The galleries hissed and cheered—the cheers at last drowning every hiss.
Stoneman pushed his way among the mob which surrounded the badgered Puritan as he attempted to retreat into the cloakroom.
“Will you vote?” he hissed, his eyes flashing poison.
“My conscience will not permit it,” he faltered.
“To hell with your conscience!” the old leader thundered. “Go back to your seat, ask the clerk to call your name, and vote, or by the living God I’ll read you out of the party to-night and brand you a snivelling coward, a copperhead, a renegade, and traitor!”
Trembling from head to foot, he staggered back to his seat, the cold sweat standing in beads on his forehead, and gasped:
“Call my name!”
The shrill voice of the clerk rang out in the stillness like the peal of a trumpet:
“Mr. Roman!”
And the deed was done.