noon
Why had they not answered with a shout of triumph ? His somber mind refused to believe that they would not rise . Even now he was sure they were mobilizing in a sheltered mountain gorge . Before noon he would hear the roar of their coming and see the terror-stricken faces of the whites fleeing before their rush . He had repeated to his Northern crowds the fable of negro suffering in the South until he believed the lie himself . He believed it with every beat of his stern Puritan heart . And he had repeated and shouted it until the gathering Abolitionist mob believed it as a message from God .