n the midst of a multitudinous silence, for an eternity lasting
forty-five seconds. He made a racking effort, and at the end of this
epoch found words again. "In making my argument in this debate, I would
state that--"

"Two minutes!" said the chairman. "Refutation by the negative. Miss D.
Yocum. Two minutes."

"I waive them," said Dora, primly. "I submit that the affirmative has
not refuted the argument of the negative."

"Very well." With his gavel the chairman sharply tapped the desk before
him, "The question is now before the house. 'Resolved, that Germany
is both morally and legally justified in her invasion of Belgium.' All
those in favour of the--"

But here there was an interruption of a kind never before witnessed
during any proceedings of the Lumen Society. It came from neither of
the debaters, who still remained standing at their desks until the
vote settling their comparative merits in argument should be taken. The
interruption was from the rear row of seats along the wall, where
sat new members of the society, freshmen not upon the program for the
evening. A loud voice was heard from this quarter, a loud but nasal
voice, shrill as well as nasal, and full of a strange hot passion. "Mr.
Chairman!" it cried. "Look-a-here, Mr. Chairman! Mr. Chairman, I demand
to be heard! You gotta gimme my say, Mr. Chairman! I'm a-gunna have my
_say_! You look-a-here, Mr. Chairman!"

Shocked by such a breach of order, and by the unseemly violence of the
speaker, not only the chairman but everyone else looked there. A short,
strong figure was on its feet, gesticulating fiercely; and the head
belonging to it was a large one with too much curly black hair, a flat,
swarthy face, shiny and not immaculately shaven; there was an impression
of ill-chosen clothes, too much fat red lip, too much tooth, too much
eyeball. Fred Mitchell, half-sorrowing, yet struggling to conceal tears
of choked mirth over his roommate's late exhibition, recognized this
violent interrupter as one Linski, a fellow freshman who sat next to him
in one of his classes. "What's _that_ cuss up to?" Fred wondered, and so
did others. Linski showed them.

He pressed forward, shoving himself through the two rows in front of him
till he emerged upon the green carpet of the open space, and as he came,
he was cyclonic with words.

"You don't put no such stuff as this over, I tell you!" he shouted in
his hot, nasal voice. "This here's a free country, and you call