In Chapter 8 of Lord of the Flies, as Jack challenges Ralph's leadership, he asks the boys to vote against Ralph. But "the silence continued, breathless and heavy and full of shame."
In answer to this uncomfortable silence, Jack says, "all right then." He lays the conch down as "humiliating tears run down his cheek":
'I'm not going to play any longer. Not with you....I'm not going to be a part of Ralph's lot--....I'm going off by myself.
As he blunders out of the triangle, Jack turns and glances back at Ralph:
For a moment he paused and then cried out, high-pitched, enraged. "--No!"
Jack recalls the first time he contended for leadership. In Chapter 1 as he and the choir marched up to where Piggy and Ralph were standing with the conch, Jack challenged Ralph then for the position of leader:
'Who wants Jack for chief?'
With dreary obedience the choir raised their hands.
'Who want me?" [Ralph]
Every hand outside the choir except Piggy's was raised immediately. Then, Piggy, too, raised his hand grudgingly into the air.
....Jack's face disappeared uder a blush of mortification.
Jack's scream of "--No!" is denial that he will be humiliated again. Instead Jack runs, returning to the hunters over whom he becomes chief of the hunters.
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