"Go on, go on," said Troup nervously, "I hear someone moving."
"Ah-h-h!"
There was a wild yell from the crowd, and a hoarse roar from above. Hamilton and Troup looked up. Dr. Cooper's infuriated visage, surrounded by a large frill, projected from his bedroom window. "Don't listen to him," he shrieked, thrusting his finger at Hamilton. "He's crazy! He's crazy!"
"The old fool," fumed Troup, "he thinks you're taking your just revenge.
If I could get inside—"
Dr. Cooper was jerked back by a friendly hand and the window slammed. "Someone understands," whispered Troup, excitedly; "and they'll have him out in two minutes. Go on, for heaven's sake."
Hamilton, who had been tearful with laughter, began again:—
"I appeal to you, my friends, am I crazy?" Indignant shouts of "No! No!" "Then let me, I pray, make a few remarks on the possibility of holding New York against the advancing fleet, that you can testify to my sanity to-morrow, and save me from whatever unhappy fate this irascible gentleman has in store for me."
"Go ahead! Go ahead!" cried someone in the mob. "We won't let him touch you."
And again Hamilton harangued them, until Troup slipped round to the rear of the big building and returned with word that Dr. Cooper was safely over the back fence and on his way to the Asia. When Hamilton announced the flight, there was muttering, but more laughter, for the mob was in a better humour than when it came.
"Well, that silver tongue of yours did the old man a good turn to-night, but you shan't make fools of us again." And a few days later, when Alexander attempted to head off the same mob as it made for the press of Rivington, the Tory printer, they would not listen to him. But the effort raised him still higher in the estimation of the patriots, for they saw that his love of law and order was as great as his passion for war.