They departed silently, awed by the menace of his countenance, but all the more bitterly fixed in their resentment.

That night two more hollow “chunks” shook the ground of Smyrna, at intervals an hour separated, and morning light showed that two isolated barns had been destroyed.

Mr. Luce appeared in the village with his sack, quite at his ease, and demanded of Broadway certain canned delicacies, his appetite seeming to have a finer edge to correspond with his rising courage.  He even hinted that Broadway’s stock was not very complete, and that some early strawberries might soften a few of the asperities of his nature.

“I ain’t never had a fair show on eatin’,” he complained to the apprehensive storekeeper.  “It’s been ten years that my wife ain’t got me a fair and square meal o’ vittles.  She don’t believe in cookin’ nothin’ ahead nor gettin’ up anything decent.  She’s a Go-upper and thinks the end of the world is li’ble to come any minit.  And the way I figger it, not havin’ vittles reg’lar has give me dyspepsy, and dyspepsy has made me cranky, and not safe to be squdged too fur.  And that’s the whole trouble.  I’ve got a hankerin’ for strorb’ries.  They may make me more supple.  P’raps not, but it’s wuth tryin’.”

He tossed the cans into his sack in a perfectly reckless manner, until Broadway was sick and hiccuping with fear.  “Love o’ Lordy,” he pleaded, “don’t act that way.  It’s apt to go off—­go off any time.  I know the stuff better’n you do—­I’ve dealt in it.  Ain’t I usin’ you square on goods?”

“Mebbe so,” admitted Mr. Luce.  “Fur’s you know, you are.  But the trouble with me is my disposition.  It ain’t been made supple yet.  If you’ve got in stock what my appetite craves I may be more supple next time I come.”

He dug a tender strip out of the centre of a hanging codfish, and walked out.  Parading his ease of spirits and contempt for humanity in general, he stood on the platform and gnawed at the fish and gazed serenely on the broken windows.

“I done it,” he mumbled, admiringly.  “I showed ’em!  It won’t take much more showin’, and then they’ll let me alone, and I’ll live happy ever after.  Wonder is I hadn’t reelized it before.  Tail up, and everybody stands to one side.  Tail down, and everybody is tryin’ to kick you.  If it wa’n’t for that streak in human nature them devilish trusts that I’ve heard tell of couldn’t live a minit.”  He saw men standing afar and staring at him apprehensively.  “That’s right, ding baste ye,” he said, musingly, “look up to me and keep your distance!  It don’t make no gre’t diff’runce how it’s done, so long as I can do it.”

And after further triumphant survey of the situation, he went away.

“Hiram,” said Cap’n Sproul, with decision, turning from a long survey of Mr. Luce’s retreating back through a broken window of the town house, “this thing has gone jest as far as it’s goin’.”

“Well,” declared the showman with some bitterness, “to have them that’s in authority stand round here and let one bow-legged lunatic blow up this whole town piecemeal ain’t in any ways satisfyin’ to the voters.  I hear the talk, and I’m givin’ it to you straight as a friend.”