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 and rising as if he would throw his window up and shout down to the menacing masses: "Here I am—answerable!"

"Better not, Mr. Boland," warned Scanlon soberly. "Better not—they're not themselves exactly. They're a bunch of Indians and they're getting worse. Better use the private exit and get away for an hour or two."

Scanlon's words were uttered in just the tone to carry conviction to a tenacious man who nevertheless believes in discretion. Mr. Boland fidgeted for a while, hating to show yellow and hating to be rash too. Eventually he took the Chief Fixer's advice; and it was well that he did, for thirty minutes later a geyser-burst of mad humanity roared up the stairway and streamed along the corridor into his private office, through doors which Oskison opened obsequiously and hastily, knowing that they would be battered down, if he did not.

Missing Old Two Blades, the mob took small vengeance on his property; disarranging, overturning, smashing and destroying, then rushing back downward to the street, leaving the upper purlieus of Boland General looking as if a herd of wild cattle had trampled through.