At this, Hobbs, stricken with mortal terror, and oblivious of the girls who gathered around him, lost his head. There was no escape downstairs, but opposite his desk was a grated iron window that led on to an adjoining roof. Noting it desperately, he heaved up his soft body and made a plunge for safety. But such was his bulk that, though head, arms and shoulders went through, he stuck there, anchored in an iron grip. "Help!" he called chokingly, "Help!" The mob looked up and stared, when from the rear ranks came a bull-like roar of laughter. Then another burst out and another, till from the ground spouted a fountain of jeers, hoots and ridicule that reached the fat man as he hung suspended, with purple face and gesticulating arms. Clark, in his office, waiting coolly for what might come, caught the change in the note of riot and, stepping into the next room, saw the legs of his comptroller brandished in the air. The rest of him was invisible, and still in the square outside rocked the booming shouts of Slavic and Scandinavian mirth. A moment later Hobbs was dragged back, with torn clothing, swollen neck and scratched body. Clark glanced at him contemptuously and went out. Then the doors opened, and he was on the front steps. The mob saw him and held its breath. Few of them had ever been so near him before. He stood with a quiet smile on his face and a light in his keen eyes, and, in the momentary hush, began to speak. There was no fear in voice or attitude. The wind, blowing from the rapids, brought the echo of their clamor to the upper windows so that the accounting staff heard not a word, but the mob heard, and presently the big Pole laughed, just as he had laughed at Hobbs' distorted face suspended above him. It was contagious, and Clark, playing upon the mood of the moment, drove home his point. The money was coming, and he himself would stay there till it came. In the meantime, the money would be slower to arrive if there was trouble, and that was all he had to say. There followed a little hesitation, then an indefinite movement, and the crowd began to shuffle toward the shattered gates. As it dwindled Clark glanced over his shoulder and saw a man within twenty feet, both hands thrust eloquently into his bulging coat pockets. "Thanks very much, Belding, I'm glad it wasn't necessary," he said crisply, and vanished inside the big doors.