Green Park

Green Park is presented as a London public space where the threat of war takes physical form: workmen dig slit trenches in its ground while Hugh Legat watches the crisis gather around him. The park’s brief appearances connect preparations for possible attack with the unease of ordinary civilian life.

Setting and Wartime Preparation

From a dining room, Legat can see through thick plate glass to forty or fifty workmen digging slit trenches in Green Park. Some are stripped to the waist in the humid weather. The view brings an unmistakable act of civil defence into an otherwise enclosed, social setting: beyond the windows, the ground is being prepared for the possibility of danger.

Recurrence and Narrative Function

The workmen return in a later glimpse, swinging their picks in the park. That repeated image gives the preparation duration and weight; the trenches are not merely an idea but labor continuing in the city. Against the subdued dining room, where Legat keeps checking the entrance, the workers’ activity makes public anxiety visible. The park thus serves as a threshold between private routines and the approaching crisis, with ordinary urban ground turned into a practical response to the prospect of war.