‘Come along up!’ said De Forest to the captives, ’Breakfast is quite ready.’

It appeared, however, that they did not wish to go.  They intended to remain in Chicago and make crowds.  They pointed out that De Forest’s proposal was gross invasion of privacy.

‘My dear fellow,’ said Pirolo to the most voluble of the leaders, ’you hurry, or your crowd that can’t be wrong will kill you!’

‘But that would be murder,’ answered the believer in crowds; and there was a roar of laughter from all sides that seemed to show the crisis had broken.

A woman stepped forward from the line of women, laughing, I protest, as merrily as any of the company.  One hand, of course, shaded her eyes, the other was at her throat.

‘Oh, they needn’t be afraid of being killed!’ she called.

‘Not in the least,’ said De Forest.  ’But don’t you think that, now the Board’s in charge, you might go home while we get these people away?’

‘I shall be home long before that.  It—­it has been rather a trying day.’

She stood up to her full height, dwarfing even De Forest’s six-foot-eight, and smiled, with eyes closed against the fierce light.

‘Yes, rather,’ said De Forest.  ’I’m afraid you feel the glare a little.  We’ll have the ship down.’

He motioned to the Pirolo to drop between us and the sun, and at the same time to loop-circuit the prisoners, who were a trifle unsteady.  We saw them stiffen to the current where they stood.  The woman’s voice went on, sweet and deep and unshaken: 

’I don’t suppose you men realise how much this—­this sort of thing means to a woman.  I’ve borne three.  We women don’t want our children given to Crowds.  It must be an inherited instinct.  Crowds make trouble.  They bring back the Old Days.  Hate, fear, blackmail, publicity, “The People”—­That!  That!  That!’ She pointed to the Statue, and the crowd growled once more.

‘Yes, if they are allowed to go on,’ said De Forest.  ’But this little affair—­’

’It means so much to us women that this—­this little affair should never happen again.  Of course, never’s a big word, but one feels so strongly that it is important to stop crowds at the very beginning.  Those creatures’—­she pointed with her left hand at the prisoners swaying like seaweed in a tideway as the circuit pulled them—­’those people have friends and wives and children in the city and elsewhere.  One doesn’t want anything done to them, you know.  It’s terrible to force a human being out of fifty or sixty years of good life.  I’m only forty myself. I know.  But, at the same time, one feels that an example should be made, because no price is too heavy to pay if—­if these people and all that they imply can be put an end to.  Do you quite understand, or would you be kind enough to tell your men to take the casing off the Statue?  It’s worth looking at.’

’I understand perfectly.  But I don’t think anybody here wants to see the Statue on an empty stomach.  Excuse me one moment.’  De Forest called up to the ship, ‘A flying loop ready on the port side, if you please.’  Then to the woman he said with some crispness, ’You might leave us a little discretion in the matter.’