Britt took down the shield.  He displayed a countenance of bland satisfaction.  “I don’t think I’ll be allowed to do it,” he retorted, answering jest with jest.  “You know what women are when they see a good-looking house needing a mistress.”  He rolled the paper up carefully.  “And now, talking of something sensible, I hope you’re going to turn out in good numbers when that contractor begins to hire.  And pass the word!”

Nobody showed much enthusiasm.  One man with a querulous mouth suggested:  “It will seem like helping waste money, tearing down a stand of buildings that ain’t in any ways due to be scrapped; I ain’t sure but what it will seem like a worse waste of money, building a palace in a town like this.  Don’t you expect to be taxed like Sancho?”

“Until we get some kind of legislation or court action to make our town acts legal, the taxation question isn’t worrying me much,” said Britt, grimly.  “I’ll take my chances along with the rest of you on getting an act allowing us to compound with creditors.”

“Probably can be arranged,” said a man with the malice against the usurer that prevailed in the oppressed town.  “We’re sending a good man to the next legislature.”

But Britt, in that new mood of his, was refusing to be baited.  He began to look about.  “Where is that person who calls himself a Prophet?”

The others joined with Britt in making a survey of the landscape.  Nobody had been paying any attention to Elias, whose voice had been stilled since the one-sided affair with Britt.

“There he is,” announced a man.

The Prophet was patrolling.  He was marching to and fro in front of Britt’s house.  Then he walked in through a gap in Britt’s fence and went to the house and peered in at one of the windows.  He had lowered and folded his big umbrella and carried it under his arm.

“I call on all of you to note what he did then,” called Britt.  “He has been doing that lately.”

The Prophet returned to the road.  Then he seemed to be attacked by another idea.  He went back through the gap in the fence and peered in at another window.

“I repeat, he has been doing that.  I was getting ready to take proper measures to handle him.  Something better than talking back to a lunatic!  But I didn’t reckon I’d have such good luck as this!  Twelve men right here for my witnesses!  Look hard at him, men!”

They did look, though they did not comprehend what Britt’s excited insistence signified.  He pulled out a notebook and pencil and handed it to the nearest man.  “Mark down two!  Mark it down—­and all of you take due notice.”

The Prophet returned to the highway and came slowly pacing along toward the group.

“All of you saw, did you?  All of you ready to bear witness?” demanded the magnate.