Page:Chesterton - The Man Who Was Thursday.djvu/66

Rh been screaming for some time past; now there was a change in his accent, more shocking than any scream.

"I end all this!" he said, in a voice as heavy as stone. "This man cannot be elected. He is a——"

"Yes," said Syme, quite motionless, "what is he?" Gregory's mouth worked twice without sound; then slowly the blood began to crawl back into his dead face.

"He is a man quite inexperienced in our work," he said, and sat down abruptly.

Before he had done so, the long, lean man with the American beard was again upon his feet, and was repeating in a high American monotone—

"I beg to second the election of Comrade Syme."

"The amendment will, as usual, be put first," said Mr. Buttons, the chairman, with mechanical rapidity. "The question is that Comrade Syme——"

Gregory had again sprung to his feet, panting and passionate. Rh