nine o'clock
Away down near the docks , a clock over a public house pointed to half past seven , and he judged it time to return . He came back . The Mile End Road was still deserted , the city round the bank was destitute of life , Fleet Street empty . Pompeii lay not more utterly dead than this weird city of vast business palaces , and the Strand shewed nothing of life or almost nothing , every shop was shuttered though now it was close upon nine o'clock . Something had happened to London , some blight had fallen on the inhabitants , death seemed everywhere , not seen but hinted at . Stray recollections of weird stories by H. G. Wells passed through the mind of Jones . He recalled the city of London when the Martians had done with it , that city of death , and horror , and sunlight and silence .