Tom knew what company was gathered there: gamblers, truckmen, drunken farmers, men from the river steamers making riot while their boats lay at the wharf, with a motley gathering of good-for-nothings of the back-alleys, and tippling clerks from the Main Street stores.

There came loud cries for a song, and, in answer, the voice of Crailey rose over the general din, somewhat hoarse, and never so musical when he sang as when he spoke, yet so touching in its dramatic tenderness that soon the noise fell away, and the roisterers sat quietly to listen.

It was not the first time Ben Jonson's song had stilled a disreputable company.
"I sent thee late a rosy wreath, Not so much honoring thee, As giving it the hope that there It might not withered be." Perhaps, just then, Vanrevel would have wished to hear him sing anything in the world rather than that, for on Crailey's lips it carried too much meaning tonight, after the voice in the garden.

And Tom lingered no more near the betraying sliver of light beneath the door than he had by the gap in the hedge, but went steadily on his way.
Not far from the hotel he passed a small building brightly lighted and echoing with unusual clamors of industry: the office of the Rouen Journal.

The press was going, and Mr.Cummings's thin figure crossed and recrossed the windows, while his voice could be heard energetically bidding his assistants to "Look alive!" so that Tom imagined that something might have happened between the Nueces River and the Rio Grande; but he did not stop to ask the journalist, for he desired to behold the face of none of his friends until he had fought out some things within himself.