The seconds ticked into minutes, the air became stifling, for now the front of the gallery was packed.  Now, if ever, the fate of the Truro Franchise hung in the balance, and, perhaps, the rule of Jethro Bass.  And now, as in the distance, came a faint, indefinable stir, not yet to be identified by Wetherell’s ears as a sound, but registered somewhere in his brain as a warning note.  Bijah Bixby, as sensitive as he, straightened up to listen, and then the whispering was hushed.  The members below raised their heads, and some clutched the seats in front of them and looked up at the high windows.  Only the Speaker sat like a wax statue of himself, and glanced neither to the right nor to the left.

“Harkness of Truro,” said the clerk.

“He’s almost to Wells County again,” whispered Bijah, excitedly.  “I didn’t callate he could do it.  Will?”

“Yes?”

“Will—­you hear somethin’?”

A distant shout floated with the night breeze in at the windows; a man on the floor got to his feet and stood straining:  a commotion was going on at the back of the gallery, and a voice was heard crying out:—­

“For the love of God, let me through!”

Then Wetherell turned to see the crowd at the back parting a little, to see a desperate man in a gorgeous white necktie fighting his way toward the rail.  He wore no hat, his collar was wilted, and his normally ashen face had turned white.  And, strangest of all, clutched tightly in his hand was a pink ribbon.

“It’s Al Lovejoy,” said Bijah, laconically.

Unmindful of the awe-stricken stares he got from those about him when his identity became known, Mr. Lovejoy gained the rail and shoved aside a man who was actually making way for him.  Leaning far out, he scanned the house with inarticulate rage while the roll-call went monotonously on.  Some of the members looked up at him and laughed; others began to make frantic signs, indicative of helplessness; still others telegraphed him obvious advice about reenforcements which, if anything, increased his fury.  Mr. Bixby was now fanning himself with the blue handkerchief.

“I hear ’em!” he said, “I hear ’em, Will!”

And he did.  The unmistakable hum of the voices of many men and the sound of feet on stone flagging shook the silent night without.  The clerk read off the last name on the roll.

“Tompkins of Ulster.”

His assistant lost no time now.  A mistake would have been fatal, but he was an old hand.  Unmindful of the rumble on the wooden stairs below, Mr. Sutton took the list with an admirable deliberation.

“One hundred and twelve gentlemen have voted in the affirmative, forty-eight in the negative, the rules of the House are suspended, and” (the clerk having twice mumbled the title of the bill) “the question is:  Shall the bill pass?  As many as are of opinion that the bill pass will say Aye, contrary minded No.”

Feet were in the House corridor now, and voices rising there, and noises that must have been scuffling—­yes, and beating of door panels.  Almost every member was standing, and it seemed as if they were all shouting,—­“personal privilege,” “fraud,” “trickery,” “open the doors.”  Bijah was slowly squeezing the blood out of William Wetherell’s arm.