Noon had come, and was pouring its heat into the court room. The committees having been chosen, the convention could do nothing more until they reported. Bailey therefore said: "What is--the _further_--pleasure--of the convention?" And Rankin arose. "Mr. Chairman," he said, "I move that we take a recess until two o'clock." Bailey put the motion and of course it carried. And then he said: "And the convention--stands adjourned--until two o'clock this afternoon--at which hour--the riot--will be--resumed." His gavel fell. As he was descending from the platform, Rankin rushed heavily toward him, and at the same instant, Randolph also started for him. Before Rankin could congratulate him, Randolph was talking. "Look here, Zeph, and you, too, Jim," he began in that curious inofficial tone which men use when their relations become personal again, "we demand a vote on this permanent organization business. We ain't going to be shut out altogether." "Don't like my presiding, eh?" asked Bailey. "Oh, I'd like it all right if it was on my side," Randolph laughed, "but we demand a vote." "Oh, you'll get a vote, Hal," Rankin remarked, "all the vote you want 'fore you're through--eh, Zeph?" "I always aim to treat every one fairly," answered Bailey. Randolph looked at him, "Aw, come off!" he said, helplessly. XI The convention assembled at two o'clock, though with the only conspicuous deliberation that our deliberative bodies display, it was half-past two before Judge Bailey brought it to order by a crack of his gavel. The sun had seemed to hang still on the meridian. The white cloud that had mounded itself on the horizon in the early morning had slowly and majestically inflated all the day, until it covered the whole of the western sky, where it flashed in the focalized rays of the sun. Far down at the base of the pile of cloud, an ominous blackness was spreading, so that the farmers of the various delegations, trudging along the sidewalks toward the court house, with their waistcoats unfastened and their coats on their arms, prophesied rain, and, drawn out of the differences of factional feeling into the brotherhood of husbandry, they welcomed it with reciprocal felicitations for the common good it would do their corn. When they reached the court house, the heat was stifling; the day seemed to stand still with the sun, and the air they breathed fairly scorched their nostrils. The report of the committee on credentials was received; there were no contests. The report of the committee on resolutions was read, and the platform, in the wider partisanship that momentarily swallowed up factionalism, applauded. And then Jim Rankin read the report of the committee on permanent organization. The report recommended that the temporary organization be made permanent.