Page:The gold brick (1910).djvu/274

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"Misther Chairman!" he yelled, "I challenge that vote!"

"Misther Chairman!" yelled Grogan, "a point of order! The gentleman isn't a member of the Fifth Ward delegation and can not challenge its vote!"

"The point of order is well taken," promptly ruled the chair. "The gentleman from the First Ward is out of order—he will take his seat."

Men were screaming, brandishing fists, waving hats, coats, anything, scraping chairs, pounding the floor with them. There were heavy, brutal oaths, and, here and there, the smack of a fist on a face. In the tumult, the five Simmons votes went to Conway. Muldoon was beating the table with his club and crying:

"Order! order! order!"

"To hell with order!" bawled some one from the First Ward delegation.

"On this ballot," Muldoon was calling, "there were sixty-nine votes cast; necessary to a choice, thirty-five. James P. Conway has received forty votes; John W. Underwood, twenty-nine, and George W. Simmons"—he paused, as if to decipher the vote—"none. James R. Conway, having re-