AQUARTER OF A MILE south of the dogleg in the road where Roger Comstock had met Bob Shaftoe, the frontier of London could be discerned by the Wise in the Ways of Real Estate. The most infallible sign of which was that, here, the track leading to Black Mary’s Hole had been improved with a name, Coppice Row , devised to conjure forth, from the fevered brains of would-be buyers, phant’sies of a cozy and bucolic character, be they never so removed from Truth. Along Coppice Row, buildings were going up, or had gone up so recently that they were still redolent of the horse-hair mixed into their damp plaster. On the left side of the road, as one departed from London, the sprawl had been baffled for the time being by the stand of trees, and root-ball of ancient property-rights, surrounding Sir John Oldcastle’s. On the right were a few indifferent buildings, all made of red brick still warm from the kilns. These had shop-arcades facing the street, and flats above. The largest of these buildings commanded a frontage of some hundred feet, sliced into a dozen shop-fronts of various widths. Most were quite narrow, and most still wanted tenants.