Above the tilted hats of the gathering a cloud of smoke drifted in thin, gray currents along the low ceiling, following the drafts that puffed aimlessly whenever the outer door opened, and let the cool night air rush in with its sane and sanitary freshness. Over all, as though a part of the low hanging cloud of smoke, as though an element of the feculent atmosphere, hung almost palpably the mass of oaths and epithets, disjointed words and empty phrases that were poured out in a mad débâcle by all those excited voices. To this were added the scrape and shuffle of boots, moving unsteadily on the floor, and the click of glasses as these men pledged anew a cause which by all the defiance of their angry tones was evidently lost. In the midst of them all, with his broad back leaning against the rail that guarded the bar, was Garwood himself. His rumpled shirt was open at the throat, his cravat was gone, his soiled cuffs had come unlinked and he fittingly portrayed in his whole appearance the utter rout and demoralization which had that day overtaken his political faction. His eyes blazed now with the confused emotions that ran riot in his soul, and now they lost all their luster and seemed to be set in a filmy stare, until their swollen lids fell heavily over them, to be raised again only by an effort. He had laid his hat down on the bar, where its brim, flattening to the walnut surface, was soaking up the liquor that had been spilled from an overturned glass. In a strange whim of his disordered mind he had commanded every one to let the hat lie where it was, and they had all obeyed, with the seriousness of drinking men. And there it reposed, all its grace and expression gone, strangely typifying the wreck of its wearer's fortunes. As Garwood stood there, his black hair matted to his brow, his cheeks and chin blue with a long day's growth of the stubble of his beard, he suddenly flung over his shoulder a peremptory order to Steisfloss to fill the glasses again, and when the saloon-keeper pushed the tall bottle toward him, he turned half around and splashed a drink out of it with an unsteady hand. Then holding the little tumbler in a precarious grasp, he faced about again and with elbows resting on the bar behind him, he broke forth in a thick voice: