You've
got the muscle of a grizzly bear. I'm glad to be quit o' ye."

"It ain't a fair election, Abe," Samson laughed. "If you were rassling
for the right you could flop me. This little brush was nothing. Your
heart wasn't in it, and by thunder, Abe! when it comes to havin' fun
I rather guess we'd both do better to let each other alone."

"'Tain't exactly good amusement, not for us," Abe agreed.

It was growing dark. Ann Rutledge arrived on her pony, and called Abe
aside and told him that the raiders were in the village and were breaking
the windows of Radford's store because he had refused to sell them
liquor.

"Have they any guns with them?" Abe asked.

"No," Ann answered.

"Don't say anything about it," Abe cautioned her.

"Just go into the house with Sarah Traylor and sit down and have a good
visit. We'll look after the raiders."

Then Abe told Samson what was up. The men concealed themselves in some
bushes by the roadside while the minister sat close against an end of the
house with his blood hound beside him. Before they were settled in their
places they heard the regulators coming. The horses of the latter were
walking as they approached. Not a sound came from the men who rode them.
They proceeded to the grove just beyond the cabin and hitched their
horses. There were eight men in the party according to Abe's count as
they passed. The men, in concealment, hurried to the cabin and surrounded
it, crouched against the walls. In a moment they could see a big spot,
blacker than the darkness, moving toward them. It was the massed raiders.
They came on with the stealth of a cat nearing its prey. A lion-like roar
broke the silence. The blood hound leaped forward. The waiting men sprang
to their feet and charged. The raiders turned and ran, pell mell, in a
panic toward their horses. Suddenly the darkness seemed to fill with
moving figures. One of the fleeing men, whose coat tails the dog had
seized, was yelling for help. The minister rescued him and the dog went
on roaring after the others. When the New Salemites got to the edge of
the grove they could hear a number of regulators climbing into the tree
tops. Samson had a man in each hand; Abe had another, while Harry Needles
and Alexander Ferguson were in possession of the man whom the dog had
captured. The minister was out in the grove with his blood hound that was
barking and growling under a tree. Jack Kelso arrived with a lantern. One
of Samson's captives be