Part 95

Other voices pot-shotted at him with the words, “Nelson Sinkler.”

“Will one man in this convention stand up and show himself so that I can talk to him face to face?” shouted the man at bay.

Detective Mullaney and Richard Dodd could not find seats. The others were sitting, and the two were marked men.

“Well, Dodd, you have been whispering. What have you to say aloud?” demanded the man they were baiting.

“I say your name is not Walker Farr.”

“You!” The tall young man darted a finger at Mullaney.

“I say you're Nelson Sinkler.”

“And what of him?”

“He is wanted by the state of Nebraska for murder.”

A sound that was mingled sigh and groan ran and throbbed from galleries to floor; it filled the great hall and seemed to vibrate back and forth over the assemblage. And for the long minute that the dreadful sound continued until it had breathed itself out into horrified silence the man who stood on the settee looked straight into the white face of the girl in the gallery.

But those of the throng who devoured him with eager stares could not discern one trace of confession on his countenance.

Then he did a strange thing.

He held his arms out toward Detective Mullaney and crossed them, wrist over wrist, and he smiled.

“If you are certain enough of your man to dare to arrest me, sir, I stand here waiting for the handcuffs.”

The detective hesitated, visibly embarrassed. He had been looking for confusion, confession by manner, even collapse.

“This is a put-up political job,” declared a delegate. “That's no murderer--that man.”

“I am waiting,” repeated Farr.

Detective Mullaney flushed. There were murmurs of hostility in the throng about him. He ran over swiftly in his mind the contents of his note-book and fortified his courage.

“I haven't secured a warrant yet--but I'll take your dare,” he announced. He started to come down the aisle.

“Just one moment,” called a stentorian voice in the gallery. “You're wrong, my man, down there. I don't want to see an innocent person disgraced in public nor an officer get himself into a scrape. That man is not Nelson Sinkler.”

“What are we running here--a state convention or a police court?” Colonel Dodd demanded, leaping up and grabbing the arm of the presiding officer. “Order all those men ejected from the hall.”

But at that moment the convention was not in the control of the chairman. Irregular as it all was, human nature demanded to be shown there and then.

Delegates arose, shouting, and surrounded Farr, making effectual bulwarks against Mullaney with their bodies. Voices asked the stranger in the gallery for information, and he motioned the vociferous mob into silence.

“I am a United States post-office inspector, and I can easily prove my identity, gentlemen. I'm here in this convention merely as a spectator, killing time till my train leaves. But I know Nelson Sinkler because I arrested him a month or so ago after he had been a fugitive for two years. He killed a mail clerk. He is now awaiting trial. If that man down there is arrested as being Nelson Sinkler it will mean a lot of trouble for somebody.” He sat down.

“Who are you?” yelled a chorus of the ring's henchmen. They pressed as near to Farr as his body-guard would permit and shook their fists at him.

“I am a man and not a spirit,” he said in the first silence--and silence came quickly, for they were eager to hear. “You can see that for yourselves. But just now I am less a man than a Voice.” He shouted that last word. “The Voice calls you to rebuke the kind of politics that has just been attempted here. You have seen, you have heard! Will you indorse it by your votes? Will you keep in power that gang that has attempted it in the desperation of defeat?”

“No,” the voices of men tumultuously replied.

Reckless and unjust attack had never tossed a more golden opportunity into a man's hands.