There was a scraping of chairs, a hum of voices, that ascended immediately to a roar, and then a score of men began to shout crazily: "Mr. Chairman! Mr. Chairman!" Pusey had seated himself, he was as indifferent as ever. And Rankin could only stare at him in stupefaction. The Singed Cat alone was unmoved by the startling climax to all those withering days of heat and suspense. He hammered the desk with his gavel and said: "The convention--again--will be--in order. Let the roll-call proceed." And Hale called loudly amid the din that would not subside: "Tazewell?" The chairman of that delegation shouted: "Thirty votes for Garwood!" The staid old court room with all its traditions of the dignity of judicial proceedings was in an uproar. The whole convention was on its feet, everybody was calling: "Mr. Chairman." From without, men to whom had been borne by some occult transmission of intelligence the news of that, the final moment, crowded breathlessly into the room. The belief that the morning was cool had been a delusion. Now that the peace induced by universal harmony had been marred, men began to perspire, to grow red in the face; the atmosphere in an instant had become stifling. The Garwood men had begun to cheer. The Sprague men and perhaps the little group of Barrett's supporters, foiled in whatever their original purpose had been, realized that they were defeated, and they raged impotently. Hale was hurriedly casting up his easy sum, and when he handed the slip to Bailey his heart leaped with the thought that at last the Pekin post-office was his. The Singed Cat deliberately studied his figures, and his deliberation, with the power of the definite announcement that was pending, compelled a sudden quiet his gavel had theretofore been unable to invoke. And at last, in the suspense which was all fictitious, the product of the Anglo-Saxon mania for legal forms, he said: "Upon this ballot. General William M. Barrett--has received--twenty-four votes," it was seen that he was reversing the order for its effect, "Conrad Sprague--forty-eight, and Jerome B. Garwood--ninety-three. Mr. Garwood--having received--the necessary number--and a majority--of all--the votes--cast--is therefore--declared--to be--the nominee--of the convention--for Representative--in Congress--for the Thirteenth District--of Illinois--for the term--beginning--the fourth day--of March--ensuing." The strain was over, the long pent-up emotions of the seventy men who had stood solidly for Jerry Garwood, and now had won victory at last, broke forth, and they flung their hats into the air, tore off their coats to wave aloft, brandished chairs, and pounded one another on the back, yelling all the time. The followers of Sprague yelled no less excitedly, though their rage was that of defeat. Randolph strode to where Hale was sitting, his mouth stretched wide in a demented yell, and pounded the table with his fist, crying unceasingly: "Mr. Chairman! Mr. Chairman!"