it that militia
business at once, and if he don't, he won't be the only one to suffer."

[Illustration: "WHO THREATENS MY SON AND MY PEOPLE?" DEMANDED OLD
WALLACE.]

"Who is that?" demanded old Wallace, stepping promptly out from his
front door. "Who threatens my son or my people?"

The stranger had stepped away into the shade of an ailantus-tree before
he answered. Jim Wallace stood in moody silence, confused by his
father's sudden appearance, and ashamed that such menace as this against
him and his should have been spoken without instant rebuke. "What I said
was meant in all friendship to you and yours, Mr. Wallace. You don't
know me, but I know you," said the stranger; with marked foreign accent,
but in civil tone. "I want to avert trouble from your roof if I can, and
therefore told Jim to get Fred out of that tin-soldier connection. No
son of yours ought to be used in the intimidation of honest workingmen
who only seek their rights, and if he is wise he'll quit it now and at
once."

"No son of mine shall be intimidated from doing a sworn duty by any such
threats as yours," said Wallace, with rising wrath; "and if that's the
game you play I'm ashamed to think that son of mine has had anything to
do with you. Who are you, anyway? What do you mean by coming round
'intimidating honest workingmen,' as you say, at this hour of the night?
You're no trainman. Man and boy I've known the hands on this road nearly
forty years, and I never thought to see the day when rank outsiders
could come in and turn them against one another as you have. Who are
you, I say?"

"Never mind who I am, Mr. Wallace. I speak what I know, and my voice is
that of ten thousand working--or more than working--_thinking_ men. If
you're wise you'll see to it that this is the last time your boy carries
orders to his fellows to turn out against us, for that's what he has
done. If you _don't_, somebody may have to do it for you."

"That isn't all!" shouted the old Scotchman, as the other turned away,
"and you hear this here and now. My voice is that of ten million
law-abiding people, high and low, rich and poor, and it says my boys
shall stand by their duty, the one to his employers, the other to his
regiment, you and your threats to the contrary notwithstanding. You
haven't struck, have you, Jim?" he asked, turning in deep anxiety to his
silent, crestfallen son.

And for all answer Jim simply shrugged his broad shoulders and made a
deprecatory ges