I excused myself and walked over to an open window at the back of the stage and looked down. It must have been forty feet to the stony street beneath. Then I went to a side window and threw up the sash. This window looked out on a roof ten or twelve feet below. I got a broken broom that stood in the corner and propped the window open. The thought of fire was upon me and I was inwardly planning what I would do in case of a stampede. I am always thinking about what I would do should this or that happen. Nothing can surprise me—not even death. If any of my best helpers should leave me, I have it all planned exactly whom I will put in their places. I have it arranged who will take my own place—my will is made and my body is to be cremated. “Cremated? Not tonight!” I said to myself, as I placed the broom under the sash. “If a panic occurs, the people will go out of the doors and I will stick to the stage until my coat-tails singe. I’ll say that the fire is in an adjoining building; then I’ll smilingly bow myself off the stage and gently drop out of that window.” “All ready when you are,” said Mr. Fass. I passed out on the stage before that vast sea of faces. It was a glorious sight. There was a row of military men from the French warship in the harbor, down in front; priests, and ladies with sparkling diamonds; a bishop wearing a purple vestment under his black gown sat to one side; a stout lady in decollete waved a feather fan in rhythmic, mystic motion, far back to the left. The audience applauded encouragingly, I wished I was back in that dear East Aurora. But I began. In a few minutes my heart ceased to thump and I knew we were off. I spoke for two hours, and I spoke well. I did not push the lecture in front of me, nor did I drag it behind. I got the chancery twist on it and carried it off big, as I do about one time in ten. I finished in a whirlwind of applause, with the bishop crying “Bravo!” and the fat lady with the fifty-dollar feather fan beaming approbation. Fass stood in the wings to congratulate me. ------------------------------------- I shook hands with a hundred. The house slowly emptied. I bade the genial Fass good-by. He took my hand in both of his. “You will come back! You must come back!” he said. He walked with me, bareheaded, to my carriage. He again pressed my hand. I rode to my hotel and went to bed, and to sleep. I was awakened by a bright glare of light that filled my room. I got up and looked at my watch. It was just midnight. Off to the East I saw red tongues of angry flame streaking the sky from horizon to zenith. “It is the Jewish Club, all right,” I said. I pulled down the blind and went back to bed. When I went down to breakfast at seven o’clock in the morning, I heard the newsboys in the streets crying, “All about the fire!” I bought a paper and read the headline, “Hubbard’s Lecture Hot Stuff!”