Slowly the minutes passed, until an hour had gone by, and it began to be whispered about that the company dared not run any cars. Still the men waited, and the crowd waited too. But at last some grew weary of inaction, and when Steel proposed that they spend the time barricading the tracks, his suggestion met with a quick response.
From a neighbouring street the men brought Belgian blocks and piled them on the track. They pulled down tree boxes and broke off branches of trees, and when an ice wagon came along they took possession of the huge blocks of ice and capped their barricade with these.
Suddenly the doors of the car-house were thrown open, and a car rolled slowly out.
There was an instant of breathless silence, followed by a roar like that of a thousand savage beasts, as the strikers saw that new men were running the car, and that it carried half a score of policemen, armed to the teeth.
As it approached the barricade some of the officers sprang off and began to throw down the obstructions, the others standing ready to fire upon the mob if necessary. The crowd showered bitter words and taunts upon the officers, but did not venture to molest them. The motorman stood with his hand on the lever, ready to start the car the moment the track should be clear. Carrots, with a pack of street Arabs at his heels, jeered at the new motorman, climbing up on the car and taunting him, until, at last, his patience was exhausted, and he suddenly lifted his foot and kicked one of the boys off the car. The boy fell heavily to the ground, and instantly the shrill voice of Carrots was uplifted, crying frantically,
"He's killed Billy Green! He's killed Billy Green! Pitch in to him, boys! Pitch into him!"
Billy Green was already picking himself up, with no worse injury than a cut in his cheek, but the mob took up the cry, and,
"Pitch into him! Pitch into him! Kill him! Kill him!" was shouted by hundreds of savage voices as the crowd pressed about the car. They tried to drag the motorman off, in spite of the guards, they smashed the car windows, they tore out the cushions, they beat the policemen, and wrenched their clubs out of their hands. Finally several of the officers drew their pistols and fired into the air.
At this the crowd fell back for a second, and the turmoil of shouts and cries that had been deafening a moment before, died away in sudden silence--a threatening, dangerous silence as of a wild beast about to spring.
Into this instant of silence broke a new cry from the outskirts of the crowd.