Even old Marsh began to have suspicions that maybe he had been a trifle too “brash,” as he called it in the privacy of his soul, and he pulled himself together and started toward Tracy with invitation in his eyes; but Tracy warned him off with a gesture which was quite positive and eloquent.  Then followed the stillest quarter of an hour which had ever been known in that house at that time of day.  It was so still, and so solemn withal, that when somebody’s cup slipped from his fingers and landed in his plate the shock made people start, and the sharp sound seemed as indecorous there and as out of place as if a coffin and mourners were imminent and being waited for.  And at last when Brady’s feet came clattering down the stairs the sacrilege seemed unbearable.  Everybody rose softly and turned toward the door, where stood Tracy; then with a common impulse, moved a step or two in that direction, and stopped.  While they gazed, young Brady arrived, panting, and put into Tracy’s hand,—­sure enough—­an envelope.  Tracy fastened a bland victorious eye upon the gazers, and kept it there till one by one they dropped their eyes, vanquished and embarrassed.  Then he tore open the telegram and glanced at its message.  The yellow paper fell from his fingers and fluttered to the floor, and his face turned white.  There was nothing there but one word—­

“Thanks.”

The humorist of the house, the tall, raw-boned Billy Nash, caulker from the navy yard, was standing in the rear of the crowd.  In the midst of the pathetic silence that was now brooding over the place and moving some few hearts there toward compassion, he began to whimper, then he put his handkerchief to his eyes and buried his face in the neck of the bashfulest young fellow in the company, a navy-yard blacksmith, shrieked “Oh, pappy, how could you!” and began to bawl like a teething baby, if one may imagine a baby with the energy and the devastating voice of a jackass.

So perfect was that imitation of a child’s cry, and so vast the scale of it and so ridiculous the aspect of the performer, that all gravity was swept from the place as if by a hurricane, and almost everybody there joined in the crash of laughter provoked by the exhibition.  Then the small mob began to take its revenge—­revenge for the discomfort and apprehension it had brought upon itself by its own too rash freshness of a little while before.  It guyed its poor victim, baited him, worried him, as dogs do with a cornered cat.  The victim answered back with defiances and challenges which included everybody, and which only gave the sport new spirit and variety; but when he changed his tactics and began to single out individuals and invite them by name, the fun lost its funniness and the interest of the show died out, along with the noise.

Finally Marsh was about to take an innings, but Barrow said: 

“Never mind, now—­leave him alone.  You’ve no account with him but a money account.  I’ll take care of that myself.”