Well—­” Here, by some chance, the recollection of a word of Dora’s flickered into his chaotic mind, and he had a brighter moment.  “My opponent said she proved all war is wrong—­or something like that, anyhow.  She said she proved it was wrong to fight, no matter what.  Well, if she wasn’t a girl, anybody that wanted to get her into a fight could prob’ly do it.”  He did not add that he would like to be the person to make the experiment (if Dora weren’t a girl), nor did the thought enter his mind until an hour or so later.  “Well,” he added, “I suppose there is little more to be said.”

He was so right, in regard to his own performance, at least, that, thereupon drying up utterly, he proceeded to stand, a speechless figure in the midst of a multitudinous silence, for an eternity lasting forty-five seconds.  He made a racking effort, and at the end of this epoch found words again.  “In making my argument in this debate, I would state that—­”

“Two minutes!” said the chairman.  “Refutation by the negative.  Miss D. Yocum.  Two minutes.”

“I waive them,” said Dora, primly.  “I submit that the affirmative has not refuted the argument of the negative.”

“Very well.”  With his gavel the chairman sharply tapped the desk before him, “The question is now before the house.  ’Resolved, that Germany is both morally and legally justified in her invasion of Belgium.’  All those in favour of the—­”

But here there was an interruption of a kind never before witnessed during any proceedings of the Lumen Society.  It came from neither of the debaters, who still remained standing at their desks until the vote settling their comparative merits in argument should be taken.  The interruption was from the rear row of seats along the wall, where sat new members of the society, freshmen not upon the program for the evening.  A loud voice was heard from this quarter, a loud but nasal voice, shrill as well as nasal, and full of a strange hot passion.  “Mr. Chairman!” it cried.  “Look-a-here, Mr. Chairman!  Mr. Chairman, I demand to be heard!  You gotta gimme my say, Mr. Chairman!  I’m a-gunna have my say!  You look-a-here, Mr. Chairman!”

Shocked by such a breach of order, and by the unseemly violence of the speaker, not only the chairman but everyone else looked there.  A short, strong figure was on its feet, gesticulating fiercely; and the head belonging to it was a large one with too much curly black hair, a flat, swarthy face, shiny and not immaculately shaven; there was an impression of ill-chosen clothes, too much fat red lip, too much tooth, too much eyeball.  Fred Mitchell, half-sorrowing, yet struggling to conceal tears of choked mirth over his roommate’s late exhibition, recognized this violent interrupter as one Linski, a fellow freshman who sat next to him in one of his classes.  “What’s that cuss up to?” Fred wondered, and so did others.  Linski showed them.

He pressed forward, shoving himself through the two rows in front of him till he emerged upon the green carpet of the open space, and as he came, he was cyclonic with words.