and hoped that they would trick the midday public into purchasing , for at this hour of the morning she ranged herself entirely on the side of the shopkeepers and bank clerks , and regarded all who slept late and had money to spend as her enemy and natural prey . And directly she had crossed the road at Holborn , her thoughts all came naturally and regularly to roost upon her work , and she forgot that she was , properly speaking , an amateur worker , whose services were unpaid , and could hardly be said to wind the world up for its daily task , since the world , so far , had shown very little desire to take the boons which Mary 's society for woman 's suffrage had offered it . She was thinking all the way up Southampton Row of notepaper and foolscap , and how an economy in the use of paper might be effected -LRB- without , of course , hurting Mrs. Seal 's feelings -RRB- , for she was certain that the great organizers always pounce , to begin with , upon trifles like these , and build up their triumphant reforms upon a basis of absolute solidity ; and , without acknowledging it for a moment , Mary Datchet was determined to be a great organizer , and had already doomed her society to reconstruction of the most radical kind . Once or twice lately , it is true , she had started , broad awake , before turning into Russell Square , and denounced herself rather sharply for being already in a groove , capable , that is , of thinking the same thoughts every morning at the same hour , so that the chestnut-colored brick of the Russell Square houses had some curious connection with her thoughts about office economy , and served also as a sign that she should get into trim for meeting Mr. Clacton , or Mrs. Seal , or whoever might be beforehand with her at the office .