There was sudden hush in the big room. All men were gazing at the mounting masses that rolled into the heavens and blossomed bodefully over the wooded hills. Fat clouds of the smoke hung high and motionless. From the earth went up to them whirls and spirals and billowing discharges like smoke from noiseless artillery.
A man had climbed upon a window-sill of the hall in order to see more clearly.
"I tell you, boys," he shouted, "that's a racin' fire, and it's in that Jo Quacca slash! I, for one, have got a stand of buildin's in front of that fire."
He jumped down and started for the door. Several men followed him.
The chairman of the town committee began to shake a paper above his head.
"It's no time to be leaving a caucus," he pleaded. "We've fixed up a new call. We'll get down to business now."
"I know where my business is just this minute!" shouted the man who was leading the first volunteers. "And it ain't in politics."
The chairman tried to put a motion to adjourn, but at that moment the meeting-house bell began to clang its alarm.
"Save your property, you Jo Quacca fellows!" some one cried, and the crowd stampeded.
Thornton remained in his place in front of the rostrum. He noted who were running away. The deserters were the back-district voters—the opposition among whom his enemies had prevailed. The villagers remained. Here and there among them walked Talleyrand Sylvester. He was unobtrusive and he spoke low, but he was earnest.